Politicians giving TV interviews seems somewhat antiquated at this point. The questions are pre-approved by the politicians team and are often just layups for them to bash their opponent, plug some bullshit they showed up to, and repeat some talking points.
For these reasons in recent years it has become common for politicians to make appearances on independent media, specifically content creators. This has been adopted widely in the states with some politicians having their own podcast’s and constantly collaborating with creators on their side of the political spectrum. This is most common amongst senators and smaller scale candidates but the most popular cases of this is Bernie Sanders on Joe Rogan’s show and Donald on the NELK Boys podcast.
This version of interview offers a great medium for politicians to appear closer to those they represent, with the recent rejection of many mainstream outlets by large portions of the population these viewers have moved to content creators for all forms of entertainment. It is easy to understand people's reason for the distrust of mainstream media, especially when clips like John Bolton admitting to planning Coup's exist. Jake Tapper in this interview watches John Bolton admit to planning coups and does not push him to explain what he just said at all. How, as a journalist with any ounce of integrity, can you allow a former national security advisor to admit to planning coup’s in foreign countries and not make that the whole point of the interview from there on. This clip and others like it show the biases in mainstream media and the reluctance to rock the boat in any way shape or form. Now I think this reluctance to rock the boat stretches to many content creators especially those in the position to interview politicians, but nonetheless viewers trust content creators to give them the truth more.
So, with the turn to creators for content and coverage of elections, how are the Canadian leaders approaching this new battle ground? Well as per usual most are behind the trend with the exception of one fellow. That is Pierre Poilievre the head of the conservative party in Canada who has fully embraced independent media and content creators as a source of media coverage. Now this is not that surprising, the idea of the mainstream media being untrustworthy or biased has been a huge conservative talking point, headed by Donald himself. Now the validity of this criticism is a whole other topic, but I must say the media is equally if not more harsh on any form of progressive politics. Just look at the media’s response to any union strike (i.e Britain’s Rail Strike, CUPE Strike Ontario, or US Rail Strike). But I digress, many on the right have moved away from traditional news coverage and have begun sourcing and creating their own news media.
Pierre in his run up to becoming conservative party leader has done a couple of mainstream media interviews, but his most popular by far was with a content creator known as Jordan Peterson. This interview has over 2 million views which is far and away the most popular video any Canadian candidate has done. If you look up interviews with Justin and Singh it is basically only mainstream media outlets with middling views. This is a distinct advantage Pierre possesses, mainstream media is simply not viewed by many young people, and is not trusted amongst many people in Canada (Mostly right wing voters). It allows him to galvanize and target his specific audience and access new ones, who may be more sympathetic to his rhetoric. Especially because he is doing interviews with creators who have a distinct right wing tilt, but also attract viewers with centrist or maybe even left leaning views.
With Singh and Justin I assume their campaigns have distinct reasons for not appearing on anything except for mainstream media. For Trudeau I assume it is because many Canadians are now completely fed up with his faux working class politics that involves a speech pattern that resembles that of a smooth talking boy from art class in college. For Singh I am honestly not sure why he has not tried to access independent media sources, or at least not any popular ones.
Perhaps these two campaigns are just scared of having a long form interview where persistent questions can be asked regarding their stances on various issues. This is an issue Pierre did not have to face in his interviews because they were some real little league shit, hell I could have answered these questions in a way that would satisfy any conservative in the country. To see a full breakdown of why these interviews were such a walk in the park and why this is dangerous, I have an article coming out next week. Now I must be honest, I imagine Justin and Singh could get an interview set up where it is just as much as a walk in the park as Pierre’s, so why haven’t they?
I wish I had the answer, maybe it is because there are not many clearly progressive podcasts that are popular in Canada, but I imagine they could at least appear on something. Or perhaps it is just because their teams do not see the value in independent media yet. This is a lot of words to talk about how Pierre is more popular on Youtube, but I think it is important.
Over the last few years Pierre has skyrocketed in popularity, partly due to him capturing the attention of young voters. In this article by the CBC they have quotes from young voters talking about how they saw Pierre on social media and his message spoke to them. Pierre’s message is one of change, passion, and direct action, at least on the surface this is the case.
But more importantly I think Pierre has successfully separated himself from being in any way associated with the current state of Canada. Where inflation is crushing the working class who is still recovering from the trauma of COVID. Fear and anger is what is fueling voters and Pierre is speaking to that through his message, and he is getting his message to voters through social media.
This quite simply cannot be said about Singh or Trudeau. Recently I tried to listen to some of Singh’s most recent content on social media and honestly it was rough. Now I generally like Singh and most of his politics, but his social media was very poorly run. Every interview of him is a clip taken from his speeches in the house of commons or from some TV interview he did. This is a mistake for two main reasons. No one watches the house of commons for a reason, it is fucking mind numbing, convoluted, and in no way entertaining. The second reason is that you have to speak in a certain way for TV and for discussions in the House of Commons, you cannot send fiery jabs at your opponents or even speak directly to the viewer. By having this be the only medium in which your media is published it makes you come across the same as any other politician.
Once again this cannot be said about Pierre, mostly because the most popular media surrounding him is not even published on his own social media, and is in a completely separate medium than the House of Commons. When he does publish videos of him in the House of Commons it is of his fiery debates with other politicians. This sets him up to be the underdog, the dark horse, the one fighting for change. It is honestly a brilliant social media campaign.
I have not mentioned Justin here much because his social media is the same old same old. Posting about whatever bill he passes in a positive tone, and taking every photo op-chance he can get while spewing the same old appeal to the culture war with one hand and fucking the working class, Indigenous peoples, and environment he claims to support with the other. His entire candidacy for 2025 at this point relies on playing the culture war game well enough to keep his voters in the city happy and paint any who are not staunchly liberal as the enemy. Which won’t work, in my opinion, because any progressive at this point see’s him as a conservative who leans left on the culture war and all conservatives see him as a communist (ridiculous and inaccurate label but they are right to think he sucks).
So is it just Pierre’s savvy social media campaign that has made him so popular amongst youth voters and conservatives as a whole? No, of course not, what has gained him such widespread popularity is the fact that he is not seen as a part of the problem. Singh and especially Justin are, they have been in power during the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent inflation (due to corporate greed not COVID-19 spending) and honestly have not done much to combat the issues Canadians are facing (I put less blame on Singh since he has no majority power).
Pierre is seen as the savior, the new guy who will shake everything up and make major changes to help the working class. And he loves this, he plays into it very well through his rhetoric, but the reality is he is none of those things and will help nobody but the corporation's just like every other conservative politician. He recognizes and talks about the problems but his plans will not solve them, you know why? Because he loves capitalism just as much as the next guy, and no capitalistic approach will get us out of this mess. We need increased taxes of corporations, more workers rights, and more public spending on social safety nets that will help the working class. Plus a myriad of other things but that is an issue for another day, on another article.
I want to close this out by rehashing why Pierre’s domination of the political social media landscape in Canada is so important. Social media has become a key battleground for politicians, if not the battleground, and if Singh, Justin, and other “progressive” leaders don’t realize this, then we may as well call the 2025 election now.
Interested to hear if any readers feel that my criticisms of Singh and Trudeau are valid regarding their lack of innovation and focus on social media.