Ian Tomlinson and Blogging about Blogging
Reactions on the blogosphere (my oh my, I hate that word) have been inevitably mixed. A lot of people see his treatment at the hands of the police as absolutely shocking, whilst some point that he may have been provoking the police. I'd be in the former camp, but debate is always good and seeing an alternative perspective is part of the point of seeking the opinions of others.
But one of the more worrying responses to this police attack (and, provoked or otherwise, it was an attack) is the desire of some blogs to criticise others for not shouting about this more promptly or in the *right* way - particularly those on what is referred to as the right of the blogosphere (seriously, who came up with that word? Someone who really, really hates bloggers and wants them to have the worst name ever in the history of the English language?)
Mr Eugenides points out that blogs are not a 24/7 news service, and the content of the blog is very much down to the individual author. Absolutely - the fact that Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more properly on the Tomlinson case doesn't mean that Iain Dale has to. Besides. with something like the attack on Tomlinson, there is no need for blogs to publicise it. The visuals are so arresting (no pun intended) and so immediately controversial that this story heads up to the top of the news bulletins anyway, and will be endlessly debated whether the blogs pick up on it or not.
We often seem to forget that whether you have a small blog that attracts a few thousands vews a month (like this one) or one that gets hundreds of thousands a month (like Dale or Fawkes), you are still only tapping into a fraction of this country's circa 60,000,000 people. The majority of this population probably don't know what a blog is and don't care; of those that do, a hefty proportion will probably question who these bloggers are, and why they don't get out more.
Yet people will stray onto blogs, particularly over controversial issues like the police attacking a man on the way home from work. And they may see some big debates over who said what and when. And they would be well within their rights just to not fucking care.
Seriously, read this post back to yourself. What is one of the most boring sentences in this post? What is one of the most boring sentences ever written? Which sentence actually bored the author whilst he was writing it? This one: Absolutely - the fact that Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more promptly on the Tomlinson case doesn't mean that Iain Dale has to. Even if you know who Ireland and Dale are, that sentence is still pretty fucking boring. If you don't know who the two bloggers in question are, then you'll probably be heading back to The Daily Mail's website for a blow by blow breakdown of the case (pun not intended).
You can passionately care, and rant until you are blue in the face, about the sanctity of blogging and the importance of standards; the reality is that people just don't care. Blogs work best when they are uncovering scandals, expressing controversial opinions and debating the issues of the day. When it comes down to bellyaching about the timings of posts, they are about as interesting as a Latin lesson on a summer's day.
Blogging about blogging is dull, ladies and gents. And with that in mind, I'm going to stop doing it now.
posted by The Nameless Libertarian @ 11:43 am
5 Comments
5 Comments:
Paul Staines (aka 'Guido Fawkes') treated G20 violence as a big bloody joke across 4 posts last week. Later evidence emerged that showed that some of this violence had led to the death of a man, and suddenly he lost all interest.
Iain Dale also appeared to make a joke about it being a non-story until he saw the key footage; "Not a lot in tomorrow's papers. Oh well, I suppose it'll be Jacqui Smith's turn for a battering again..."
Ha-bloody-ha.
Even after seeing the key footage, Iain took a cautious position with a single post and promptly lost all interest (apart from a link to the Mr Eugenides post where Iain totally misrepresented James Graham's position).
It is dishonest to suggest that this is about me or anyone else demanding that X blog about Y
No-one is insisting that anyone blog about anything... but I'm well within my rights to point out where certain bloggers lose interest in certain stories.
For example:
Iain Dale has clearly stated that he will now no longer feature/publicise stories from/involving Craig Murray, purely because he feels insulted by something Craig said about him.
I cannot force to carry stories from/involving Craig Murray, but I can point out that this makes Iain look more like a petulant child than a political commentator, and that it raises questions about what other matters Iain doesn't feature on his blog or in his 'politically neutral' magazine just because he doesn't like certain people.
Here I will remind you that both Paul Staines and Iain Dale present themselves as a more reliable source of information than mainstream media on the basis that their bloggage is 'unfiltered', when it is clearly filtered according to their own personal and political bias.
Meanwhile LFAT is accusing me of not linking to certain evidence and not discussing it, when I have clearly done both.
So, to close:
"Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more properly on the Tomlinson case"
Only if what appears to be a joke was meant as a joke. Iain Dale has yet to explain if he meant it as a joke or not. He's free to leave me hanging of course, but not to later bitch about my being dishonest about an answer he refuses to give.
"Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more promptly on the Tomlinson case "
Iain *did* that and it came across as a poor joke.
Well, opinions are divided between those who are in two minds and those who think there's another side to all this.
It's important to debate all this and compare and contrast the two extremes (continued p94).
Even if LFAT wanted to debate this fairly/rationally, I doubt he could while insisting on believing in things that didn't happen while insisting that 'lefties' are believing in things they cannot see.
Iain refuses to answer my emails and has banned me from his 'blog' again (that ban resulting from Iain refusing to debate/discuss an event in which he was directly involved that had a significant impact on my personal life).
Paul Staines only ever blogs about me or emails me when he thinks he has the upper hand about this or that, which isn't often.
So much for the importance of debate. With regard to extremes, please do not group me with those taking an extreme view of Tomlinson's death. From the moment I saw the video evidence, I described the event using the same word(s) later used by Nick Hardwick, chairman of the Independent Police Complaints Commission; it was an assault.
Tim,
Guido hasn't commented on the assault; to a large extent, during the protests he tried to play the would be banker looking down on the rioting proles. It may not be the most edifying position for him to take, but nonetheless it is the position he has took. And it is a part he stopped playing round about the time someone died.
Now, my interpretation (and interpretation is, by its very nature, subjective) of your post was that it was, in part, a comment on when Dale posted. To me, when he posted - or the wonderfully generic post he eventually came out with - is irrelevant. The issue is (and this is not just about you/Dale/Guido) when bloggers start arguing about the blog response to this example of police brutality, rather than the assault itself.
People looking in on the blogosphere (*shudders* at the word) may be in danger of seeing people who are arguing about who said what and when, rather than the circumstances of this assault. I don't really care what positions certain bloggers take on the facts of the case, I just don't see it as a constructive use of blogs to talk about when people responded to this. Again, a subjective position.
You're correct, you are well within your rights to point out when certain bloggers lose interest in things. Just as I am well within my rights to say that this sort of thing may alienate others who are not immersed in this interweb world.
As it stands, I agree with you on the circumstances just before Tomlinson's death; the video shows he was assaulted by the police.
TNL
Mark,
Quite.
Must shut up about this and go to bed.
TNL
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