The Media and the Mob

Gerard Cunningham, writing in The Village, is not happy about what he considers to be the scant coverage given to the “Pantigate” affair by the mainstream media.

You’ll recall that Rory O’Neill made remarks on the Saturday Night Show on 12 January which described certain named individuals as homophobes. The individuals, aware that they did not, in fact, have an irrational fear and hatred of homosexuals, objected to this, and solicitors’ letters were sent. RTÉ duly removed the segment from its player and apologised for any distress that might have been caused.

Cunningham:

Broadsheet.ie, TheJournal.ie and Krank.ie reported on the removal of the clip from the Player. The next day the Irish Independent reported that John Waters had complained to RTÉ. The Mayo News picked up the story too (O’Neill is from Ballinrobe), and that was about it. Noel Whelan and Una Mullally wrote opinion pieces in the Irish Times from different perspectives, but there was little other reporting in the mainstream press.

Well, he’s just mentioned at least seven separate articles in different, mostly national, newspapers. Not exactly an airbrushing from history.

Cunningham goes on to tell us that, thankfully, “bloggers”  rescued the “story” from the oblivion into which it was threatening to fade.

The story that hardly anyone old-media was reporting refused to die. Blogs proliferated and were shared online, journalists were tackled on twitter about why they weren’t covering the story ... RTÉ received a lot of heat online for their actions (over 800 complaints about the apology) but the truth is, it could have been anyone. [He means, I think, that newspapers are so terrified of being sued for defamation that they would all have behaved much like RTÉ did.]

Given the current cultural climate in Ireland, it probably isn’t too hard to whip up 800 hotheads who take umbrage at the suggestion that support for traditional marriage does not equal “homophobia”, and get them to fire off an e-mail. Cunningham seems to think that because a lot of angry comments are floating around Twitter about something, that thing must necessarily be an issue of major national importance.

RTÉ estimated that over 2,000 people attended a protest over the affair on Sunday 2 February. In contrast, the reactionary Reform Alliance conference attracted 1,400, after weeks of front pages and endless hyperbole on television and radio.

Ah. Up to now, Cunningham’s tone has been fairly measured. But reactionary is one of those buzzwords that, like bourgeoisie and patriarchy, immediately have the effect of nailing one’s ideological colours to the mast. (As an aside, I cannot think of any conservative equivalent for a liberal – I mean, a term used to describe a liberal which a liberal would not use to describe himself. Godless liberal, perhaps, but you’re not going to see that in a mainstream magazine, unless it is being used ironically.)

The Panti Bliss saga shows Ireland still hasn’t worked out the appropriate paremeters for rigorous debate. It shows the tin ear of newspapers and broadcast media, which failed to register the level of support for Panti – next to no-one sided with the Ionas. It shows the powerf of social media to colonise stories that the old media cannot (or will not) cover. And a bravery which the old media seem tellingly to have forgotten.

Well, Mr Cunningham, if “next to no-one” disagrees with you, how exactly is airing your opinion online “brave”?

Cunningham does not specify whom he refers to when he says that “next to no-one sided with the Ionas.” Next to no-one in Ireland? But how does he know? Next to no-one he follows on Twitter? That is more plausible. But to imagine that angry Tweeters (is that the term for them?) constitute some kind of legitimate demos, whose mighty collective voice should determine the content of newspaper editorials, is to invite mob rule.

He is right about one thing, though: the power of social media. It can not only topple tipsy TDs, it can also determine the content, perhaps also the outcomes, of national debates. Time to get liking and sharing.