AIBU to seriously wonder who reads The Daily Mail and The Sun?

[Blandings]

Both papers today have done themselves proud with their anti-Labour rhetoric and lies/misinformation.

So it does beg the question, who reads this rubbish and believes it? Anybody with half a brain cell and google can find facts out for themselves.

Am I being naive and people just don't want the truth, they want a version of facts that they believe is true?

Apart from anything else, it's just absolutely rubbish journalism.

I'm pretty sure that the post about "grubby lower class people" is intended to be heavily ironic...

As a PP said, The Sun has a very low reading age (I've heard 5) and it is a highly skilled job writing prose like that. A lot of people just can't access the broadsheets (The Mirror would be the alternative). Also, naked women... They know their market.

All newspapers are full of shit. I'm surprised people even bother with them. And don't even get me started on people who quote Daily Fail stories as fact.

^Grubby lower class people who probably don't even live near a waitrose or a good school.
Yuck - probably best to ignore them if you can, but if you are stuck with them try to explain what sort of newspapers they should read.^

Do only working class people read the DM? Strange as it seems to hate them. I remember picking it up early on after moving to this country and there was an article where they had some lesser royalty's daughter dress like a "chav" and go to a mall for laughs at the poor people anyway I'd say middle class racists pick up the print edition. And as for The sun, thick racists.

The online edition is the most read online post in the world I think? People love racism and sexism though

I read the Mail. Along with the Independant, the Guardian and whatever other online paper I feel like reading during the day. I don't believe half of the bollocks that's written in any newspaper but it's good to get different perspectives.
I don't read the Sun at all though.

My parents used to get The Daily Mail. I used to enjoy it - Lynda Lee Potter and all that.

However, when they used Cheque Book Journalism and paid the Yorkshire Ripper's wife for a story my father marched down to the newsagent and cancelled the delivery as a protest.

I'm pretty sure that the post about "grubby lower class people" is intended to be heavily ironic...

Yes but in that way that assumes other people see something that's blatantly not true (dm readers being seen as poor working class) so maybe you're projecting your own views just a bit.

*online edition of the DM that should say on pp

My parents read it and it reinforces beautifully all their prejudices. Foreigners? All here to sponge off the state whilst simultaneously taking all the jobs.

I hate the prose that is outwardly outraged but has an undercurrent of titivation. E.g the story a few years ago when a teacher ran off with a pupil. It was along the lines of.. It is disgusting that this pretty girl with her short skirt and well developed bust was taken advantage of. Abhorrent that the teacher noticed her shapely legs and took her into the stationary cupboard.'

Oh yes, DM readers are literate lower middle class (largely). I was just commenting on the PP's post about "grubby lower class" which others have taken as a slur but which I'm sure was meant to be facetious.

I said "you are" when I should have said the "writer is". My apologies Katherine. It wasn't directed at you but was a response to your comment if that's not clear as mud.

Katherina i know it was ironic that was why I agreed with it. It was clearly directed at the people who are so much better than the rest of us and if only we could be educated like them then we would understand that you should only read the guardian. To be honest based on your comments about 5 year olds reading the Sun I would guess it was directed at people like you.

my bloody parents in law.
MIL justifies it by saying that she prefers the crossword in there to the one in the Telegraph (which was previously their paper of choice)
FIL is just a git

I don't understand these posts. Surely you realise that millions and millions of people read them. People related to you. People you work with. People who sit next to you on the bus. You know, normal people.

You sound like you don't know much outside of your narrow life

I read the DM on line for the shits and giggles.

But I have to say they have surpassed themselves with their anti Labour stories today.

It is positively frothing

I certainly don't go to any print media for political facts. They are all as bad as each other in bias to one party or another. Why pick on the DM or the Sun. DM has the biggest readership in the UK and I do look at it online. Doesn't mean I support its views on politics. I look at lots of sites. I listen to the radio alot too but doesn't mean I agree with the interviewees I hear.

I am a literate, well educated person who is capable of looking at lots of different types of media, biased and "independent" (although can you really believe this) and I make up my own mind.

Do alot of people listen to the DM and believe it? Yes very likely. I hedge a bet that they were conservative-leaning anyway, they haven;t been swayed by the DM headlines.

What papers do you actually read and believe then?

The Guardian really is not though.

Haha. The Guardian is at least as biased as any other newspaper in popular circulation. It's in the nature of newspapers really, but the Guardian is a nice healthy example of it.

They all are, if you think any newspaper isn't biased and crap you are making a statement about yourself more than the newspaper. Only a range of them gives you any possibility of a balanced view, and if your range include the Guardian/Mirror, it should include the Telegraph/DM.

These days, I use Twitter and Reddit for my news.

As people are highlighting, most of the U.K. Press have agendas to push, which is frustrating to read. I did used to read the Guardian, until it became so misogynistic

I do have to admit I like Daily mails sport section, hate the online guardian format and get my news mainly from BBC and sky. I do not know any unbiased news source.

I used to solely rely on the BBC for a news source as the only one that is supposed to be unbiased (not so sure even that's true anymore) but I am highly distrusting of news in general these days so do question absolutely everything I read or hear.

But I have to say they have surpassed themselves with their anti Labour stories today.

A very wise politics-talking guy told me this week: 'When they stoop to making shit up bout you, it means you've got them running scared'

Completely agree Accio
And may I say - brilliant username!

Not at all, Olivia - I am from a working class background and have many relations and friends who read The Sun. I do not make a value judgement about people having a reading age of 5 (for which there might be many reasons - I make no judgement about any of those reasons). I wish that there was a left-wing tabloid similarly easy to read and of equal appeal.

I think we understood metspenglers' post differently.

To clarify further - the reading age of 5 is a known journalistic target, not a comment of any kind on the prose.

Yahoo! Another Tory bashing thread.

I wish that there was a left-wing tabloid similarly easy to read and of equal appeal.

The Mirror - my parents read it and my Grandparents used to read it, all proper working class, old school Labour/ Trade Unionists. As my parents had it delivered, I read it growing up, which probably explains a lot! It also has a reading age of 7.