In early 2017, I just couldn't cope anymore.
I was 23, had just graduated from the University of Essex, an experience that was very difficult and had taken a severe toll on my mental health. The confident person I'd been at the beginning of my degree had been replaced by a shell; I felt unable to look for a job or do much of anything at all, and I was wondering if it had been worth going at all. Outside of me, the world was in deep, deep shit. Theresa May was the Prime Minister, Donald Trump was the President of the USA, we'd voted to leave the EU, we had a decent Labour Party leader but everyone was demonising him, and the country and world seemed to be descending unstoppably into fascism. I was depressed and fed up, seeing no way out of my situation.
But, there was something that really helped... the left-wing news blog The Canary became a real haven for me that year. I got hooked very quickly on this incredible website, run by intelligent and knowledgable people, which told me the news stories I was properly interested in. I read it so often I found I could usually predict which writer had written which article without looking. There were ideas for protests to get involved with, recommendations of good radical musicians like Lowkey, the odd bit of satire in John Shafthauer's occasional Off the Perch segments, editorials by Kerry-Anne Mendoza, James Wright talking about regional politics, Ed Sykes' analysis of what was going on around the world, Steve Topple documenting being the partner of someone with ME (since then, I've entered a relationship with someone who has a close family member with ME, so I'm learning a lot more about it - it's a horrible illness)... I came to learn so much about what was going on, why Jeremy Corbyn was so hated in the mainstream press and why that was unfair, how politicians on TV talk shows were deliberately misleading the public, how the Brexit situation was more complex than just 'in' or 'out', and most importantly of all, that there was hope for the future. I listened to The CanaryPod podcast, exploring the news stories in more depth. Every single article was finished off by a 'Get Involved!' section, listing practical things that I could easily do to help with whatever they were talking about. I've been an active blogger since before The Canary started, but the quality of its writing did definitely improve my ability to write decent and intelligent blogs (my earliest ones are super-cringe!)
The Canary felt like a friend to me - or, more accurately, a wonderful group of friends, a collective of amazing human beings who were standing up against the status quo and sharing information and ideas on how to improve it. This increased in the run-up to the 2017 election, when The Canary held an event at Watershed in my home town of Bristol. I went to it; I was so incredibly depressed at the time, but Kerry-Anne Mendoza's speech actually made me feel more positive. I'll always remember what she said about how humans are brilliant at adapting to their circumstances, but very bad at picturing themselves out of them. However things are at any particular time, it feels like this is how it's always going to be from now on. In the late nineties, before the Iraq War, it felt like the left had won and that 'this party's never going to end' - which of course it did. She then made the comparison to this time period, the one we were in, and how it feels like nothing would ever be hopeful again... but it could be, if we all came together. These words struck a chord with me in a way that very little else ever has; I've wondered if Kerry-Anne knows how much it meant to me. I met her afterwards, and proudly told her that 'I read The Canary all the time, like literally all the time!' (I actually did very little else in those days, I was too depressed to focus on much.) I also spoke to James Wright, John Ranson and plenty of other Canary writers... I felt like a part of something.
And then, we did something amazing. Against all the odds, Theresa May actually lost her majority in that election and Labour made huge gains. All right, it wasn't QUITE enough to bring Jeremy Corbyn to power, but it was close, and it felt like we did that just by being honest, sharing news and making people feel hopeful. It felt like we were on track to winning.
And now it's six years later. It's been a few years since I've read The Canary regularly, I'm doing a lot more with my life now and I simply don't have the time anymore to devote as much energy as I once did, but I still dip in and out from time to time. The management has changed a fair bit since then - Kerry-Anne left in 2021, citing the need to concentrate on her own mental health recovery (which I respect very much respect, mental illness is the worst and I've been there). It's also changed its business model, becoming a co-operative rather than a top-down venture - another thing I respect, it takes a lot of guts to admit that things were wrong before. But something more distasteful has happened to The Canary as well... the quality of journalism has become toxic.
My realising this has been a bit of a long-time coming. I started noticing it when was a little bit disappointed by the lack of actual discussion in this article about Roald Dahl's racism. I have some issues with the way we approach Roald Dahl - he was racist, and it's important that that's addressed, however he was also a complex figure and ahead of his time in some ways (for instance, being staunchly opposed to corporal punishment in schools). Moreover, I find it problematic how we edit his works, supposedly to make them more suitable for a modern audience, and yet continue to promote them like hell. If we really think his legacy is that harmful, we should take the advice of Philip Pullman and just let his books fall out of print, let modern authors get more limelight instead - but of course we won't, because they sell, and we're capitalists at heart. I would have hoped The Canary would explore this side of things a bit more, but they didn't. I was a little disappointed, but not exactly offended - not everything has to be explored from a complex angle.
Then there was this article by John Shafthauer - 'The problem with Just Stop Oil (and how to start fixing it)'. I thought this article made some interesting points, but the thing that really bothered me was that in spite of the headline, there is nothing about how to fix it at all. The whole article is just a list of issues with Just Stop Oil's tactics, before the final sentence 'I’m not going to say how we achieve that, but it won’t be through traffic jams the rich (including politicians) can simply avoid in their private jets.' It's fine to disagree with someone's tactics, including Just Stop Oil - but saying 'I agree with the cause, but not with the method' is what the likes of Piers Morgan and Richard Madeley do. You have to explain what's a better way of doing things if you're going to have any argument at all, and this one just didn't, in spite of saying that it would in the headline. I really didn't think this kind of 'blame protesters for trying to do something' journalism was what The Canary was for.
However, this pales in comparison to how appalled I was by what I read last night. The Canary published this article discussing how killer nurse Lucy Letby was a beneficiary of white privilege. To be clear, I agree that she was, and I even said as much in my previous blog - 'she's an attractive middle-class white girl, which highlights our inherent racism, sexism and classism as a society'. I clicked on this link because I was genuinely interested in this angle. But the article, by Afroze Fatima Zaidi, isn't really about white privilege or how Letby was a beneficiary of it. The overwhelming majority of it is devoted to attacking Novara Media, and in particular the journalists Aaron Bastani and Ash Sarkar, for suggesting that making the issue solely about racism overlooks all the other systemic injustices which meant Letby got away with it for as long as she did. Which is also true - one injustice being in place doesn't mean other injustices aren't.
The article is extremely dishonest. It pretty much says that if Letby had been black, she'd have been spotted and dealt with straight away. This is not provable. There is no example given of a black nurse who did the same thing and was dealt with faster (I don't know if there's ever been a case like this) and even if there was, that doesn't by itself prove that this would happen every time. It may suggest it, but that's not the same as proof. The article also suggests that the journalists it's criticising are saying that racism wasn't a factor. If you actually look through their Twitter feeds, it's quite clear that this is not what they are saying, just that it wasn't the only factor and that it's harmful to suggest that it was. Zaidi also invalidates the experiences of the journalists involved by claiming that they aren't black. I'm not sure what definition of 'black' she's using here - if it's just about skin tone, perhaps they aren't. But Aaron Bastani and Ash Sarkar are both people of colour - Bastani is the son of an Iranian refugee, and Ash Sarkar is of Bengali heritage and is also a Muslim. I think both are more than qualified to talk on the subject of racial discrimination - not that one's individual experiences are the most important, of course, otherwise Suella Braverman and Priti Patel would be more worth listening to on the subject than Jeremy Corbyn.
But it's the last line of this that really filled me with shock. It ends with 'With allies like this, who needs serial killers?' In this line, Zaidi has likened Ash Sarkar, one of the most feminist, anti-fascist, anti-racist journalists around today, someone who's stood up for Palestinians, for political prisoners, for transgender people, with Lucy Letby, someone who did the worst things imaginable to the most vulnerable people. This is something I'd be appalled by if it was in The Sun, never mind in a news outlet that used to be cutting-edge and prided itself on standing up for the most vulnerable. Even if I'm wrong, even if Aaron Bastani and Ash Sarkar have messed up this time, it's obvious from their past work that they're good people. You can criticise them honestly and politely, rather than this vicious attack-dog style. This kind of article actually makes me wonder if Afroze Fatima Zaidi is on the far-right. It reads like something that the far-right think that the left believe, rather than what we actually campaign for.
Why is there no decent analysis anymore? What happened to the fearless organisation that highlighted the stories the mainstream media were scared to print, that did exposés on the way mainstream politicians were silencing the left, that spelled out the plight of junior doctors, that talked about mental health, racism, sexism, climate change, protest, campaigns - and hope? What happened to all of that stuff? What happened to the 'Get Involved' side of The Canary (none of the articles I've linked to have this anymore)? What happened to The Canary's Facebook page? Why is it posting articles from years ago, rather than about what's happening now? Why is it trying to turn us against other left-wing outlets like Novara Media? Why do we have articles that read more like they're in The Sun or The Daily Mail?
I've tried to find out, and I can find very little discussion about this online. Maybe it was Kerry-Anne Mendoza personally who held it together, and since she's gone the passion has too (I hope not, as there were so many Canary writers I used to appreciate). Maybe the mood in the news room has gone down now we no longer have a decent leader of the opposition. Maybe it's the Facebook algorithm meaning it gets less traffic. Maybe they've been threatened by someone important and they don't have the energy to stand up to it. Maybe it's a combination of all these things. Maybe it's something I haven't even thought of. Or maybe it's just inevitable that decent news outlets decline over time.
I don't know what it is, But if anyone who works for the Canary reads this (and I'll be sending this article to them, as well as to Kerry-Anne Mendoza) - I beg you, please, please get your act together. The world is even worse now than it was in 2017. More urgently than ever, we need something like what the Canary used to be. Not just for the quality of journalism and the importance of knowing what's going on, but for the hope. In 2017, the Canary gave me hope and helped me manifest it. It doesn't do that anymore.
Realising how bad the Canary has become, when it meant so much to me in the past, is almost like grieving for someone who's died. I'm sad, and I feel quite angry. But I think I will not let that emotion dominate. I'm stronger now than I was in the past, and I'm more capable of making my own way and trying to make a difference. So I'm going to leave you with the Canary's old motto, something that I haven't heard in a long time: 'Don't get angry, get involved.'
Update: Since writing this blog, the editing team at the Canary has been in touch with me. It was only a short message and didn't go into much detail, but they were very kind and seem keen to talk to me about these issues and work to improve. I must admit I wasn't expecting them to be as open and co-operative as this, but I'm glad they have been. I really hope it leads to something positive.
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