Surely this is atypical. A more representative lead would be “Exposed:BBC role in Labour’s plot etc.”
It is a sad decline for what was once the premier provider of news as opposed to comment.
You are right to say there is now something rabid about the paper. It is interesting that The Times, which has stuck more strongly to reporting facts not prejudices,has been far more successful in recent years.
Even The Times has been sliding down into ‘soft’ features with a preoccupation with people’s sex lives. There’s more and more lightweight drivel - sub-Daily Mail drivel.
Sadly, all too true. But at least it hasn't gone completely over to the dark side. As Roisin remarked above, the FT (for which I worked for seven years) is now, by some way, the best newspaper in Britain.
Trying to leave aside axes to grind, that strikes me as a first class analysis, Walter. Your assessment of what's become of Le Journal du Dimanche since it's lurch towards the French far right would be worth reading, too.
I remember sitting next to Tam Dalyell on a flight from Edinburgh to London one morning shortly after the end of the Iraq war.
I was reading The Guardian, and he was reading The Telegraph, which - given that he was a labour peer – surprised me more than a little.
As we rose from our seats to leave the plane, I passed him my copy of the Guardian because there was a good story in it about the use of depleted uranium shells - a subject on which I knew he was well informed – and asked why he was reading the Telegraph. “Oh it’s the only trustworthy paper”, he replied.
On its news pages, it followed the facts. Even on politics, it gave space to both sides. And there are still traces of that today. But its view of the world has become both toxic and distorted. A great shame.
It is indeed a sad state of affairs Walter. But, as an erstwhile occasional reader of this once great paper - if only because it fell into my parents’ doormat daily and because the sport section was quite good - I’m not sure I really care?
So it’s gone to the dogs; so it’s desperately trying to hang onto a diminishing readership and make a profit….but it’s a (notionally) free market?
I now inwardly chuckle when I see people reading the Telegraph - like I do when I see my beloved Uncle Ken with his daily digest of the Express AND the Mail! He’s a bit bonkers and slightly to the right of Attila the Hun but I’d defend his right to be so.
So let it prevail. Who cares? Keep writing objective, quality comment elsewhere. Thanks for doing so!
My parents buy the Telegraph. I used to admire it for covering similar stories to the Mail, but in digging up the nuances and caveats in those stories.
The problem, I think, is that unlike the Mail/ Express, it still has that reputation, now undeserved. So when the DT states that Alison Connolly is a political prisoner and victim of two-tier justice, with no mention of her having pled guilty, that's dangerous. I think we've lived in a genuine liberal democracy for so long that we've forgotten how fragile and counter-intuitive a form of government they are - we have to actively defend them.
Absolutely. I think the Telegraph's current view is that Britain is finished unless it elects Nigel Farage as PM, who then deports hundreds of thousands of immigrants to God knows where. It has no shame.
It strikes me that the Telegraph, Mail etc are turning into the equivalent of the drunk old guy in the pub. Loosing relevance in a world of online news, they started spouting random stuff from the corner. When that didn’t work, they’ve started shouting increasingly outrageous things just to get attention. With any luck they’ll get barred soon.
In my youth the Telegraph was read by the educated classes, today it attempts to cater for the bigoted classes in a forlorn attempt to keep readers. It should have gone down with the Empire.
I was an early adopter of the Sunday Telegraph when it first appeared in 1961. I used to pick up a copy on my way home from mass. I read the Daily avidly during the Thorpe trial because I was working in Ashton-under-Lyne and the Guardian was not available. The Telgraph was good on juicy trials.
Much as I am not a fan of the Telegraph, you don’t say in the article what is wrong with some of the articles you’ve posted. For example, the one about civil service internships appears to be true and was also reported by the BBC.
What is true is that Labour want to make it easier for working class applicants to get civil service internships. This is NOT the same thing as saying that interneships will in future be retricted to to working class applicants or that success could depend on the jobs held by applicants' parents when they were 14.
I am forced to admit that the Telegraph was not the only news site to report this story – though none gave it the same prominence.Do you believe that the future civil seriice will be run by scousers, cockneys and Brummies whose parents were "plumbers, receptionists or van drivers"? I don't. But I could be wrong.
Surely this is atypical. A more representative lead would be “Exposed:BBC role in Labour’s plot etc.”
It is a sad decline for what was once the premier provider of news as opposed to comment.
You are right to say there is now something rabid about the paper. It is interesting that The Times, which has stuck more strongly to reporting facts not prejudices,has been far more successful in recent years.
Even The Times has been sliding down into ‘soft’ features with a preoccupation with people’s sex lives. There’s more and more lightweight drivel - sub-Daily Mail drivel.
Sadly, all too true. But at least it hasn't gone completely over to the dark side. As Roisin remarked above, the FT (for which I worked for seven years) is now, by some way, the best newspaper in Britain.
I don’t think it hurts to add soft features to get more readers, at least on the web which is the only place I see it or any papers.
Trying to leave aside axes to grind, that strikes me as a first class analysis, Walter. Your assessment of what's become of Le Journal du Dimanche since it's lurch towards the French far right would be worth reading, too.
I subscribed to the JdD the week before it changed hands. A rum do.
Oddly, something similar has happened to "die Welt am Sonntag", under the (newish?) ownership of Stefan Aust. Who is a genuinely rum cove.
Same thing happening at The Times. The Guardian is full of 'lifestyle' features. The FT is the only UK daily worth reading.
I know. And I left it to join the Telegraph.
I remember sitting next to Tam Dalyell on a flight from Edinburgh to London one morning shortly after the end of the Iraq war.
I was reading The Guardian, and he was reading The Telegraph, which - given that he was a labour peer – surprised me more than a little.
As we rose from our seats to leave the plane, I passed him my copy of the Guardian because there was a good story in it about the use of depleted uranium shells - a subject on which I knew he was well informed – and asked why he was reading the Telegraph. “Oh it’s the only trustworthy paper”, he replied.
On its news pages, it followed the facts. Even on politics, it gave space to both sides. And there are still traces of that today. But its view of the world has become both toxic and distorted. A great shame.
It is indeed a sad state of affairs Walter. But, as an erstwhile occasional reader of this once great paper - if only because it fell into my parents’ doormat daily and because the sport section was quite good - I’m not sure I really care?
So it’s gone to the dogs; so it’s desperately trying to hang onto a diminishing readership and make a profit….but it’s a (notionally) free market?
I now inwardly chuckle when I see people reading the Telegraph - like I do when I see my beloved Uncle Ken with his daily digest of the Express AND the Mail! He’s a bit bonkers and slightly to the right of Attila the Hun but I’d defend his right to be so.
So let it prevail. Who cares? Keep writing objective, quality comment elsewhere. Thanks for doing so!
I'm ready to let go. It's just a shame that the paper has ended up like this.
My parents buy the Telegraph. I used to admire it for covering similar stories to the Mail, but in digging up the nuances and caveats in those stories.
The problem, I think, is that unlike the Mail/ Express, it still has that reputation, now undeserved. So when the DT states that Alison Connolly is a political prisoner and victim of two-tier justice, with no mention of her having pled guilty, that's dangerous. I think we've lived in a genuine liberal democracy for so long that we've forgotten how fragile and counter-intuitive a form of government they are - we have to actively defend them.
Thanks Walter agreed.
Do you remember when the telegraph and the mail et cetera used to get furious about people “talking Britain down”?
Absolutely. I think the Telegraph's current view is that Britain is finished unless it elects Nigel Farage as PM, who then deports hundreds of thousands of immigrants to God knows where. It has no shame.
It strikes me that the Telegraph, Mail etc are turning into the equivalent of the drunk old guy in the pub. Loosing relevance in a world of online news, they started spouting random stuff from the corner. When that didn’t work, they’ve started shouting increasingly outrageous things just to get attention. With any luck they’ll get barred soon.
The thing about Ambrose is that he may be as nutty as a fruit cake but he also has, or had, a sweet golf swing
... and sometime in the next fifty or a hundred years he may be right about the euro.
In my youth the Telegraph was read by the educated classes, today it attempts to cater for the bigoted classes in a forlorn attempt to keep readers. It should have gone down with the Empire.
I was an early adopter of the Sunday Telegraph when it first appeared in 1961. I used to pick up a copy on my way home from mass. I read the Daily avidly during the Thorpe trial because I was working in Ashton-under-Lyne and the Guardian was not available. The Telgraph was good on juicy trials.
Oh yes. An eventful day in court was worth a thousand extra sales.
Newspapers are so last century. What you need, Walter, is a subscription to TikTok.
NOOOoooooooooo
I am always surprised by how weird the Telegraph headlines are. One my own posts:
https://open.substack.com/pub/flash100/p/murky-waters?r=5ce9t5&utm_medium=ios
Much as I am not a fan of the Telegraph, you don’t say in the article what is wrong with some of the articles you’ve posted. For example, the one about civil service internships appears to be true and was also reported by the BBC.
What is true is that Labour want to make it easier for working class applicants to get civil service internships. This is NOT the same thing as saying that interneships will in future be retricted to to working class applicants or that success could depend on the jobs held by applicants' parents when they were 14.
But that’s exactly what the BBC reported.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3ez3v9v8jqo.amp
I am forced to admit that the Telegraph was not the only news site to report this story – though none gave it the same prominence.Do you believe that the future civil seriice will be run by scousers, cockneys and Brummies whose parents were "plumbers, receptionists or van drivers"? I don't. But I could be wrong.