IndyMedia UK - Corporate media going mad about Mayday

http://uk.indymedia.org/

As an antidote to the press coverage of Mayday, Indymedia UK will focus on the corporate media and their campaign of misinformation, while presenting an alternative view of Mayday past and present. Mayday 2001 events will also be reported direct from the streets on the main Indymedia UK page.

Last year in the run up to Mayday 2000, the corporate media ran an enormous amount of articles predicting blood in the streets and planned violence worse than that seen on June 18th 1999 in the City of London.

This high level of propaganda was unfounded. Following on from previous articles like the now infamous claim that Reclaim The Streets were stockpiling illegal weapons, the hysteria culminated in headlines like "Army on Standby for Riot".

On the day thousands gathered in Parliament Square, digging up the turf and planting seeds and vegetables, dancing around a maypole and generally partying. After a MacDonald's was attacked by a small number of the crowd moving up Whitehall, police moved forcefully to trap thousands in Trafalgar square, keeping them there for the rest of the afternoon. The fallout of this continued for a few hours and several clashes between police and demonstrators occured (see our M1 2000 subsection for alternative media coverage of Mayday 2000).

This was not the orgy of expected violence reported by the press before Mayday 2000, although given the reporting after the event you could be forgiven for believing it was. Much of the press coverage was fuelled by 'moral outrage' at the graffiti sprayed on the Cenotaph and the colourful redecoration of statues like that of Winston Churchill.

This year the press coverage so far of Mayday 2001 has stayed true to form, predicting severe levels of planned violence targeting the City of London and the police themselves. Reporting has included a high degree of sensationalism, startling inaccuracies and utterly confused dates (perhaps revealing the laziness of the corporate media and even the recycling of copy from last year?).

As an antidote to this coverage Indymedia UK will focus on the corporate media and their campaign of misinformation, while presenting an alternative view of Mayday past and present.

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