The author's dystopia "Pilgrim Process" features a tactic used by the would-be dystopian regime when it wants to make abrupt and profound changes to society, such as the introduction of multifunction ID cards and capital punishment. (The political consensus is against capital punishment until one day it strangely isn't.) There is an orchestrated outpouring of spin, not just from those one might expect to campaign for a change, but also from those whom the public might trust never to do so. Politicians suddenly reverse a position they have held to all their life, newspapers change allegiance and not only is there an overwhelming volume of spin all of a sudden, but it is all coordinated and dozens of apparently unconnected commentators and organizations speak as one. This may ring a bell with anyone who's experienced the current barrage of anti-Brexit spin put out by David Cameron's "Remain" campaign and its many unexpected friends around the world. Newspapers suddenly backing a position at odds with their reader's habitual preferences may strike a chord with anyone who has seen a copy of the Mail on Sunday recently, with its increasingly fanatical pro EU slant so totally at odds with its mainly Eurosceptic readership and the weakly proBrexit stance of its weekday sister paper, the Daily Mail.
In the nineteen forties, George Orwell wrote of "words falling on the issues like snow". This is more like a violent hailstorm, but the truth and the real issues are still apt to get buried.
This hailstorm of propaganda is not a panic reaction, because it was David Cameron and nobody else who decided that there would be a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union in the first place. Mr Cameron went out of his way to court a debate, upon which he has poured out spin like a biblical plague. What's being decided here is not whether or not the UK will leave the EU, but whether or not any important issue will ever again see a civilized and reasoned debate. It is nearly impossible for anyone but the government to win a "debate" conducted in this manner. The number of individuals and organizations which are orchestrated into a perfect storm of propaganda is too great for anyone less than a government to pull it off. The opposition are left trying to wave banners in the teeth of a hurricane.
PS:
Pro Brexit campaigners have tried to raise the issue of Turkey joining the European Union, only to be slapped down with the line that Turkish membership is "probably" decades away. This is revealing, because it's certainly not being said that Turkey will not join. Until recently it was German policy that Turkey should not join, but certain difficulties with Russia may have made the powerful Turkish army suddenly welcome in the peace loving EU.
PPS: The vote was for Brexit, of course. However, the dystopian spin hasn't gone away and Tony Blair, for example, has repeatedly declared that the electorate will change their minds and be given another vote, where they will of course vote to remain in the European Union and sign up for any and all of its new schemes and wheezes. It's extraordinary.
PPS: The vote was for Brexit, of course. However, the dystopian spin hasn't gone away and Tony Blair, for example, has repeatedly declared that the electorate will change their minds and be given another vote, where they will of course vote to remain in the European Union and sign up for any and all of its new schemes and wheezes. It's extraordinary.
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