O/T:- Media Bias

[jackal2]

Here's my question... let's say that there's someone called Brussell Rand, and that multiple, extremely serious and credible accusations have been made against him. Let's say that there has - to date - been no legal action taken against him. Are people and organisations not entitled to change their view on him based on that evidence, and decide that they don't want anything to do with him any more? And don't want to support him or his work or his career or his bank account directly or indirectly?

If someone was in your employment and you sacked them on the grounds of hearsay, rumour, speculation and media reports before any arrest, charge or conviction was made, then they would rightly have legal grounds to take you to task. What you would most likely do, if the allegations were that serious, is put them on paid gardening leave until such time as the allegations were proven or indeed disproven.

The problem in this case - whether it's Russell Brand or Brussell Rand - is that he is not an employee. He's a user of certain social media platforms and a beneficiary from some advertising revenue. It's true that those advertisers and social media platfoms have no obligation to continue associating with him and therefore cannot be legally taken to task for choosing not to do so, but clearly their decision to cut ties is based on the media storm around said individual, based on nothing more than allegations at this stage.

If it proves that the allegations go nowhere in terms of a criminal or civil conviction - which is still entirely possible - then what are we left with? A person whose income and self-employed career has been at least damaged, possibly wrecked, by media publicity rather than any proven wrongdoing. Can that be right?

The media now seem to have increasingly unfettered power to affect/damage someone's life before any civil or criminal liability has been found, or even formally come under investigation.

As you say, the issue here isn't Russell Brand any more than anyone else who has found themselves in such a position. I don't actually like or for that matter trust this particular celebrity and I think it's entirely possible that he has pre-emptively adopted a narrative position to protect himself, but whether he has or not, he is still entitled to 'due process'.

Brand states in his latest video that it is clear that [mainstream media] organisations "collaborate in constructing narratives". I agree with that. Whether it's Brand, Schofield, Edwards or anyone else, what we often see now is one media outlet lead off with a 'story' and then the rest pile in with a clearly orchestrated 'drip, drip, drip' of stories building day by day which, when you look beneath the headline, often amount to little more than innuendo, speculation or vague allegations. The intention seems to be to create the impression of something "real", to manipulate public opinion, and in turn put pressure on the authorities to take knee-jerk action before the formal process of investigating such matters has even really begun.

Do we believe these organisations as "trusted" news sources that should enjoy such apparent influence? In some cases, the people they eventually target were previously "one of their own", perhaps even once lauded/promoted for behaviour that is now latterly being condemned.

There could be numerous motives behind what they do, ranging from a guilt that they weren't aggressive enough in the past in exposing the likes of Jimmy Saville, through to - as Brand implies - an agenda to discredit or undermine the credibility of those who challenge the MSM hegemony. Either way though, it seems that the MSM are attempting to usurp the powers of those legally entitled to investigate and judge allegations against individuals.