Writing in Spiked, Tim Black reviews the falsehoods being peddled by Prime Minister Keir Starmer to rationalize the UK government’s latest campaign to impose digital identification throughout the country. Each previous such scheme, Black notes, was presented as solving the most pressing of the day – and proved a costly boondoggle. Starmer’s current pitch is that digital I.D. will cut down on illegal immigration, which is laughable given his government’s inaction on that topic.
The Medium is Not the Message
Ann Coulter skewers the conventional wisdom that social media cause (rather than reflect) social disorder. Whether it’s newfangled television or crazy rock n’ roll lyrics, Coulter writes on her personal website, “Older generations are always alarmed by whatever new thing young people are doing,” adding this likely dates back to “when cavemen hectored their cave children to stop making dolls out of clay.” Those who today blame social media for creating mayhem, Coulter argues, miss the key point that it is the content of the message, not the medium, that matters most.