The daft face of hateful media

Reality show ‘celebrity’ Narinder is in hot water, again. Recently, she posted an unkind comment about the Princess of Wales’ appearance at the cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday. 

The Princess has, this year, undergone major abdominal surgery and treatment for cancer. She has already been the subject of vicious online harassment and abuse and a wholly disproportionate attack by photographic agencies for minor tweaking of a photo. To pick on her, again, was particularly stupid and cruel but Narinder went there.

The backlash has been fierce. Royalists and non-monarchist alike have called her out for the post. Realising that her already meagre media career was in jeopardy, Narinder deleted her post and replaced it with one of those non-apologies aimed at making herself the victim. People were piling on her, she claimed, because she’s a brown woman. 

Unfortunately for her, Narinder has very public form for horrible posts about the princess in her past and many reminded her of this. She is also one of the most tedious race baiters in the media. 

I’ve written about Narinder before, on this site. I called her out for her description of Conservative politicians of South Asian origin as coconuts. I mentioned that I had met her once, a long time ago. I found her to be not unintelligent. She was desperate for fame, even then and that’s fair enough. Each to their own. However, it’s disappointing that she has chosen the route she has, to try and achieve it.

Ironically, she may have achieved her greatest name recognition this week, at a point when her career is plummeting south. 

The British press, while professing outrage, has, in its reports, elevated her to ‘BBC presenter’ and television ‘star’ as if she was a female David Dimbleby. The same press, of course, simultaneously referred to the Princess of Wales as Kate Middleton. The British press does this often and after 13 years of marriage there can be little doubt now that it is deliberate from a press that bends over backwards to call male rapists ‘she’.

The reality is, Narinder is not a presenter or a star. She is what used to be called a shock jock. She appears on morning television as a commentator and says something outrageous.  Or she posts something horrible on social media. The intention is to get engagement for either the TV show or her own account so it can be monetised. Clicks mean money. 

There are quite a few people who make a good living from this kind of ‘social commentating’.

It’s part of the media that seeks to enflame rather than inform. 

But this week may have started the beginning of the end for this kind of media. Donald Trump‘s landslide political victory may well have a seismic effect , not only on the cultural landscape of the west but also on its media.

The mainstream media/legacy media has been on its knees for some time but the US Presidential election kicked it to the cub decisively. Its influence on the electorate was negligible. It was slow, plodding, out of touch, partisan and mostly irrelevant. With all its resources and money it could not compete with social media influencers and podcasters armed only with microphones, iPhones and a passionate, energetic commitment to representing the millions the mainstream media, had chosen to ignore.

Mainstream media contributors like Narinder have little to offer in this new world. They can draw attention to themselves and cause a hiccup in a teacup for a day or two, but they don’t change minds and they have no influence over swathes of the public. If anything they are likely to repel the masses. Ultimately people want hope, aspiration, positivity. People like Narinder offer division and negativity and the public has seen the horrible consequences of that over the past few years and it’s not what they want more of in the future. 

The signs of coming change are already there, if you care to look.

Despite the tantrum from his employees at the Washington Post, Jeff Bezos recently issued a statement saying: Most people believe the media is biased. Anyone who doesn’t see this is paying scant attention to reality, and those who fight reality lose. Reality is an undefeated champion.

CNN is laying off hundreds of employees who failed to bring in the ratings. Other networks are smarting from losing viewers.

Don’t be surprised if the Fashion magazines which refused to have the elegant Melania Trump on their covers are secretly making overtures to her now. 

Like it or not, X is the future, especially with its encouragement of Citizen Journalism. Not all of the latter is good but if you follow the right accounts it’s pretty enlightening.

X is now the number one platform for breaking news. It allows the best and easiest interaction with followers. It’s no longer an echo chamber disconnected from the real world.

Yes, it can be vile but it’s now equal opportunities vile instead of one sided as old Twitter used to be.

It’s hard to look at old Twitter with rose coloured spectacles when it happily allowed people to be cancelled because they had the wrong political views. When it had people saying they had champagne on ice in the event Boris Johnson died from Covid. When it wished excruciating pain on Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed. When it allowed horrific threats to JK Rowling. When it demanded in the same week that we ‘don’t look back in anger’ when children were blown up with nail bombs at a concert but three days later that we should ‘rage rage rage’ against some silly tweet that President Trump posted.

X retains all of old twitter’s flaws and has added some of its own but it’s the inevitable fast paced product of a world that has been divided and segregated.

If the mainstream media wants its old influence back, it has to be more impartial or it will simply die.

Any changes in the USA will filter down to the UK media.

As for Narinder, she’s really just the messenger. It’s the people behind her who will have to make changes as to what they want to sell their dwindling audience. 

The people behind the hate are the ones to consider. The ones who encourage a culture of perpetual anger, name calling and division. They’ve had a lucrative run. Maybe the gravy train is slowly coming to an end.

Narinder is rightly being called out but she is the foolish front of an ugly industry that, hopefully, we can now start seeing the back of.