Carole Cadwalladr is not happy (which makes for a change).
For the last few months the columnist has been kicking off about the Guardian Media Group entering negotiations with Tortoise Media to sell the Observer.
James Harding, the Editor and co-founder of Tortoise Media, is behind the bid and believes he can turn things around with a £25 million investment. He attempted to woo staff with a presentation about his plans, but they appear as unimpressed as Cadwalladr and will go on a 48-hour strike in December.
“This is a post I never wanted to write,” Cadwalladr’s Substack on the topic begins, before she explains how the Scott Trust, the shareholder of the Guardian Media Group, has fostered “values of ‘press freedom’ and ‘liberal journalism’” at the papers. She says that “the events of the last two months have forced my colleagues and I to question everything we thought we knew”.
Cadwalladr is not the only one reeling from shock. Last month “70 leading U.K. cultural figures” penned an open letter in protest of Tortoise’s ownership bid, including Mary Beard, Bridget Christie, Richard Coles, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Hugh Grant, Armando Iannucci, Helena Kennedy, Joe Lycett, Caroline Lucas, Eddie Marsan, Ian McEwan, James' O’Brien, Chris Packham, Maxine Peake, Philip Pullman, Michael Rosen, Carol Vorderman and Harriet Walter. They said they were "shocked and dismayed” and that the sale would be “disastrous”.
Quite why they are all so horrified is anyone’s guess. The Guardian Media Group’s finances have been
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If the Guardian/Scott Trust are so ‘independent’, why are they denying clear evidence of harm from RF radiation (ie WiFi, 4G, 5G)? Scott Trust are partners with GM Ventures/Mercuri who are invested in technology and digital development. The Guardian also receives funding from the Gates Foundation; these are ‘donations’ but what does that mean in terms of censoring evidence showing harm from one of Bill Gates’ biggest investment interests? The Guardian never interviews independent experts in RF radiation but invariably wheels out a tiny pool of Big Wireless defenders and evidence-deniers such as David Robert Grimes or EE head Howard Jones who are not RFR scientists/have clear conflicts of interest. So it seems a bit murkier than that where ‘independence’ and the Guardian are concerned.
Anything endorsed by James O’Brien and Chris Packham is reason enough to dismiss it entirely.
Flicking communists being propped up by free enterprise money. Just like Marx and Engels: stupid, dangerously stupid ideologies kept alive by capitalist funds. Time these upper middle class communists were refunded. MEGA – Make England Great Again
“It takes “misinformation and disinformation” very seriously..”
The Oxbridge Guardian habitually spreads misinformation and disinformation by omission.It has an ethos of “If it don’t fit the narrative, it ain’t getting in”.
As somebody once said of the Guardian ‘you can’t even use it wipe your arse as there is already shit on both sides.’
I would quite enjoy it if bitter, destructive infighting started amongst the left and as a result the entire woke movement fragmented into hostile factions acrimoniously battling over minute disagreements.
Splitter!
I thought that had already happened.
Not enough! Not enough!
I want total religious war between the various woke fractions about some complete absurdity that will destroy them, so that the insanity of their ideology becomes clear to everyone.
I also want it to be ridiculous to the extreme for maximum entertainment.
Being funded by the Gates foundation means they’re free of corporate interest in fact they’re not even tainted by it.
As I understand it Scott Trust pays no tax and paid no Inheritance Tax when it was set up.
Farmers will be pleased for them.
I admit to having little or no expertise in such matters but it appears to me that the Scott Trust seems to have been set up as a tax avoidance scheme from inception and is currently worth £1bn.
Literally quite rich of the Graun then to cyberbeg off people who do pay tax at the end of every article.
“free from the taint of corporate interests..” Brilliant. Apart from the millions in ‘grants’ it receives from the Bill Gates & Soros empires and that little Cayman Islands tax haven where Guardian Media Group stash their profits.
Has it actually occurred to them that even the Scott Trust might need to stem some of the losses?
Free from the taint of honesty or journalistic integrity.
The ‘open letter’ is pretty well a hilarious parody of chatterers & Luvvies in one 🤣 How they imagine they’re gonna help is beyond any wit to solve isn’t it !!!! Sorry peeps you lot are the ultimate problem 🥲🥲🥲
“values of ‘press freedom’ and ‘liberal journalism’” at the papers. She says that “the events of the last two months have forced my colleagues and I to question everything we thought we knew”.
Yes love, it’s called reality, your wishes and cult based beliefs will always come in second place..
one thing I doubt you and your brethren will ever get their minute lefty brains around!
“…have forced my colleagues and I to question…”
She can’t even choose the correct form of the first person.
A handy reference to all those people whose opinions I should avoid.
As the articles in the Guardian and the Observer are immediately suspect (not ironically) of misinformation or disinformation.
Decades ago I subscribed to the Observer. While the news tended to lean left it was a good Sunday paper worth reading. But the value of the news declined as the move to left-wing ‘entertainment’ increased.