‘Truth’ probably means in the modern liberal sense; if it aligns with the liberal-progressive ideology it is true. A new epistemology for a new age. This is a bit of a running theme, on this website. [1] I have a commenting account on the Guardian. For some reason they haven’t blocked the account. But it is being “monitored”. What this means, in practice, is that comments I make on various topics are passed, e.g. a comment in favour of the Palestinian cause was passed by the censor. But, anything, even remotely putting the Russian point of view on the Ukraine war, is silently, censored. Normally blocked comments are marked “deleted by moderator”. Mine just vanish.
Today I was reading the comments on an article by the Guardian’s super intelligent Nesrine Malik about immigration. Malik is a really thoughtful and expressive writer. I can almost forgive her her completely unestablished premise that anyone who comes to the UK on a work visa should automatically get Citizenship, so well does she write. Anyhow; the comment I was replying to said “why is it a stretch the Putin is involved in pushing immigration in Europe”. This was referencing a story, (possibly placed by the intelligence services), in today’s media about Russia being involved in immigrant smuggling ‘gangs’ in Bulgaria. The story was just a claim; no evidence and no concrete details. The usual thing. I replied to this comment with a simple comment saying something like “yes, not a stretch, but, still, no more actual evidence or even details than in the stories about Russian jets in Estonia, von der Leyen’s plane being electronically sabotaged and various ‘drones’ which apparently can’t be shot down near key NATO bases”. My comment, which is making a point about how this story about Russia being involved in illegal immigration in Europe seems to be part of a pattern of recent vague stories about Russia harming Europe, which stories share the common thread, that they lack convincing detail, let alone evidence. By any stretch, a reasonable comment. I won’t over claim for myself, but it seems to me a reasonably observant comment, noticing, phenomenologically, a media trend. That comment lasted about 20 seconds! You have to love the Guardian. (I was very tempted to post another comment За родину. за Россию, just to provoke them and see if they will finally close the account, but then I reflected that I don’t want to get stopped by Special Branch police next time I pass through Heathrow).
Notes