The Media Studies student with a basic knowledge of how audiences consume media texts will tell you all about the famed Hypodermic Needle Model. This was a theory that came into prominence in the 1920s that suggested audiences passively digest information without question. As this era ushered in the use of propaganda by the Soviets and later the Nazis, it was more or less accepted that people could be manipulated into thinking what the ‘powers-that-be’ wanted them to believe.
Tag Archives | Torres
What’s The Point Of Scottish Football?
The ignominy of seeing one of Britain’s biggest and most successful clubs this week finally accepting the grim reality of administration was one thing. Glasgow Rangers’ humiliation however, paled in comparison when the disparity that exists within Scottish football became glaringly apparent when the club had ten points deducted for its failure to balance the books. The upshot of this was in many respects the biggest indictment of football north of the border. Rangers were left trailing archrivals Celtic by fourteen points but nevertheless maintaining a nine point cushion of comfort from third placed Motherwell. The remainder of the season will inevitably be just a dull procession.
Nick Hornby Ruined My Life
Dispatch No. 100
If you want someone to blame for the ninety-nine Dispatches that have preceded this one, blame Nick Hornby. It was never meant to last this long, you know. It was just something to have a bit of fun with. You weren’t meant to read any of these things I’ve written. I’m riddled by my own obsession with putting a semi-cogent piece of writing together every Sunday. And to cap it all off, an Arsenal fan has done this to me.
Oligarchs Prefer Blondes
The final part in the loose ‘Chelsea trilogy’ of Dispatches seems to have pinpointed the root of Fernando Torres’ current woes.
He may end the season with a Champions League medal dangling round his neck. He might go on to score over thirty goals in the Premier League with a record haul of hat-tricks. He might even gratefully receive an approving thumbs-up from a famously impassive Russian. But no matter what he does, Fernando Torres’ horrific miss in front of the Stretford End will forever feature in various Christmas cash-in blooper DVDs fronted by an assortment of ‘funnymen’ like Michael McIntyre or footballing ‘characters’ like Ian Wright.
The Ring Of Fire
“Heat cannot be separated from fire or beauty from the Eternal,” the Italian poet Dante Alighieri told us back in the Middle Ages. His masterwork, The Divine Comedy, inextricably binds him with the image of fire as a means of suffering and purification that so many people of religious persuasion perceive to be the conventional depiction of hell.
Attack of the Clones
Hero: noun (person) – a person who is admired for having done something very brave or having achieved something great. Cambridge English Dictionary.
Fernando Torres was tellingly substituted in the 58th minute of tonight’s local derby between Portugal and Spain after failing once again to re-capture the goal-scoring brilliance that makes him such a prized asset for his club side whilst Cristiano Ronaldo, rightfully and sadly in equal measure, is on his way home. He will be joining a litany of heralded casualties that have failed to live up to the hype that has been heavily bestowed upon them prior to the first kick of a ball in South Africa. The question that comes foremost to the mind is, why have the game’s supposed ‘big names’ so miserably failed to produce the mesmeric magic that so many had hoped they would?
-
In Defence Of Luis Suarez by Rachael Singh
-
What’s The Point Of Scottish Football?
-
Captain Caveman: The De-evolution of John Terry
-
Alan Davies Is Here All Week
-
Liverpool Football Club, 1892 – 2012 – An Obituary
Subscribe / Connect
Make sure you don't miss any Dispatches by staying connected.
