Media Archives - Page 4 of 6

Brandon Straka has become something of a living meme since the US election of 2016. Like many Democrat voters and avid Clinton supporters, Straka was not only disappointed at the election result; he was also bewildered, angry and afraid. As an openly gay man, Straka was convinced that the US had taken a sharp turn towards state sponsored oppression and bigotry. Like hundreds of thousands of others, he believed that he was in great danger following the 2016 electoral upset.

Prior to the election, Straka was pretty much a run-of the mill, box ticking American liberal, and it was those professed values of inclusivity and compassion that led to his now famous #WalkAway journey. Although he was doing the usual crying and condemning on social media following the Trumpocalypse, Straka possessed enough self-awareness to realise he must’ve missed something really big to be so badly blind-sided by Clinton’s defeat.

So began his quest to understand why millions of ordinary Americans had voted for a man the mainstream media had declared officially off limits due to his racism, bigotry, misogyny and stupidity. What was happening? Were all these voters just dumb, easily fooled, or were they all just secret racists?

Modern Heretics

Dave Rubin – Modern Heretic

11 July 201930 April 2020 - by Charles Naton - Leave a Comment

Kicking off this series honouring modern-day dissidents, heretics and dangerous thinkers is the always thoughtful, always affable and genuinely curious Dave Rubin. Condemned by louder sections of the chattering classes as some sort of gateway drug to political extremism, Rubin is one of the most popular and laid-back linchpins of a cultural phenomenon which has become known as the intellectual dark web.

Describing himself as a classical liberal, Rubin’s philosophical and political journey has been followed and replicated by thousands of men and women throughout Western society over the last two decades. The numbers are climbing by the day.

As a one-time panellist and contributor for the extremely progressive Young Turks Network, Rubin has spoken at length about his personal development from progressive firebrand to fierce critic of identity politics and passionate defender of individual rights. Always thoughtful, kind and intellectually curious, his long form interviews on the Rubin Report are some of the most watched, commented on and beloved political content on YouTube, although he’s also branching out onto other platforms such as Bitchute because not even an openly gay married man is safe from the ideological outrage mob that stalks our society in search of victims to lynch and lives to ruin.

Media

Is Jo Brand Worse than Danny Baker?

16 June 201930 April 2020 - by Charles Naton - Leave a Comment

By now, even the microscopic life outside of our solar system has heard about the Jo Brand acid joke controversy.

Claims and counter-claims surrounding freedom of expression, incitement to violence, political correctness and media hypocrisy have been churning around editorial pages for several days now.

The BBC have defended Brand’s statement, although she herself has since issued a public apology. It seems that BBC editors have no problem with what she said, even though she herself wishes that she hadn’t said it. How much of that public contrition is genuine is anybody’s guess and irrelevant anyhow.

The fact that the BBC saw fit to broadcast Brand’s words on a pre-recorded show has been highlighted as proof positive of the Corporation’s double standards when it comes to policing the speech of its staff and presenters. Piers Morgan, among among many others, has been loudly pointing out that the beeb didn’t hesitate to axe Danny Baker for sending a crass tweet about the Duke & Duchess of Sussex’s newly born son, yet actively defended a presenter who, at the very least, finds some comedic value in the idea of those she disagrees with suffering life changing injuries.

Media

Modern Heretics

12 June 201930 April 2020 - by Charles Naton - Leave a Comment

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” Mahatma Gandhi.*

When the New York Times recently published a prominent ~~hit piece~~ article entitled The Making of a Youtube Radical, it featured a collage of hate-filled internet bigots as its front splash. Dangerous demagogues like Jewish Nazi Ben Shapiro and openly gay (also Jewish) erstwhile Young Turk Dave Rubin were finally exposed to the light of civilised society. Other illuminati of the Intellectual Dark Web included such shadowy and menacing figures as gun toting Bill Whittle and the clearly deranged Stefan Molyneux, who earned himself no fewer than three mugshots in that montage. Now we know who the mainstream media really fears.

As the New York Times watches its bottom line swirling round the same drain that swallowed its reputation in 2016, it has been reduced to the kind of childish finger pointing and false equivalence which is rightly derided across the serious debating chambers of cyberspace. This desperate attempt to mix dissenters of every stripe into a synthetic moral panic around some sinister and imminent Alt Right threat (cue evil laugh) is a glaring admission of their own failure to engage and persuade. The once mighty media establishment has been reduced to the status of a young Dave Lister, who describes everything he sees as crypto fascist, despite not having the first clue as to what that obscure phrase even means.

Media

The US Media are Acme’s best Customers

3 February 20191 May 2020 - by Charles Naton - Leave a Comment

You’ve gotta hand it to the Yanks. They make the best cartoons by miles.

Over the past couple of years the American mainstream media has unwittingly produced an endless stream of hilarity, setting new standards for schemes involving ludicrously unlikely devices of destruction.

The first ground-breaking classic was the unprecedented hostile campaign the Democrat establishment and their media allies catapulted at Donald J Trump while he rallied his way towards the White House. In time-honoured tradition, that impossibly heavy mass of hysterical hyperbole completely missed its target, rebounded off a sceptical public and crushed the cable networks with a resounding crunch. Trump was elected President while the media’s already dubious reputation was squashed flatter than a cartoon cat beneath a falling anvil. Thud!

Never the sort to let physics or practicality stand in their way, the US establishment tried again with its increasingly desperate and derided Russian collusion hoax, but that unstoppable snowball of scandal simply melted away as it rolled down from the top of the mountain, reduced to nothing more than a grubby ice cube in a small puddle. Splosh!