to be really f**ked off that the tabeloid media actually run this country

[fluffles]

no discussion about who is or is not right or 'best' in politics, but i am really really p'd off that the newspapers in this country can decide who does and does not keep their job.

who gave them a mandate to rule? i do not buy a red-top they do not represent me.

can their multi-millionnaire owners decide who is in and who is out just because a certain number of thousand people buy their paper???

I feel your pain. I hate the way that the media influence things.

Gordon Brown does not have a mandate to rule, to get a mandate you have to be formally elected. Gordon Brown was not elected to run this country, nor was he elected to be the leader of the Labour party, he forced his way in by back room antics.

well it seems to me that a 'mandate to rule' basically means do the red-tops like you.

[and btw. i'm not necessarily pro-Gordon it's just that the way our system works is that we DO NOT elect our prime minister, we elect our MP and the part with teh most MPs gets to choose a leader who becomes PM. It's the way it is, tony blair and gordon brown and new labour did NOT invent that idea]

Agree so much, I was particularly desappointed in yesterday's Independent.

oh dear, am very about that extra 'e' in the title - was too angry to spell

do you buy them?

i don't - tell all your friends not to - they are a shower of shite

yup

it's crazy isn't it

what's even more worrying is, I think alot of people don't even realise this is the case! madness

oh no no custardo btw def do not buy them!

I mean yup I effing hate etc etc as per OP

no i don't buy them, but we're now in the twisted situation where what makes the front page of one paper goes on to make the lead story on the BBC news.

i mean BBC FFS!!!!!!!!!! News?!?!

it seems 'news' is now what another paper decides to print!!!

yes yes yes yes but it's not just the tabloids - all the papers and the TV jump on the bandwagon and tell us the same thing. It's frightening that Rupert Murdoch now rules this country and I agree that most people don't actually stop to think about what they are reading - they just assume they are being told the facts rather than what is often a horribly distorted opinion.

It makes me laugh when we all mock countries such as China for having dodgy media which present a one-sided view of affairs. our media are no better, just controlled by someone who is not in the government. Still just as manipulative though.

yes but I think the tabloids are most powerful, like if you see a bad headline about X celeb/MP/whatever you think 'oh dear their career is just about to be ruined'

and sure is sure is sure within a couple of weeks they're in the gutter and the tabs are exalting the next poor bastard celeb/MP whatever to superstardom ready for their imminent fall

just stay well out and don't buy the tabloids innit and ignore everything your mum says if she buys them

You are very very right about this, I think that as a society we need to stop buying into all this populist crap that is peddled and manipulated by those with power.

I suppose they're not ALL bad; I think the Mirror were quite critical of the BNP weren't they? Or am I making that up?

If the tabloids ever think about supporting the BNP THEN we're in trouble

Luckily, the tabloid journalists usually come from well educated backgrounds and have mostly worked for broadsheets previously so are not that stupid!

i'm sure individual journalists are not stupid - or evil - it's the editorial policy i have issue with...

and the fact that most papers seem to have abandoned all thoughts of communicating news and become campaign sheets for whatever series of causes their owner decides on a personal whim...

most of them aren't even self-consistant!