I am going to make a big post with my feelings about the protest yesterday and the whole cuts situation sometime during the weekend but for now, a list with some interesting and funny chants from it.
Get those animals of the horses!
(referring to the police…cavalry)
One, two, three, four, Clegg is David Cameron’s whore!
(Clegg was the target of 70% of the chants)
What do we want? Tea!
(Some people got really desperate during the two hours we spent on Westminster Bridge and decided to play…traditional British to persuade the police to let us go)
You can now shove your wedding up your ass, you can now shove your wedding up your ass, now shove your wedding, now shove your wedding, now shove your wedding up your ass!
(in the “If you are happy and you now it clap your hands” rhythm, you can tell Prince Williams wasn’t the most loved person last night)
There were obviously more funny moments, feel free to reblog and add them!
DISCLAIMER: I am not a follower of the UK politics. My knowledge is limited to the fairly basics (the names of the parties and their leaders, where the parties are in the political map, etc). But I always find myself interested in politics so I’ve been reading the news lately about the General Election, which takes place next week, 6th of May. Also, considering my opinion, I am a “utopianist”: I believe in a society that just can’t exist (you know, no money, no need for actual jobs, etc). When it comes to voting I pick parties that are closer to my beliefs. Most of the times, these parties are “left”.
(I don’t find any of the above relevant to what I am posting but I am pretty sure people will read this and think that I am trying to go for someone and against someone else: I am not. I am just “reporting” what I find terrible. I was intending to make a longer post but I am in the middle of my university exams revision so I don’t have that much time. What I am posting is representative enough anyways.)
The two major british parties are the Conservatives and the Labour. But this time it looks like a third party is joining them: the Liberal Democrats (you can understand this by checking YouGov’s and The Guardian’s voting intention polls).
So, there have been some “incidents” during the past few weeks:
- To get the general picture of how newspapers are dealing with it, you can take a look at the Daily Mail’s website (3 out of the 8 “Elections” stories are about Nick Clegg personally, all of them negative).
- Furthermore, Daily Mail (with this frontpage, that day) accused Nick Clegg (the Liberal Democrats’ leader) of “trying to laugh off his Nazi slur on UK”, because of this article he wrote for the Guardian (8 years ago, mind you). The newspaper also mentioned “donations being paid to Nick Clegg’s personal bank account”, although data like this has been clearly reported by the party and Nick Clegg (as The Independent reported on a quite detailed article).
- The Sun selectively picked some polls from YouGov, failing to present the data about the Liberal Democrats chance of wining if the voters didn’t see voting them as a wasted voted. Them, with the addition of The Daily Telegraph, also personally attacked Nick Clegg in various ways you can read on this article (from The Independent again, if only they had a better website they’d be my first visit).
And as these were not enough, I read another article on The Guardian today, titled “Nick Clegg: I could work with Labour, just not Gordon Brown”. Now I am pointing this “incident” out as it’s really impressive because, thanks to the internet, you can cross check what’s being/has been said and who said it, in no time.
The very reason I wanted to read it was the fact that I’d be disappointed if that was true. Especially, having watched Nick Clegg answering relevant questions on BBC. One of the bullet points after the title reads “Nick Clegg changes stance on talking to last place party” and the article quotes him saying “I think, if Labour do come third in terms of the number of votes cast, then people would find it inexplicable that Gordon Brown himself could carry on as prime minister. As for who I’d work with, I’ve been very clear -much clearer than David Cameron and Gordon Brown- that I will work with anyone. I will work with a man from the moon, I don’t care, with anyone who can deliver the greater fairness that I think people want.” To me, the above has one opinion (Nick Clegg’s opinion about Gordon Brown being the PM if Labour come third) and one statement (Nick Clegg stating he “will work with anyone that delivers the greater fairness that I think people want”).
Now, go watch the video. It’s 277 seconds. But you don’t even need 277 seconds to understand that something is wrong. 39 seconds are more than enough:
- From 1:26 to 1:50 you can watch and listen the interviewer asking Nick Clegg what will happen if the Labour loses. (“Loses” is not really clear here by the way, does it mean 2nd or does it mean 3rd?) Nick Clegg explains exactly what is also mentioned on the article by The Guardian. So no “change of stance” here.
- Then, straight after that, the LibDem’s leader said “my job is not to handpick politicians from other parties but to deliver the commitments on which we have been campaigning”. He even used the same word twice (“deliver”). The two statements (the one from the article and one from the video) are almost identical in words and syntax. So where is the change of stance The Guardian goes on and on about? (there has been at least one more article from them claiming so, can’t find it but will update the post if I succeed)
I am going to repeat this: I didn’t spend my time writing this to try persuade anyone to vote the Liberal Democrats, or to join them, or like them, or whatever. Just wanted to give a nice example of how newspapers and the media in general can influence people on issues of that importance. People (especially the elder) in my country (Greece) sometimes act like newspapers are the one and only source of information and news. “Newspapers reported it or it didn’t happen” and “It didn’t happen if newspapers didn’t report it” are two phrases that explain how things are. We have to become quite more cautious about what people tell us these days. The tools for us to do so are available.
Just use them!
