Santa Claus is dead, long live Santa Claus!
I can still recall being told that Santa Claus was a fictional being, that is to write that I think that I can. I think that I can also remember my mother being upset that my next-door-neighbour had shattered the myth, and consequently dulled the lustre of all future Christmases. I think that the 'telling' happened in the garage of the house in which I grew up; I would have been somewhere in the region of four or five years old at the time, a year younger than the 'offending' neighbour. I also seem to recall that it hadn't actually come as a huge surprise.
Had it happened in today's Britain the myth would have already been unceremoniously crushed at school, prior to my being tested on prepositions and subordinating conjunctions. I think that my childhood was infinitely more pleasant for the absence of such an early grinding of self-confidence, under the jackboot of regimental testing for toddlers.
Memory though is a fickle thing, often now I can't even seem to remember why it is that I have just left the room I was last in, or where I have placed that elusive paint brush, or what that last item on the shopping list should have been. So, it's entirely possible that those more-remote 'memories' are now merely figments, pasted together from half-forgotten anecdotes.Whatever happened way back over fifty years ago, I now cannot ever remember having believed in Santa Claus. Which is strange, as Santa seems so much more plausible than the concept of an honest Prime Minister.
Shattered myths come in all guises; that Schools' Minister Nick Gibb is so much emaciated and automated collateral is of course no myth at all, whereas the upstanding integrity of the UK's 'free press' is very much a myth. And this would rather undermine any misbegotten idea that we actually inhabit some sort of democracy.
The 'news' that we are every day served-up relies quite significantly upon the premise of honesty, as should all such reporting. We would hope that this at least might squeak through the 'Free Press' integrity test. So, for the sake of argument, let's juxtapose two competing recent news stories, the anti-semitism row and the anti-scouse row, see how things pan out.
It will have come as no surprise to many that Ken Livingstone has been in the news, he is not everybody's cup of tea, and has never shied away from controversy, and much of what he is reported as having said in the past is not to the liking of our media lapdogs. I listened to the 'news' and I read the 'reporting'- obviously not the likes of The Daily Mail- and then I set about digging for the facts behind the 'news.' It goes without 'saying' that news reporting, which then requires such extra effort, when we are all judged to be so 'time poor,' should not pass as news reporting at all. So, shame on you BBC and The Guardian; much of the rest we have come to expect nothing more of, but The Guardian and the BBC had once courted so much more.
With Blair pulling the strings- clearly visible at one point- John Mann moved in. He had not remembered his lines, and had been reduced to simply repeating the one that had stuck inside his cavernous skull. Jabbing the puppeteer's wooden finger, he boomed, "You're a disgusting Nazi apologist, rewriting history..." I think the strings have been airbrushed out of The Telegraph's footage, the 'newspaper' probably unhappy that this orchestrated moment looked quite so wooden. Anyway, with the entourage of yesmen in tow, the words "Roll cameras." all but obscured, off we went. And there, without much further ado, we had it, glue still wet, the news headline of the day.
The transcript of what was said by Ken, prior to the staged outburst, is freely available to anyone who might care to make the time, I've linked one of the most likely to be honest here. I've read the thing and several others many times- all giving pretty much the same account, although others are rather more selective- and I cannot find the merest shred of anti-semitism uttered. It would be fair to write that Ken is very much an anti-Zionist (as are all universal freedom-aspiring individuals), and that anti-Zionism and anti-semitism are not one and the same thing. There are many Jewish Israelis who would simply love to be given more airtime (BBC?) in order to clarify this point. But, what the BBC and all other news outlets settled for was nothing short of the scandalous blurring of the chasm between unacceptable anti-semitism and wholly-justified anti-Zionism. Had the world's media not been quite so covertly-controlled we might all be rather clearer upon the point and the world would almost certainly be a considerably less war-torn place.
The anti-scouse issue is now, I would contest, considerably less muddied, although one could be forgiven for believing things to be otherwise. The anti-scouse thing to which I refer is, of course, to do with Hillsborough.
It pains me to write that the Hillsborough tragedy has been a bare-faced lie that has endured for almost thirty years. I know that it has also pained many others to have written about the recent publication of findings; we had all known that so much of the incident- the deaths of 96 innocent people- was being misrepresented, but we had not been able to dig quite so deeply into the facts of the event, as were those who carried out the investigation.
The media have been hailing the report as 'justice,' or as 'the truth,' or as something along these lines. Surely though, I am not alone in noticing that some of this lie appears well set to endure further? Either way, to be judged innocent of blame, some thirty years after having been unlawfully killed is not yet any sort of justice.
We know that the presented findings are true; that several police individuals lied, that many of those who didn't had their statements doctored, that the 'news reporting' of the media- especially the lowly 'Sun"- was pursued as an anti-Liverpudlian agenda, that the lies told about alcohol-overindulgence were known by certain reporters to be untrue. We have seen the invertebrate Kelvin McKenzie scuttling from the light of blame. We have heard the buffoon Bernard Ingham refusing to apologise for the disparaging remarks that he, as Thatcher's press secretary, made at the time. We know also that the graphic imagery of the victims being squeezed of life was just too horrific to show to the general public.
And we know that the 'findings' are currently being presented to the public as 'justice.'
I'm going to go rogue and to suggest that the Prime Minister of the day certainly had access to much, if not all, of this information as early as the days immediately after the event. Surely it cannot be treasonable to think (know) as much? That Thatcher was nothing short of a witch in human form is well documented, and that she prided herself in keeping fully abreast of current affairs is still much gloated about in Tory circles, when these types are not busily calculating the immense sums of money that austerity has accrued for them. It would have been very remiss of the woman not to have studied in-depth such a huge event, having taken place in one of her targeted 'enemy' camps.
When the lies are quite this huge they leave a sort of stench in the aether, an impossible-to-define odour, omnipresent and yet also omniabsent. Once one has detected the slightest whiff the stench is always there, never again will the air be quite clear of it. Once noticed it's like rancid milk spilt in the rear of your car on the year's hottest day. Yet, even this is not its most cloying 'attribute;' no, that is its ability to appear to remain undetected by others who one knows are, for some inexplicable reason, pretending that there is no such stench. It is sometimes as if one is surrounded by the most ardent fans of the Emperor's new clothes, whilst the Emperor's 'parts' are being waved in one's face.
If our flared nostrils have now finally picked up the whiff, and we shake our heads and attempt to clear our throats and stomachs of the need to retch, we suddenly find that the stench is all-pervading, that it is everywhere!
My God, the nation's top selling paper- pretending news- is a festering lie! Murdoch and the likes of Kelvin McKenzie really are contemptible. So why are they permitted to own our Prime Minister, and to keep him or her as a virtual pet in a gilded cage?
And what of Orgreave? And why did all those officers come dressed 'for action,' without wearing numbers, that may later have been used to identify the real thugs?
And did so few people really know about the activities of Jimmy Savile? And who the Hell were the 'top' names who covered his slimy trail? And what was their purpose in doing this?
And why is a proven insider-trader being set loose upon the nation's health service? And why is it that this excuse for a man was behaving as a simple nodding dog to the same man who owns most of our media? And can this really be healthy for an aspiring democracy?
And who are the likes of John Mann and Hilary Benn really serving? Why is it that all of those TV journalists and others don't even ask the question, "So, is there a difference between an antisemitist and anti-Zionist?"
And, if austerity is just an excuse to strip the public sector to the bone and beyond, why are more people in the public eye not questioning this action?
And if Iain Duncan Smith really is so concerned about the harm that austerity is causing to those dependent upon DWP rulings, why isn't he more forthcoming about the number of deaths caused by his department?
And if 'our' government are looking to really improve our lot, with a new 'Bill of Rights,' replacing the 'Human Rights Act,' why is Mr Assange still fearful for his well-being, even after the recent United Nations tribunal ruling?
And quite why is it that we sing so worshipfully about all of our media- 'the free press'- being owned by wealthy individuals with a clear anti-democratic agenda?
And just how many constituencies currently are, or should be, under investigation for Conservative electoral expenses discrepancies?
And if Nigeria and Afghanistan are quite so "corrupt" why is it that they feel so compelled to launder their money in our capital city?
Wow, look at all of those colourful balls in the air! Why are we applauding?
Is it not the duty of a news media to better inform the public, that they might in turn better enhance 'our democracy?' And if we must daily endure political speak about how important the preservation of democracy is, why are we so routinely being lied to; untruths being presented as facts and facts being systematically buried beneath lies? Why does 'our' media routinely create false stories when there are so, so many real stories pleading to be unearthed?
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