Media & online policy

Summary and Aims of our policy.

It is an absolute core value of Everyone is God that the truth is always spoken, and everyone is free from threats and attack of any form. No civilized and functional society can operate without this, and our policies uncompromisingly deliver it. Our media and online policy creates a clear and simple set of rules which simplify the process of publishing any material for media companies, organisations, and individuals, they ensure responsible quality reporting, while protecting all people. Far too often false, imbalanced, or attacking information is published. Our policy ensures that anything that is published by anyone, in any form, or on any platform, is the truth, is balanced, respectful to everyone, and is constructive.

Current unresolved issues.

Current legislation is ineffective at ensuring the truth is always published. The media can can put out information which is not true, and it can be difficult and hugely expensive to challenge them in court, making it unlikely for anyone other than the extremely wealthy. The online environment is even more unregulated, anonymous commentators and trolls are able to say whatever disinformation they wish, propagate conspiracy stories, and regularly go to extremes of stalking and death threats, with almost zero chance of being brought to justice. In general there is a culture of rudeness, criticism, disinformation, and attack, that runs through all our media and online platforms.

The second area of problem is the huge imbalance in nearly all reporting, and the obsession with bad news. News reporting is dominated by war, rape, murder, and scandal. It only reports a small proportion of the positive stories of humanity. This presents a highly biased and depressing view of humanity that is demotivating to anyone who wishes to fulfil themselves and make the world a better place.

All of these issues are profoundly destructive to society in general, especially to children; it encourages a biased, sinical and depressed outlook of society, and encourages escalation of all forms of bad behaviour, such as attacking others, violence, and crime.

Our Policy - How it resolves the issues and achieves the aims.

We have four simple laws that ensure all published information is truthful, respectful, and constructive.

Source & evidence. We will introduce legislation to make it mandatory to have to publish the source of all material published, and a record of consent to the full story, from the source, must be kept. This means that it would be illegal to publish stories from unidentified sources with phrases such as 'sources said' or a 'close friend said'. Instead media would have to say 'John Smith said' and have a record of consent from John Smith to the full story. Similarly anyone who claims something is true, must clearly state their evidence for this, so if someone said 'this vaccine is dangerous', they would have to state the piece of research, or other legitimate source, to corroborate their statement.
Speculation. Where someone publishes their speculation about something, they would have to state that it is speculation at the beginning of the article, so that it is clear that it is not fact. Speculation (where there is no factual basis for it) of a negative or damaging nature is strictly illegal, whereas negative stories can be published where there is legitimate evidence for the story, as long as the procedure in point 1 above is followed.
Balance. We will introduce legislation to make it mandatory to have to publish an equal amount of positive and negative stories in all professional media, unless there is opt in group which want something other than this.
Respect and constructiveness. All communication of any form must be respectful, well mannered, kind, and constructive. Any form of destructive, attacking, mocking, or rude reporting is strictly illegal, under our Supreme Law Policy.

The effect of these policies would be to benefit media companies who publish material, all the people that they write about, and those that consume the media. It would mean that companies could never be accused of printing something that is false, as they would have a verified statement of their source. This means they would save considerable amounts of time, money, and stress involved in dealing with complaints, and ultimately fighting very expensive court cases. Their sources and the people they write about are fully protected against incorrect reporting, as there is a consensual audit trail of all material published, and so to therefore is the consumer. The net result is that it will be very rare that anything false, unreasonably damaging, or derogatory is ever published, and if it is, there is immediately a source that will have to be accountable for it. The policies therefore protect everyone, and ensure that media companies work to high standards that promote balanced, factual, reporting with high social consciousness.

Ultimate policy.

Our ultimate policy is to bring these four laws to any communication of any form, and the entire online environment, so that everyone is protected at all times, this is something that requires full accountability of everyone who uses the web. To achieve this, we would bring in legislation so that whenever someone logs on to any electronic media of any form, this can only be done with a traceable public profile, see our Public Database Policy. This would ensure that any posting online, or online activity, is immediately traceable, and therefore the person who is the source of the activity is always accountable for their activity. As soon as this link is made, it is a simple matter to ensure that the law is followed and enforced during all online activity and through our Criminal Justice Policy, see examples below. This would immediately bring to an end nearly all disinformation, trolling, threats, manipulation, conspiracy stories, rudeness, and attack in the online environment.

As with all ultimate policies, solving fundamental problems requires fundamental change in the values of people. In this case, society would need to make a clear and simple choice to prioritise accountability and transparency over privacy. Realistically we would also need a single world leader in order to be able to safeguard the entire online environment, even in any single country. If humanity were to make this simple choice, everyone on the planet would be protected, and the truth would be spoken kindly and respectfully about everyone, at all times, and in all circumstances, both in the media and online. This would bring profound benefits to society, and change global consciousness.

Examples.

Someone is rude about you on social media, and uses offensive language to insult you. You follow the correct procedure (which will be taught in schools), you write back to them, and politely ask them to withdraw their comment, apologise, and assure you that they will not repeat this behaviour. They decline to do so. You then follow procedure and report the incident to the police, directing them to the post on social media. The Police can immediately access this post, and trace it to the source. The post breaks a number of laws in our supreme law such as the law of respect and manners, and there is immediate and conclusive evidence (the post) that the accused has committed a crime. The Police write to the criminal advising them that they have committed a crime, the penalty for the crime is a £1000 fine, and the investigation and costs of dealing with the crime are £125. They advise the criminal why they have committed a crime, and to take down the post immediately. They also order that the criminal to make another post on social media explaining that they have committed the crime, to make a written apology to the victim, along with assurances that it will not be repeated. They also order the criminal to attend 20 hours of therapy at £65 per hour (which the criminal will have to pay for), to establish why the criminal sought to attack the victim, and resolve properly the underlying psychological cause of their behaviour.

A company develops a new drug, which is fully tested and licenced through the authorities. An individual places a post on social media saying the drug is dangerous, and causes cancer. The company asks the individual politely why they have made this post, and what is the evidence they have for their statement. The individual does not respond, and so the company follows correct procedure, and reports the individual to the police on suspicion of misinformation. The police write to the individual, asking for their evidence for their statement, the individual does not have any evidence, and so the police fine the individual £1000 plus costs of the investigation, for the crime of misinformation. They advise the criminal why they have committed a crime, and to take down the post immediately. They also order the criminal to make another post on social media explaining that they have committed the crime, to make a written apology to the company, along with assurances that it will not be repeated. They also advise the individual that they will need to attend 5 hours of training, at £65 per hour, to learn how to correctly present the truth when communicating with people.

In the examples above, the criminals agree with the police a payment plan for all their costs and fines. If the criminals unreasonably do not meet the payment plan and therapy/training schedules, they will be placed in prison, where they will have to pay all costs for their time there, and their rehabilitation. All fines go to the police, and relevant compensation goes to victims, and this means that all these proceedings do not cost the tax payer one penny; the police and criminal justice system is entirely self funding. All the criminals would have been aware of every aspect of the law and criminal justice procedure long before committing their offences, as they would have been extensively educated on it throughout their entire schooling.

We trust this explains how serious we are about correct moral behaviour, ensuring that everyone is treated with full respect, is fully protected with the truth, and that everyone is held accountable, at all times.

Cost savings of this policy.

The costs savings of this policy are the total saving created by the reduction in the time, money, and stress related to all incorrect or attacking activity of people in the media and online. This includes all the resources used on all sides, i.e. the media companies, the public who might pursue complaints, the lawyers who represent or defend the complaints, the judges, the doctors who deal with stressed patients, etc, the list is long. It is also the cost savings to the tax payer of the investigation of all disinformation crime. It is difficult to put a figure on these, and we do not have the resources to do this currently, so we therefore use the following highly speculative estimates, which we intend to revise as resources allow:

Nationally - Given the large cost of single cases such as the Prince Harry phone hacking case, we estimate hundreds of millions or possibly billions can be saved, and then spent on public services, and improved standard of living, rather than on pursuing complaints.

Globally - We estimate tens of billions or possibly hundreds of billions can be saved, and then spent on public services, and improved standard of living, rather than on pursuing complaints.

Supporting policies.

In uncompromisingly following the Everyone is God mission statement and solving all the issues we have in our media and online environment, we as humans have to re-educate ourselves, change our priorities, who we are, and what we believe is the correct course of action. Only then can we make the fundamental changes in our society, which solve the problems, and fulfil our dreams. Education is key in this process, and our policy is to provide this education throughout all stages of schooling, and throughout all of adult life. This is so that everyone has a clear understanding of exactly what solves the problems, and feels united in the solution. This education starts here, and an understanding of all the supporting policies below is essential in order for our Media & Online Policy to work.

Transparent Truth Policy

Freedom of Speech Policy

Supreme Law Policy

Public Database Policy

Law & it's practice Policy

Criminal Justice Policy

Education Policy