What Happened To The UK Daily Mail?

For a long time, I have read the UK Daily Mail. It was less biased than our mainstream media outlets and was willing to report negatively on Obama (which is something that I didn't see often in the U.S. media). It seemed to attract a much more conservative crowd.

When Trump ran, he seemed to get a lot of support in the comments section of the Daily Mail. He didn't always get the onslaught of negative coverage that he got elsewhere. They certainly did plenty of negative stories on Trump during the campaign and were absolutely brutal when the Hollywood tapes came out. Trump got his share of negative comments, but he also got plenty of positive comments. One thing that people determined during the campaign is that anti-Trump comments would be upvoted and pro-Trump comments would be downvoted sometimes, and it was determined by posters that the volume and speed at which the upvotes occurred and the disproportionate number of anti-Trump votes showed the arrows were rigged perhaps by a Dem group like Correct The Record.

That said, things got better post election...for a while. Now the articles are almost exclusively negative and are heavy on the Russia narrative. I'm not saying everything needs to be positive - that's not fair journalism. I am saying that they have become like every other outlet - in fact sometimes worse. They take a snippet of what Trump said or something that Trump did and spin it out of context or grossly exaggerate it in the headlines. The headlines are hyperbolic and are generated in order to get a reaction that is negative because they know a lot of people don't read the full article (not that the full article is always in complete context or completely honest) but go right to the comments section to react to the title. Right now (for example) the Daily Mail is accusing Trump of outing a CIA program about arming the rebels in Syria (which he knew about during the campaign and promised to end then and which has been widely reported) and of threatening to fire Tom Price if Obamacare wasn't passed (it was a joke). Almost all their headlines are negative and are designed to make Trump look bad, ignorant, etc. These articles get plenty of negative comments, but they are in response to a phony premise, and all I ask for is honesty.

I have noticed that a paper which once got a lot of pro-Trump comments and attracted conservatives who felt that the paper was more centrist and less biased, has now been taken over in the comments section with anti-Trump comments. At first when I began to see this I was concerned because the comments section used to be very pro-Trump. I thought his own base had turned on him. However, I have taken to reading the comments and looking at arrows and seeing that these people are full blown Democrats (which wasn't the core readership in the comments at one time). They hate Trump and hate criticism of Hillary and Obama and are supportive of programs like Obamacare and love to push the line that Trump is a Russian agent. The articles about Trump have sensationalized headlines and are often negative, so I think it's a case of "If you build it, they will come." Liberals have come for the Trump bashing, and the few conservatives that have stuck around get all their comments downvoted. I've tried to correct false headlines or negative comments, and I sometimes get barraged by red arrows, even if I am posting a fully accurate comment.

I will add that I have posted there, and I saw another pro-Trump person complain about this as well, but I have posted and sent pro-Trump comments that aren't going through. I recently tried several, and when I hit submit, the comments don't show up.

I want to conclude by saying, I'm not asking for 100% positive coverage. I won't even ask for positive coverage at this point. What I will ask for is honest coverage and headlines that aren't sensationalized. There are a lot of people who don't critically analyze the news, and it's a shame that they could be mislead. News organizations should but honesty above clickbait.

Conservatives should take the time to comment everywhere in support of Trump.

Also tease “the Russians are coming” MSM meme.

They are everywhere, I tell you. No one is safe.

I saw a Russian walking down my street the other day. Figured he bugged the place. I ordered some of Hillary’s hard disc cleaning clothes to wipe the place down.

There are Russians welcomed into Congress. Git out the tar and feathers!

There could be a Russian hiding in that closet over there.

I took Ranch dressing; the Russian dressing was too dangerous to eat.

Thanks for keeping the globe safe from the Russians and the deplorables! You are a true patriot!

It would be great to have a paper out there where the coverage isn’t sensationalized clickbait but which is devoted to objective journalism - one in which the comments section could be somewhat civil. I know I’m asking for too much ~~today~~, though.

The natural disposition is always to believe. It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing. The man whom we believe is necessarily, in the things concerning which we believe him, our leader and director, and we look up to him with a certain degree of esteem and respect. But as from admiring other people we come to wish to be admired ourselves; so from being led and directed by other people we learn to wish to become ourselves leaders and directors. And as we cannot always be satisfied merely with being admired, unless we can at the same time persuade ourselves that we are in some degree really worthy of admiration; so we cannot always be satisfied merely with being believed, unless we are at the same time conscious that we are really worthy of belief. As the desire of praise and that of praise-worthiness, though very much a-kin, are yet distinct and separate desires; so the desire of being believed and that of being worthy of belief, though very much a-kin too, are equally distinct and separate desires.
The desire of being believed, the desire of persuading, of leading and directing other people, seems to be one of the strongest of all our natural desires. - Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)
If people didn’t want to be believed, would they even bother to talk? People communicate with the intent of affecting the behavior of the hearer/reader.

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