The state of UK politics at the moment… not great. The EU referendum had a very strong media campaign by many media outlets based on lies and misinformation, such as portraying the EU as ‘unelected beaurocrats’ (a lie) and talking about £350m/week (another lie, plus the fraud of talking only about money out instead of the balance). There is a similar campaign against Jeremy Corbyn, full of smears and spin aimed to discredit and pressure him: examples of this include turning his proposal for consultation of safer transport to women into segregation and the notion that he didn’t do enough to campaign for the EU. This last one is quite clever: because he got very little media coverage of the 120+ speeches that he did, they created the perception which they use against him. Part of this claim was also that he didn’t talk about migration in the way that the more right-wing Labour MPs (and many others) wanted, he refused to join in with the anti-immigration sentiment.
We also had Theresa May (now PM) recently giving some speeches which sounded great, lots of great content about the unfairness of an economy that doesn’t work well for most people, unfair tax systems, a lack of affordable housing, and a few other things. One slogan was: “Together we will build a better Britain”. This is a sneaky slogan, of course, because it uses an empty vehicle word (‘better’) which the reader fills themselves. Of course I want a Better Britain, but I probably have something very different than she does… Anyway, I’m not discussing these specifics as much, but the general trend.
Actor Politicians
Politicians don’t really give speeches based on principle. Whether they used to, I don’t know, but it feels like the past actually had substantive disagreements and politicians arguing based on different principles and policies based on views they had.
The difference between the two main parties has narrowed somewhat: we currently have neoliberalism wearing a blue tie and neoliberalism wearing a red tie (this is intentionally sexist, because the leadership is disproportionately male). Tony Blair’s New Labour (Thatcher’s biggest legacy, she said) followed Conservative policy, in the 2015 general election Ed Miliband said that he would do the same cuts that the Conservatives had planned, and in opposition they hadn’t done very much (including not actually opposing the budget). This may change though, as Corbyn is not neoliberal… so there is meaningful difference between the parties.
Politicians aren’t so much about politics or policy anymore; they are much more about PR and appearance. It’s all about soundbite, not about substance.
David Cameron gave speeches about the importance of taking action on climate change at the Paris COP, while actually having policies that mean we take less action. “We are all in this together” actually meant that cuts hit the poorest people, companies pay less tax, and there are tax reductions for richer people. There were also numerous things said in opposition that they then did themselves – not integrity or principle, just what sounds good at the time. Theresa May gave strong criticism when Gordon Brown took over as Prime Minister from Tony Blair, calling for a general election; yet she has done the same and rejected calls for an election. Tony Blair gave speeches about the importance of protest and privacy in a democracy, while pursuing policies that went against this. Hillary Clinton too doesn’t seem to have actual policies herself, she instead says what she thinks will sound good. In one interview, presumably on a show with black audience, she says that the thing she carries everywhere with her is ‘hot sauce’. She has repeatedly changed her position on various issues – both in her recent campaign to chase the Sanders vote and throughout her career.
This means that the politicians are acting. Sure, it could be said that this is nothing new and politicians have always lied and acted – but I think there’s been a shift, from being a smaller part to being pretty much the entirety of the politician’s public appearance.
A few days ago, I came across a piece of research done into racist attitudes (in America, whites against blacks). The finding was that intelligent people were against racism in principle, and said the right things, but were still equally racist in terms of policy choices. Pretty important finding, I think. A similar thing may be going on here: it’s clear that it’s now ‘in’ to talk about inequality, and maybe Theresa May actually believes what she’s saying (in a twisted way in her own mind, somehow thinking that she is doing the right things), but the policies she’s been following do not match with the words she says.
Whereas one might usually say that you should look behind the words at what is actually done in practice, the only response to an actor politician is to disregard their words entirely and look solely at their actions.
Post-Truth Politics
Orwell had a lot to say about propoganda and media and truth. Seems he is pretty right.
This article in the Guardian <https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/13/boris-johnson-donald-trump-post-truth-politician> describes the state of politics as ‘post-truth’. The truth no longer matters. The issue is not recent, as such – lies always travel faster than the truth – but the truth isn’t even trying to chase it anymore. Media outlets, though they pretend to be more-or-less objectively informing us, actually plays a huge role in creating certain opinions. As well as an agenda they might have (which for Murdoch was quite obviously anti-EU, as well as roles he has played in politics by supporting various politicians and parties – most recently, probably putting strong pressure against Boris Johnson running for Conservative Leader and campaigning against Andrea Leadsom to pressure her to withdraw), their main aim is to draw readers. Informing people is only incidental to this aim.
As with above, the shift in recent times takes us further. It isn’t just that there are sometimes lies in the media (either by journalists directly or in allowing themselves to be a vehicle for lies); instead the real truth is disregarded as irrelevant.
(Tangent about that Guardian article: The linked article says that partly this is because with social media, “technology now allows politicians to communicate directly with their followers, with no need to transmit their claims through the fact-checking filter of a news organisation”. This is a piece of poo. The Guardian may not be quite as bad as some other organisation, but it is still terrible: this article discusses some of the Guardian’s coverage of Jeremy Corbyn, including a story where a PR man heckled Corbyn in a fairly obviously staged way and the Guardian ran it as a big story; this article discusses some Guardian censorship of an author who was critical of Israel; this article gives a great analysis of how the Guardian markets itself (‘left-wing’) and what it’s positions actually are (more ‘left’ than other media, but not very ‘left’ at all). While I’m giving links, as this is an example of Guardian Double think, here’s an article about BBC Doublethink.)
The way that media outlets are run as a business (primary aim of attracting readers) instead of about informing people can be seen clearly in the way that Trump rose in popularity in the USA and UKIP’s wildly disproportionate coverage in the UK. They say absurd things, and these get reported because they grab attention and hype. The USA is further along the way than the UK, where (among other absurdities) there was a wide campaign that President Barack Obama wasn’t actually born in the USA (the ‘birther’ movement), which involved Trump. The above Guardian article about post-truth gives some great examples of other things Trump has done, which includes lots of making things up.
I’ve already discussed a few examples of post-truth reporting: David Cameron’s speech about action on climate change (while he does not); Theresa May’s speech about making Britain better; the Brexit campaign based upon lies and mistruths (about ‘genuine concerns about immigration’, which were almost always racist falsehoods instead of actual evidence-based reasons; about the ‘unelected officials’ of the EU, which isn’t how it actually works; and the money given to the EU); and lots of reporting about Corbyn.
A couple of other big examples of post-truth include:
- The whole policy of Austerity, 2010 onwards. This has never had sound economic basis, yet was reported and accepted as if it made sense. Even the IMF – which is economically right-wing – criticised it as being bad policy. Only with the election of Corbyn as Labour leader has the Labour party actually started to challenge it, but the media hasn’t picked up on this much.
- The much-repeated Conservative line that “Labour spent all the money” and that’s why the country is in debt. Labour had been running a budget deficit – meaning they spent more than they got in, so had to borrow lots – and this did cause a national debt. However, under the Conservatives, the budget deficit went up a little bit, then went up a lot, then reduced again (but still higher than it was). It’s currently around £70bn, whereas Labour had it at around £45bn (this isn’t adjusted for inflation or growth).
- Jeremy Corbyn being labelled as a ‘terrorist sympathiser’ (for being against the anti-ISIS bombing campaign in Syria) and also for being ‘friends with terrorists’ (referring to the IRA and Hamas, as Corbyn was part of peace processes for Northern Ireland and Israel-Palestine). At the same time, UK policy in Syria was to arm actual terrorists (Al-Qaeda, Al-Nusra, etc) against Assad, the UK is closely supporting Saudi Arabia, which has actual links with terrorists (currently in Yemen, but also links with the 9/11 bombers in the past). Not to mention that UK policy was to be close friends with Assad, Khaddafi and Hussein (until we decided to call them dictators and remove them).
- Propoganda campaigns to go to war. Pretty much exactly as Orwell writes in 1984. It’s now widely known and proven that the invasion of Iraq was based on lies and that this was mostly known at the time. We’ve also recently had, via the Clinton email release (which she has repeatedly lied about and repeatedly been proven to be lying), proof that the campaign against Libya had nothing to do with the interests of Libyan people: it was not about human rights or democracy and the responsibility to protect, as was said (eg here and here).
- The anti-Russia propoganda, talking about Russian aggression in various ways and entirely ignoring our own aggression.
Conclusion
So, politicians are actors who lie and say things that sound good, and the truth doesn’t even matter anymore.
This is not a functioning democracy: this is a failed democracy. If politicians don’t say anything meaningful, there isn’t anything to really vote for, or the vote doesn’t mean anything. If the media isn’t giving people proper information, they can’t meaningfully vote about it. The EU Referendum and the USA Presidential Campaign are both examples of this failure.
What to do about this… my best idea is hope that the internet gives us a better quality. In theory, there is huge potential: you no longer need to print a newspaper and distribute it; you can just put a webpage up; it’s much easier to find information that includes the truth (whereas previously much harder to find past events or things that weren’t talked about); video evidence (like the above Hilary Clinton ones) can make it funny and exciting. But there is also a lot to worry about and many reasons why the internet might not herald a wonderful new era of good journalism.
(and there has been some criticism of Theresa May’s speech, contrasting it with what she’s actually done. Thankfully, my point isn’t that ‘there is no truth left at all’, we aren’t yet in a dystopian world entirely controlled by propodanga of some sort. My point is that we’re about halfway there, and discussing the concept of post-truth media and actor politicians.)