For self-explanatory reasons, we publish the following anonymously.
I would venture to say that we are seeing the beginnings of journalistic integrity in the paper.
These sprouts are new journalists joining the ranks of hard-nosed reporters already chipping away at the truth scene, but they face challenges, and as a veteran reporter with more than 25 years in the newspaper business, I can attest to that.
As we reported in our UK column in 2021 and 2022, the newspaper industry has been taken over by Big Tech and Big Pharma, and trustworthy journalism has disappeared without a trace. It is 13 months since my last article in which I urged UK column readers not to hate dinosaur media workers, and 13 years before that I accused newspaper industry chiefs of criminal negligence. Corona scam.
So what has changed?
In this third whistleblowing, I have chosen anonymity to protect my job inside a technocratic giant, but I want to shed light on where the news is heading and why there is still hope for the industry and humanity itself. Simply put, my colleagues are starting to wake up, in greater numbers and to varying degrees. They are starting to realize how serious the situation is.
Why did it take so long?
I know, I know, it's only been three years, but we mustn't forget that most of them have been subjected to far more propaganda than most others by being expected to consume “news” every day. But the big caveat to this optimism is that anyone who doesn't want to understand the techniques of propaganda shouldn't try to learn something about the major issues of the day by reading corporate-owned newspapers, whether local or national.
So let's go back to the new reporters who have joined the fray, the freshly graduated reporters who have not only been newly programmed by their educational institutions to worship at branch Covidian churches and Monasteries of Wake, but who have also been thrust into a world of website article targets, clickbait, chronic understaffing and woefully low wages, some of which are having to take second jobs in pubs.
They also face the problems that we veteran reporters have faced for decades: layers of editorial bureaucracy, battling PR agencies, fear of what others think, and a misinformation spewing from every media outlet that misshapes our sense of reality.And yet many of the new reporters I know are brave. They're doing their best, and they're interested in the counterarguments I offer.
mix
As an avid reader lightAs the only respectable print newspaper in the country that covers these allegations without dismissing them as conspiracy theories, I distributed copies to several colleagues, old and new, and was pleasantly surprised by the positive reactions. And like a newborn foal finding its footing, a new type of journalism is emerging from the newspaper's core.
It's good to challenge authority, light The article has been a hit and many of my colleagues are starting to take notice. One of the trainees I work with is inviting readers to write in with their personal stories. Harm of the Corona VaccineAnd a health reporter who I've been having conversations with for three years about PCR testing, the disappearance of the flu, and midazolam is now starting to respond to my emails on these subjects.
She previously ignored my correspondence, but recently admitted to being so frightened by the mainstream Covid-19 narrative (which perhaps 90% of journalists still believe to be true) that she refused to wear a mask, and was upset when she found out her boyfriend wasn't wearing one when out at the store, etc. She also said she was psychologically damaged by the relentless fear propaganda, and after multiple polite but firm challenges from me, she stopped writing articles promoting the Covid-19 narrative.
It's taken me three years to say this, but I can testify that change from within is indeed possible. In the clinical profession, they say it takes a spine and a balls. But that's metaphorical. In fact, in the mainstream media industry, more women than men have stepped up to resist the relentless drive to increase fear levels.
spine
For my part, I used my metaphorical spine to stand up and challenge what my colleagues kept quoting from NHS press releases. And I used my metaphorical two reproductive organs to risk ridicule and backlash when I stood up. The ridicule and scorn came from my superiors, but I accepted it. It was worth it, because what I warned about three years ago actually happened, and I gained credibility as a result. No one has said this to me directly, but my colleagues now listen to me and agree, often in conspiratorial tones, as if we were the French Resistance in Nazi-occupied France.
There is still work to be done, but having troops on the ground who know what is going on is far better than having fully programmed robots who believe they are on the side of justice and serving their communities. In short, my colleagues are waking up to the fact that those in power, at the local and national levels, are lying — and doing so on an industrial scale, at the behest of pyramidal corporations with power far beyond any illusory control of politics.
Our numbers are small, but they're growing across the country, and as the technocratic control becomes more apparent, newspaper reporters — generally kind, polite, fellow-loving people — are beginning to realize that something is amiss.
Advertisements and reader comments
But here's the bad news: the newspaper industry has been collapsing at a fairly rapid pace for the last few decades, with layoffs occurring every two years for as long as I can remember, but more recently, annually. In the past few years, the layoffs have always been voluntary; now, with involuntary cuts gradually occurring and hiring freezes still in place, staffing levels are in a constant state of crisis.
So what are newspaper groups doing to stop this rot? Nearly 20 years ago, newspaper groups put all their eggs in the basket, delivering the news for free while watching sales of print newspapers plummet. Little did they realise that the print editions of these groups continue to make the majority of their profits today, and that 95% of digital users are on a device with less retail space for advertising: their mobile phone.
Moreover, mobile advertising has swamped newspaper sites to the point that they are barely functional, and with such advertising providing negligible profits, editorial decisions are driven by chasing clickbait rather than news. These “easy wins,” in which reporters report only on what readers are saying about key issues (rather than reporting on the issues themselves), have helped destroy our brand and are now often laughed at in our Facebook feeds.
But on the positive side, the community of readers of the COVID-19 articles we now post on these feeds has begun to call out the dangerous lies we are spreading without question, rather than submitting to the government. In one day, these feeds contain more stories about the harms of COVID-19 shots than newspaper headlines in a year.
foam
Returning to clickbait, Newsquest, Reach plc and National World (the three companies that own the majority of newspapers in the UK, including those masquerading as local papers) all channel their editorial staff into a world of individual web targets that must be achieved to avoid punishment and reap financial rewards. It is therefore in the reporter's own interest to avoid a story about city council corruption (which might generate hundreds of clicks on our website) and instead report on what readers think about the new teriyaki chicken burger being sold in a local branch of a major fast-food chain (which might generate tens of thousands of clicks).
I despair at the state of the industry, and I wish the National Union of Journalists would somehow reverse this trend and relinquish the power to hold the big tech companies accountable for being slaves to their algorithms and clicks. But again, there are seeds of journalistic integrity emerging, especially among new recruits who, like me, recognize that the industry is being forced into a digital bubble of journalistic substance. And they are resisting, pushing back, questioning, and turning to the chapel of their union to fight these changes.
Perhaps this article will be a catalyst for people inside and outside the industry to start a fight: readers can bombard the newspapers' Facebook feeds and contact the newsdesks to denounce clickbait and government propaganda, and people inside the industry can start to resist the infringement of journalists' duty to serve the public.
I've always felt that there is a lot more power at the bottom of the corporate pyramid than there is at the top, and it's important to make sure that the people at the bottom realize their power.
I will not stop resisting, and I hope you won't either.
Humanity's struggle has been going on for thousands of years, so there's no point in giving up now.
Looking to the future of news, I see it as a fight for humanity and a fight against the artificial intelligence that is already being used to write some of the “news,” but I'm convinced that as long as the same level of recruiting that joins news teams today continues in the future, the technocratic takeover will not be smooth.
Long live freedom of speech and long live journalism.
image: GGAADD | License CC BY-SA 2.0
