Polarisation of society

Casdon just feels as if the messenger is more important than the message?

What always puzzzles me is why the groups making the most noise for their views and principles to be respected seem to be the people with least respect for the views and principles of other people.

ronib

Casdon just feels as if the messenger is more important than the message?

Who to?

I doubt Obama feels that way.

He actually cares, and is using his situation to try and make a difference.

Wyllow3

Well I agree with him, and he made the speech knowing it would be covered world wide by the press and reach many many people - its pretty irrelevant to me how much it cost a select few to actually be there.

A quick google shows that Obama gives a great deal of his money to charity, too. Depends on his income at any given point, but over 20% on one recorded year.

Doesn't matter, to me, what he was paid. His message is valid.

MerylStreep

Caramme
So you’re all for free speech but not the Daily Mails opinion because doesn’t coincide with your opinion. Hilarious 😂

That's not exactly what Caremme said

Katie59

The polarization on the US is stark, there is no middle ground and the actively hate each other, the democrats are not especially liberal by our standards but are viewed as extremists by republicans.

Who would pay to listen to any political “has been” he’s yesterdays man.

Just because he's no longer POTUS does not make him yesterday's man.

I watched him give a eulogy at Simon Peres' funeral and he was impressive and dignified, something which few of our Tory PMs over the last 12 or 13 years have been (with the possible exception of T May)

We are polarised. Because the opposite of polarisation is union, and that would be a very dangerous thing for most governments - unless we were all united with them.

Isn't the status quo exactly maintained by division?

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As POTUS he had the power and changed what he could but he didn’t convince enough voters that that was the right way. They voted for the Obama personality, when his terms finished they elected Trump.

I admire Obama as much as anyone else on Gransnet, he had the power to change things, yesterday, certainly Murdoch has much more.

The Guardian 27 April 2020
Jill Abramson
BO has a powerful voice. He shouldn’t use it for paid speeches.

1 May 2017
Steven W. Thrasher
BO’s 400000 speaking fees reveal what few want to admit.
Interesting how public opinion has changed in the space of 6 years.

I don't know that all the blame for polarisation can be laid at Murdoch's door. Newspapers have always been read by people who supported certain political views. Telegraph readers never read the DailyWorker.

Glorianny

I don't know that all the blame for polarisation can be laid at Murdoch's door. Newspapers have always been read by people who supported certain political views. Telegraph readers never read the DailyWorker.

I agree with you, Glorianny. Newspapers have always tended to espouse one political view over the other. The Manchester Guardian was a radical paper in its day. So, longer ago, was the Times.

But did they tell as many lies, or distortions of the truth, as papers like the DM tell these days?

Look at Murdoch in the US admitting that Fox News supported the lie about Trump being 'cheated' out of the 2020 Presidency, with Murdoch's approval.

I recommend that people read the article varian linked to. This takes you straight to the whole article

www.allsides.com/news/2023-03-03-0649/media-industry-fox-news-republican-propaganda-according-rupert-murdoch

I am not sure I would lay the blame for polarisation at the foot of the press, I would say social media has a much greater impact than the legacy media.
You see it frequently. I cant believe you are quoting (insert vaguely controversial name) dont you know hes far right/fascist/far left, as if we have to agree with everything someone says in order to be able to 'hear' them.

I think the press has always reported matters according to their political viewpoints and the establishment requirements. The Peterloo Massacre is a standard example some of the first accurate reports were banned and confiscated.

Glorianny excellent starting point for your lecture tour… and your fee is?

But the fact that the press reports according to its political viewpoints doesn't mean that we have to agree with them.

I really resent the intellectual arrogance of people like Gloriananny who assume that everyone but them believes implicitly everything that is said to them by politicians or that they rea in newspapers or online.

Bear in mind that people who disagree with you may not be the stupid ones.

I don't think I have asked anyone to agree with me. You are quite entitled to your own views
Nor have I said anyone implicitly believes anything.
The discussion is about the ability of the press to report truthfully and accurately, how this polarises society and if it ia all Murdoch's fault. And much as I dislike him it's been going on longer than he has.

ronib

Glorianny excellent starting point for your lecture tour… and your fee is?

I'm much cheaper than BJ!!!!

MerylStreep

Caramme
So you’re all for free speech but not the Daily Mails opinion because doesn’t coincide with your opinion. Hilarious 😂

No because they are pushing racism, and have supported fascism forever.

Fleurpepper

MerylStreep

Caramme
So you’re all for free speech but not the Daily Mails opinion because doesn’t coincide with your opinion. Hilarious 😂

No because they are pushing racism, and have supported fascism forever.

Exactly. Fans of DM like to pretend the fascist perspective is in the past. Of course it isn't. It's the backbone of the paper. The lens which everything is seen through in the writing.

Glorianny what is 'the truth' that you keep talking about?

Glorianny
How true. My ex Husband only read the Sun for the Sport and racing pages and was a successful business man and voted Labour.
My now partner who hates newspapers with a deep and utter loathing so has never read one was a card carrying member of the Labour Party until Corbyn became leader.

How can someone hate newspapers if they have never read one??

The problem these days is more that we trust and believe almost no politicians. As for newspapers, they are all biased one way or another.

News papers all have an editorial biased agenda, it’s not about the truth, it’s what the reader wants to be told about, because that’s what sells.

Give the customer what they want - they don’t want to hear the truth.