So, the new year started with the Establishment redoubling its attacks on the SKWAWKBOX in the form of a reporter with the Mail tweeting his ‘pride’ that his article about this blog and its editor had been supported by the press’ ‘regulator’ IPSO.
That ‘news’ had been all over the press in early November, so it’s curious that the author of the article considered it worth a mention now.
Normally we’d just ignore such nonsense, but in case anyone’s unaware of the wider picture, we’re putting this on the record for future reference.
IPSO
IPSO is funded by the very press it ‘regulates’. According to Hacked Off it exists to create the “illusion of reform” and until recently it was chaired by the editor of the same right-wing company that published the article.
Attempts to use the IPSO verdict to attack this blog ignore the fact that even IPSO had to note that the Daily Mail had already offered to correct the two main points in its article:
The writer of the article is ‘proud’ that IPSO considered his article ‘fair and accurate’. According to IPSO, his employers had offered to publish corrections to the article even before the IPSO decision.
The S*n, which had echoed the Mail’s claims, also published a correction:
IPSO’s record
IPSO also rejected a complaint against the S*n for language about Muslims that the nazis had used about Jewish people:
IPSO decided that the S*n’s use of the chilling phrase “the Muslim problem” was not hate-speech because ‘no specific individual was targeted’ – which is pretty much the definition of hate speech.
Muslim and Jewish groups alike condemned the decision.
The S*n writer in question happens to be a board member of IPSO.
The verdict
Old news, regurgitated and misapplied – on the first day of the new year and the day after a number of MPs, union leaders and activists endorsed the SKWAWKBOX.
Whatever the motives behind this particular regurgitation of the old ‘news’ about IPSO and the SKWAWKBOX, it’s clear that the Establishment has its sights on the ‘new left media’ that draw attention to its nonsense and propaganda, with even (then) Cabinet ministers attempting to smear them.
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