Is journalism dead or controlled by the state? Warning Schools

[Morfin]

These photos show what the MSM are using as images, the three are the BBC, Sky and Daily Mail (that's who BJ gave his interview to) images are powerful they influence the reader. This is the image that is being peddled to the public, is there really no journalists working anymore that actually research a story? As an aside I bet these 'news' outlets have pictures condemning our children for not SD when they flood out of school.

Your are right. Parents will see the images and think that is what they are getting. The reality will be much more like the images coming out of schools in Georgia at the beginning of the week.

This is the one

Yes that picture is exactly what it will look like. I wonder how many adults would fancy walking through that corridor?

I feel the government is controlling the media at the moment. It all reminds me of studying the “Your country needs YOU” posters in history at school. Do special powers exist? E.g. if the economy was bordering on collapse?

Having said that, some other newspapers do seem to be trying to offer alternative stories.

But I completely agree, those images bear no resemblance of what schools will be like unless a lot of people vote with their feet.

The more I think about it @Morfin the more outrageous it is, how can they use these images when they’re looking to enforce full attendance with no social distancing, they must have plenty of more accurate stocks images of classroom learning pre-covid that they could use. After all if we are all going back to normal surely these pictures are irrelevant?

Agreed.

These are the last four paragraphs from today's article in the Times on the subject of children apparently not spreading coronavirus in schools. The bits in bold have been hilighted by me

...

One finding has been that “children play a minor role in transmission of the virus and schools play a minor role in transmission of the virus”.

One of the worst outbreaks was in Israel at Gymnasia Rehavia, a school in Jerusalem, where 153 pupils and 25 staff were infected in late May and early June.

An outbreak at a secondary school in New Zealand had infected 96 pupils, teachers, staff and parents. A neighbouring primary school, however, had seen few cases.

“Everything you do to reopen society will impact the national R, but reopening schools, we believe, has a very small impact on it. The majority of cases are staff, not students,” Viner said."

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FFS

My thoughts:

1. a "minor" role is still a role

1. the "majority of cases are staff, not students." OH WELL THAT'S OK THEN FFS

I certainly don't fancy walking through the corridor in that Georgia photo, but as I'm starting a new job in a secondary school next month, that's exactly what I'll be doing, as will my DH, who is a teacher.

Oh dear. Those are all stock images from an image library (either one owned by the publication or one they buy in from). In the UK schools haven't gone back yet so there are no images available to use. You're reading too much into it.

Journalists, btw, work in words so you're better off reading the actual words than looking at a picture. A picture Ed or sub selects the photos.

I think there’s been a fair bit of government control behind the scenes throughout all this. The care homes scandal was talked about on mn weeks and weeks before it broke on the MSM. The media all tended to focus on the same issues at the same time during lockdown and there would be gaping holes in what they were reporting. I remember at the time I couldn’t understand why they weren’t reporting on certain issues, even when callers would mention this on LBC (for example) they would gloss over it and move on sharpish. Long term Covid seems to be only picked up on relatively recently as a popular topic yet in April/May it was already being picked up on as an issue. Either they are all lazy journalists (I’m sure that’s not the case for many) or there’s a bit of string pulling behind the scenes.

Oh and OP - yes, I do seriously wonder if journalism is being controlled by the state at the moment too. Surely any parent with half a brain in the UK knows that UK schools simply do not have the space, staff or funding to implement SD or adequate hygiene measures if all pupils are back full-time. Our teenagers' "outstanding" state secondary school doesn't even have soap or doors on half the cubicles in the pupils' toilets.

I am so depressed about it now. It’s going to be so stressful.

I haven’t sat in a room full of people without us all wearing masks since March. And now I’m expected to cheerfully run five lessons a day with no masks or social distancing.

DH wants me to quit. We can afford it, just. But I love my school and colleagues.

This suggests to me the government is worried that parents are becoming unhappy about school returns, and unions are getting worried about rising cases.

Yes these papers do print things directed by no.10 - that doesn't mean they won't do a critical article or an investigative piece tomorrow, but clearly this is orchestrated from no10

I am also cross about the images, I'd be v happy if I thought school would be distanced!

The government is very much controlling the media.

@Neighneigh

Oh dear. Those are all stock images from an image library (either one owned by the publication or one they buy in from). In the UK schools haven't gone back yet so there are no images available to use. You're reading too much into it.

Journalists, btw, work in words so you're better off reading the actual words than looking at a picture. A picture Ed or sub selects the photos.

Yes because there are no stock pictures of school taken before March 2020.

It's propaganda.

BJ knows that the economy will collapse if there's no state-sponsored childcare in September. Nothing to do with education.

(I'm a teacher, desperate to go back and teach but with the right safeguards, which my school is currently putting in place).

My classroom will look exactly the same as it did before lockdown.

The only ‘safety’ measure will be that there is a pump of hand sanitizer on my desk and 30 cm square of Perspex. That’s it.

I think he fears a backlash about having to close pubs and restaurants soon and is trying to set out his stall. Agree about pictures.

I have noticed that articles about school often contain a picture of a small child, with a mask on , and not in uniform. I guess there are safeguarding implications about using real children but all the same.

There was one the other day with a teacher at the front, next to an actual blackboard,wearing a mask, with no subheading underneath. Only The Guardian provided context for the image.

The only place they will get real pictures from , I guess, is provided by our schools, or harvesting from Twitter.

It is disingenuous to say people aren't affected by pictures : why is there a whole job in prospectus and website design then? Look at the different pictures MSM use of the PM and you can see their biases!

I agree that there is a control of message going on visit the MSM allies, and it troubles me that one seems to be the BBC who the general public trust to be neutral and factual.

I await the BBC's fact check o the PM's words about schools. I suspect there is mounting concern that people are noticing that pupils in secondary schools are, by and large, not children , research wise, and so they move the examples, images and evidence swiftly back to younger children, which is also a more emotive and emotional area to focus on.

Agree with the above comments. If schools really were going to look like the pictures suggest I for one wouldn’t have an issue with the schools returning-but they are not. Many people in this country will see the pictures, read the article and wonder what is all the fuss again from teaching staff! This is an example of fuel feeding negativity towards teachers.
I’m not sure where the media have been no real mention of the hundreds of outbreaks and more importantly the increase in outbreaks when schools opened for certain year groups in June.

My classroom will look exactly the same as it did before lockdown.

What changes have you made in the staff room?

"Given that children are at low risk of infection and their outcomes when infected are good, the main concern about opening schools is that teachers can spread it among each other"

The government has controlled the media through this whole process.. scaring the sh*t out of people to lockdown and stay in, then that all phased off when they wanted people to get back to work - all manipulation and scaremongering!!

Journalists, btw, work in words so you're better off reading the actual words than looking at a picture. A picture Ed or sub selects the photos.

It's amazing how patronising you're managing to be whilst also being extremely naive.

The information about children being at low risk of infection is based on primary schools - prepubescents. In secondary schools teenagers are as likely to get and spread it as adults, although of course less likely to become seriously ill.

My mum has switched to watching al jazeera - she says its more questioning.

Don’t worry, I suspect after a few weeks when cases have taken off and schools are the epicentres, the papers will carry pictures of crowded corridors and say how awful it is.

@MrsSpenserGregson

Agreed.

These are the last four paragraphs from today's article in the Times on the subject of children apparently not spreading coronavirus in schools. The bits in bold have been hilighted by me

...

One finding has been that “children play a minor role in transmission of the virus and schools play a minor role in transmission of the virus”.

One of the worst outbreaks was in Israel at Gymnasia Rehavia, a school in Jerusalem, where 153 pupils and 25 staff were infected in late May and early June.

An outbreak at a secondary school in New Zealand had infected 96 pupils, teachers, staff and parents. A neighbouring primary school, however, had seen few cases.

“Everything you do to reopen society will impact the national R, but reopening schools, we believe, has a very small impact on it. The majority of cases are staff, not students,” Viner said."

---

FFS

My thoughts:

1. a "minor" role is still a role

1. the "majority of cases are staff, not students." OH WELL THAT'S OK THEN FFS

I certainly don't fancy walking through the corridor in that Georgia photo, but as I'm starting a new job in a secondary school next month, that's exactly what I'll be doing, as will my DH, who is a teacher.

They’re not still going on about that Viner study, are they?!