To block GBNews from my parent’s TV?

[goslowly]

My parents retired 4 years ago. They’re both in their 60s, healthy, happy, comfortable financially.

Since they’ve retired they have been sucked in by every single thing they say on there. They can spend an entire day sat in front of the TV getting angrier and angrier. It’s to the point that if Starmer comes on the TV, they shout about how he should be killed.

it’s genuinely starting to concern me. You can’t have a rational conversation with them about anything. I miss my parents, how they used to be before all the conspiracy and anger took over.

I’m genuinely tempted to block it from their tv using parental controls and just pretending it’s some weird fault in their telly. They’d not be able to fix it.

I still firmly disagree with you seeking to control them in this way. Using a system designed to protect young children to infantilise adults is abusive.

Report them to Prevent if you're really worried; but it's controlling and red flaggy to seek to deny them access to a legal mainstream TV channel. Apart from anything else, if they realise what you've done - and they will suspect that something is up before long and just buy a new TV if they believe your lie that it's a glitch with their current one - they may well see it as confirmation that what GBN says must be right and that's why left-wing people are frightened of it and using underhand ways to try to stop the 'smart' ones from seeing it.

Rather than deprive them of their agency through devious means, could you not find other channels/media that they may engage with but which are a little more balanced and tempered?

This would concern me I must say 😬

Have you got children? If so, I would say to your parents that their language is utterly objectionable and not what you want your children to hear.

Does GB news tell them that left wing people should be killed??

im aware of how anxiety inducing it is, I’ve been through it myself. But I am not silly enough to think the long wait is due to my skin colour.

What next, are you going to tell them who they can be friends with, what books they can read, go through their phones and send them to their room/ground them. I mean if you want to treat them like children you may as well go all in. YABVVVVU

You can't! GB News is terrible, though. You only have to see some of the bollocks posted on MN to see how its toxicity rots people's brains.

My mum is like this. It’s so infuriating. There is no way to have a conversation about practically anything as it gets twisted into something political. She’s particularly obsessed with American politics, Meghan Markle & Pakistani grooming gangs. We clear the cookies off her iPad every time we visit. Would love to block stuff but she’d be so mad if she discovered that.

All my conversation with her now Is so bland and mostly centres around the weather, the garden, what people she knows are doing and what she is having for dinner.

Sounds like they need to broaden their lives and get out of the house. Spending all their time watching crap on tv is wasting their retirement. Encourage them to take up some new hobbies, preferably active ones.

As for blocking GB news; I can understand why you want to, but they are adults not children.

Can you encourage them to get out more? Social clubs, volunteering maybe? It would show them that things aren't quite as dire as they're imagining.

Hahaha. Sounds like my dad too, I'd say 100% radicalised by GB news. Doesn't matter what I call him about, he'll be ranting about Starmer, Reeves and Milliband in minutes. I am not a polite people pleaser though (not saying you are), so I tell him he's a dickhead and to shut up. Makes for colourful convos.

Yes, but obviously they do, and are clearly not as rational as you. You can't block what they watch. You probably won't be able to reason with them. However the "killing" stuff is very extreme.
My family are all Left wing, trade unionists and the like. I have elderly relatives who are very radical socialists and have become more entrenched with this. They don't advocate killing, but I think they've got into a bit more since retiring and hitting 80. I don't think there's anything you can do.

I was going to suggest the same. Charity work, socialising, hobbies, that would maybe help get things in perspective.

Even the likes of Tommy Robinson 'only' demand that we should 'send them back' or get them out of the country in some other way - even they don't actually suggest that we kill them.

How likely are they to say oh fine we can’t watch it

This isn't unique to your parents, OP, mine are similar watching the BBC. They are scared every single thing they do is affecting the climate, we're all going to die from sun exposure, they censor everything they say for fear of "walls having ears," etc etc.

All news is propaganda.

Older people are isolated and use the TV to stay "connected" but don't realise it's just replacing people and telling them how to think in a false reality.

Why don't you take them out or encourage them to do something outside of the home or inside that naturally removes them from the TV.

As for your suggestion to control their lives via their TV, I think you're using your bias as a way to justify your actions which frankly, you have no right and is, IMO, more concerning than the comments they make in their own home as is their right.

They do get out sometimes. The issue is it’s all with people who share the same sort of views.

I just miss my parents, that I could have a laugh with and enjoy spending time with them.

Obviously, you shouldn’t. But I would.

Sorry posted too soon.. Saying people should be killed really isn't healthy or right..And watching tv all day even if it's cash in the attic is unhealthy for their bodies. It would be much better all round if they were volunteering or getting absorbed by watercolour painting or bookbinding or something.

HOWEVER what you can do about it is a tricky one. Have you tried pushing back? - even "light-heartedly" "would you listen to yourselves honestly. Kill the prime minister ?? You're nuts!"

Or at least something like "blimey what miseries you two are these days!"

Pp was right to say they are being radicalised. This is a truly worrying national issue and I do think there are some pretty malevolent anti-democratic forces at work at the moment. Elon Musk is one driver of this. Maybe remind them that it was Putin who sponsored the arson attacks on the Prime Ministers properties and what they are saying makes them.sound like Putin supporters.

Yes, that's on a whole other level.

I’d be concerned about their mental health decline first and foremost. Why is there only hobby watching right wing news and shouting about killing strangers?

Agreed... and the Guardian is by no means above spreading its own extremist agenda on some issues either; they just do it in a slightly more sophisticated and nuanced way than the tabloid papers and channels.

Yes! Do it! Go on!

It just balances out the far left agenda on the other side. It isn't all unfounded nonsense. People can see what is going on with their own eyes. Don't even need to have access to the media at all.

I've just had a look at GB News. The headline is the same as the BBC one, about that grooming gang leader who can't be deported. Then it's about Russian drones hitting Kyiv, and the heatwaves.
It's not pleasant and it's very biased, but it's certainly not that extreme.

Would you be of the same mind if they only watched leftie biased news? If they were ranting about k*ing reform voters?
Assuming they don't go out in public shouting this stuff, its their business what they rant about at home. Leave them to it