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It's not disgareeing with me which makes anyone anything in particlaur it's disagreeing with the fact that NOT all the content of the tabloid media is lies. In fact a tiny proportion of it is and as I've already explained, that's not much different to what we find amongst politicians, police, office workers, TV presenters or anyone else.
There'll always be some who fall for garbage - what do you suggest can be done about that?
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I would say it's a lot bigger than a 'tiny proportion' that is a 'lie'. While I would say that only a few are complete fabrications (Muslims Banning Christmas in Luton) the vast majority are stories that are technically true but have been manipulated in terms of facts and language to meet the tabloid's own agenda and their readers prejudice.
For example; The Daily Express reported on the building of a Mega-Mosque inferring it would be funded by the taxpayer and was planned by the government. This led to the largest e-partition on the Downing Street website, was used by the BNP in their Mayoral election campaign and was picked by the Mail and some other tabloids. Problem is, some key facts were wrong. The government did NOT plan it, it would NOT have been funded by the taxpayer. This was an independent Muslim group who simply discussed the idea. The Express knew this but it made a far better story to portray it as PC gone mad.
Other examples include the moving of hospital beds to face Mecca (was not a new policy, was only if requested and most Muslims don’t, and was only if the nurse had time. None of this was mentioned in the tabloid press), A school banning Christmas cards (was because parents were request a list of students in their children’s classes, tabloids said it was not to offend Muslims), The government issued a report from a independent body saying migration had a negative effect on London (the report actually said the opposite, the mail just carefully selected lines from the report to meet their view), and many others.
You say that people can differentiate between truth and lies, how can you do that without reading multiple news sources and researching each issue? Look at the content of these forums and you will find many topics started based on a non-story like one of the ones above. It’s not about the intelligence of the reader, it’s about the manipulation of the reader, something than can be done on anyone.
This is important, and we should hold them to a higher standard because the media is our filter to the rest of the world. Politics, Crime, International Affairs, the media shows the entire world outside our limited scope to us and if the media itself is corrupt then our entire world view can be based on lies and fabrications. The danger of this is obvious, a populous which is angry about an issue can bring about changes in society’s/government’s approach to that issue, an issue which may be non-existent and changes which are detrimental to a group in society (It was Jews 60 years ago). If a politician lies, the media will call him on it. If the media lies, no opposition will be heard because the media controls who gets though to the mass population.
What can be done about it? Tougher Press commission, tougher penalties. If a story is proven or is highly suspected of being fabricated or mostly fabricated to change the meaning of the story then the paper is punished severely and has to include an apology and retraction on the front page. This would only be done if the commission finds the story was fabricated/misleading to meet an agenda and not if it was simply a journalistic error, which is an understandable occurrence. Most of our TV and Broadsheet press meet those standards, why not the tabloids as well?