Britain needs a media that tells the truth, and reports accurately & fairly. We urgently need to address the crisis of poor quality journalism in the UK press: theguardian.com/media/2021/jan…
Hard to see how the UK press can win back the public's trust until standards of truth & accuracy are significantly improved pressgazette.co.uk/survey-finds-t…
The UK government is reportedly planning to install former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre as chair of the broadcasting regulator OFCOM. Some background: independent.co.uk/news/uk/politi… 1/
Polls have consistently shown that the UK public currently has a much higher level of trust in TV and radio media than they do in the UK newspaper industry, which has consistently been found to be the least trusted in Europe: pressgazette.co.uk/survey-finds-t… /2
The UK public's low level of trust in our newspaper industry should perhaps come as no surprise. In 2016 the Daily Mail and Sun were both called out for "fuelling prejudice" in an international report on rising racist violence: independent.co.uk/news/media/pre… /3
Did you know that the far-right have a strategy to "separate the T" from the rest of the LGBT community & isolate trans people from their allies? splcenter.org/hatewatch/2017…
Today's Telegraph carries an article suggesting that "transgenderism" poses an existential threat to lesbians:
The Dangerous Speech project highlights the danger of presenting a minority group as a "mortal threat". With trans people already facing sustained hostility from a number of UK media outlets, today's headline from the Telegraph has raised new concerns dangerousspeech.org/faq/?faq=200
The Morning Star has apologised for a cartoon which overtly dehumanised trans people. This had caused widespread concern at a time when anti-trans hate crime and hostility have been surging: morningstaronline.co.uk/article/apolog… /1
The Morning Star offers their apology on the basis that the cartoon was "offensive to trans people". Yet the primary reason many people are concerned about anti-LGBT hate is that it causes real harm in real people's lives - not simply that discrimination is "offensive". /2
Attacks such as this are not only "offensive to trans people" - when newspapers demonise and dehumanise the most marginalised groups within our society, everyone who supports human rights & opposes discrimination has a reason to be concerned. /3
Does the UK media have a racism problem? Some UK journalists seem outraged at the very suggestion – but what does the evidence tell us? /1 thedailybeast.com/daily-show-hos…
Way back in 2010, experts were warning that hostile UK media coverage was fuelling a rise in anti-Muslim hate crime: theguardian.com/uk/2010/jan/28… /2
As long ago as 2008, the award-winning journalist Nick Davies published a shocking exposé of systemic racism at the Daily Mail, in his book Flat Earth News:
Racism in the UK press has been so bad that the UN put out a statement condemning "decades of sustained & unrestrained anti-foreigner abuse, misinformation & distortion": ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/…#SayNoToRacism /1
It's no surprise that the UK has serious problems with racism when two of our biggest newspapers were condemned by the @CoE in a report on rising racist violence: independent.co.uk/news/media/pre…#SayNoToRacism /2
@coe In 2016, the UNHCR called out Britain's two biggest newspapers for their "unique" hostility towards migrants. It's no surprise that racism in the UK media fuels racism within wider society
One of the founding principles of #StopFundingHate is that if we have to oppose discrimination in all its forms - be that racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, misogyny, anti-Traveller hostility, disabilism, transphobia or other forms of anti-LGBTI hate 1/ crowdfunder.co.uk/build-the-figh…
Being a consumer gives each of us a voice - and everyone has the right to speak out & raise concerns with the companies we shop with if they advertise in media that fuel discrimination & hate /2 crowdfunder.co.uk/build-the-figh…
Media outlets are free to print what they like within the law. Equally, companies are free to choose where they do & don't advertise - and consumers are free to seek to influence those advertising choices /3 crowdfunder.co.uk/build-the-figh…