Wednesday 9 December 2015

Fun while it lasted


Eureferendum.com is having a hard time fighting off the tedium and predictability of it all. I am having similar problems. If it were my job to fisk crap journalism on EU matters then I'd be a million years behind in my workload. There is too much of it to absorb, all of which is white noise. It's bleak.

It even seems like a chore lampooning Leave.EU. I've come to the conclusion that they are so far off the rails they have ceased to be serious players. They are fast becoming a parody of themselves. What more could I add? My spoof above is a bit too close to the bone.

I'm not saying it has to be a po-faced and corporate operation with no sense of humour but there needs to be a little sophistication behind it otherwise it's just adding to the noise. I'm not the only one to notice that it's gone a bit Monty Python recently. And not in a good way.

At this point even if they did land the lead campaign designation from the electoral commission it won't do them any good. What matters is whether they are getting a message out. Cleverdick memes churned out by the dozen are easily forgotten. It is ideas that lodge in the mind and in that respect, because Leave.EU is not intelligence lead, it is largely a futile operation. It's also not going to hit the mark either. Leave.EU is a paper tiger.

If you throw enough money at newspaper adverts and online advertising, eventually some of it will stick, but in real terms, I know from experience that Facebook likes and clickthroughs are worthless. You may reach your audience but you do not necessarily change their minds. Arron Banks is wasting at least half of his cash.

So you might as why I do attack Leave.EU since they are so useless? To be honest, it's fun. It's the low hanging fruit on those days when I can't be bothered with anything more serious. They take it in good humour, unlike Ukippers who are just nasty articles. Banks may be useless but he's a very likeable fellow and takes it on the chin.

In the end though, Banks and Co can be as crass as they like, but in the pecking order of who gets the most flack now, they have to get in the queue. We are on the slow wind down to Christmas, but in the new year when we come out fighting, Leave.EU will be an amusing distraction for coffee breaks rather than the centre of attention. If you see me attacking them it's because I'm slacking off. Banks is yesterday's news.

There is a more serious problem to attend to now. It doesn't matter who wins the electoral commission designation now because the media have largely decided for all of us that Vote Leave is the establishment voice and that is where they will look for opinions, largely ignoring any genuine activity by and from the people.

That is a problem. Vote Leave Ltd is equally inept, but a larger threat to our chances by way of their privileged position. You could engage in critiques of Vote Leave so that they might up their game, but they see themselves as superior beings who should not have to engage with plebs from outside the M25 - and will not respond to it. In that regard I detest them as much as Arron Banks does.

Vote Leave Ltd is entirely an exclusive operation and hugely malevolent. They think the referendum is their own personal property - and will not only ignore others in the game but also actively sabotage them. Their primary concern is their next sinecure after the referendum thus will fight to protect their prestige. It's a jobs for the boys operation.

Thus as much as it's engaging to have scraps online with the Remain camps, they are not the real enemy. The media is. They must be reminded that Vote Leave speak only for themselves and are part of the Tory establishment that largely wants to keep us in the EU or has no strong opinion either way. That is why we need a more sophisticated plan of attack.

The soft target in this is the hackosphere on Twitter. Gentle persuasion doesn't work. Hacks don't have the attention span. We have to go around them and undermine them. Make them the object of ridicule. We can't go direct as it just looks like petulance but if genuinely inquisitive readers start questioning their output then they are then forced to account themselves, where they will be mercilessly cut down.

We don't have time to pander to egos or suck up to fragile egos. This isn't an election campaign where we can try again next time. This is a one shot deal and a fight to the death. Consequently, for the time being, the soft target (the media) is the main target - and we must attack their credibility and their prestige. In that, we are not restricted to just EU issues.

Since Leave.EU are our neighbours in this, it would be nice of they kept the noise down just to save us the embarrassment. Self awareness is always a worthy virtue. The smart thing for them to do at the very least is not to piss us off. Believe it or not, we are being quite restrained at the moment. Let's keep it that way shall we?

No comments:

Post a Comment