Listen to the Satirists

Here's why we should listen to the satirists - How satirists generally have their ears to the ground and their hand on the pulse

It might be an unfamiliar contention for some, but satirists in recent years have demonstrated a remarkable ability to extricate themselves from mainstream media’s narratives and forge their own path to not just do their jobs but play the role journalists should be matching up to. In fact, the best journalists are satirists… Again, though a little out there, bear with me - one of the founding tenets of satirical publishing is to speak truth to power. In an interview for my dissertation on the subject, a prominent cartoonist summarised this singularly truth-speaking function to me, and it’s something that I’ve held dear to me ever since, keeping it in mind at all stages of my writing and drawing. We’ve seen this uttering of truth to power most prominently in Private Eye, even if the magazine format rather demeans the nature of the news it presents. As our press consider such inanities as which scantily clad model from Page 3 is partnered to Joe Wicks now, Private Eye doesn’t get the recognition it deserves. Ian Hislop, editor of Private Eye, has been ploughing his own furrow since 1986, undeterred by the media frenzy that surrounds him and his Fleet Street milieu on a daily basis. 

As the mainstream media finally cotton on to the idea that their musings over “mass-murderer” Lucy Letby may well have been wrong or fabricated through coercion, another medical doctor had a peculiarly different diagnosis. Dr Phil Hammond, former GP and associate specialist in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, outlined his case in a compelling fashion in the July 2024 issue of Private Eye Magazine, the same month that Letby was sentenced to her fate.

The same issue arises should you cast your mind back to the Post Office scandal. Whilst the masterful reporting of Computer Weekly cannot be ignored, Private Eye again did a formidable job in elaborating on the information and expanding the audience that information reached. I am not for a moment trying to undermine journalists in my appraisals here, however, our press is often reactionary in how it approaches subjects, seeking to gain the insight of people who aren’t subject matter experts but are given to pretending that they are, as the friendly wolf draped in sheep’s clothing. We need to ensure that our media is accountable and if that means bowing to the satirical gods, then so be it. 

In a mad world, only satire is sane. This is because it touches the issues at their roots, ensuring that they unearth all that bubbles under the subject’s surface before reporting. Why would you go to this much trouble for a satirical story? Because facts matter when you’re taking the piss. If you don’t have all the information, then how can you credibly mock the story? Something might come up because sometimes news is stranger than fiction, and then your story is back to square one. 

This is where Private Eye reporters get it right. People like the late, great Paul Foot whose work on the Birmingham Six led to a miscarriage of justice being overturned, and Doctors like the aforementioned Phil Hammond, who seek to evidence their articles with something so passé as actual journalism, are people that our less factual commentators (cough, Alison Pearson, splutter, Rod Liddle, gag, Richard Littlejohn), don’t tend to pay a second’s notice to. And this is why Private Eye manages to get it so right, because it does its journalism in an under the radar manner. 

Journalists shouldn’t be renowned, they shouldn’t make the news, and yet so often we have these rent-a-quote commentators available 24/7 days a week, whilst the names of the journalists I report on in this article don’t even approach being household names. People like Richard Brooks, who with his work in Private Eye co-authored their Post Office exposé are names that we should know. They should be on Question Time speaking truth to power, because speaking truth to power (satire) is how you get information. Satire is journalism and journalism is satire, so to toss Private Eye aside as a satirical publication is to ignore and invalidate the great contribution that it has made to our society. You might not believe what I have written in this article, but next time you see a scandal, search it up with the words Private Eye on the interweb and it’ll be there in black and white, along with lots of funny cartoons.

Image: Flickr/Raph_PH

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