| Internet takes no prisoners The smears and digs are up and running in this campaign.By PATRICK MALONEY, SUN MEDIA |
Brand new ways to embarrass, defame and insult politicians have arrived online.
While the Internet is a powerful tool for political campaigns, it's also opened an electronic door for smears and digs at politicians. And from party leaders to riding-level candidates, as one in London learned, no one is immune.
Rarely has that been clearer than during the Ontario campaign, with such Internet websites as YouTube and Wikipedia used to take political attacks to a new low.
"Anybody who takes politics seriously should be appalled by this dumbing-down," said Peter Woolstencroft, a University of Waterloo political scientist.
"It has a corrosive effect on politics. It sort of says that politicians are stupid and clueless."
Woolstencroft was reacting to a pair of short videos -- which some Liberals are quietly promoting -- featuring John Tory gaffes that would have gone completely unnoticed in previous campaigns.
Now, thanks to YouTube, the verbal missteps of the Progressive Conservative leader are available to all voters.
In one, Tory says "por favor" -- Spanish for please -- while using his rusty French skills to respond to a francophone reporter's question.
In the other, he's talking to a young University of Ottawa student, telling him in his day the school was referred to as "U of Zero." The student is less than impressed.
Tim Blackmore, a popular culture expert and media professor at the University of Western Ontario, says the videos are unfair to Tory and hold no value for voters.
"It's bad in the sense that it carries on a culture of confrontation rather than conversation," said Blackmore, who was especially irked by the university clip.
"This is very common, where you're 50 years old and you try to be hip and the kid says, 'What's that?' It happens to me all the time."
On YouTube, the videos are being posted by a user who is also posting official Liberal clips. Asked if he was comfortable with the clips, Premier Dalton McGuinty appeared to distance himself from them.
"When it comes to those things over which I have control, which is the campaign proper, I'm running a positive campaign," he said yesterday.
But the perils don't exist only at the political top. As technology rewrites the book of political dirty tricks, even lower-profile candidates are vulnerable.
This week, a virtual vandal sabotaged London-Fanshawe New Democrat candidate Stephen Maynard by writing sexually explicit insults, including one about fellatio, into his Wikipedia profile.
"It's an attempt to embarrass him," said Shawn Lewis, a Maynard campaign official who stumbled upon the smear.
Wikipedia barely existed during the last Ontario election in 2003, but its explosion in popularity has made it not only a source of information for voters, but also an area of concern for public figures.
The online encyclopedia now boasts more than eight million articles, including personal profiles ranging from little-known actors to legendary criminals and famous athletes. What makes the site unique is contributors are regular citizens who add information and edit out mistakes.
The Maynard attack was added by a user Sept. 15, days after the election was called. It was up about five days before Lewis found it. Wikipedia officials removed the graphic language but couldn't trace the source computer, Lewis said.
For Maynard, it was a political lesson he took in stride.
"It does suggest I'm a target, and that means that I'm a front-runner," he said.
HELPFUL AND HURTFUL
YouTube: A popular website on which viewers can post and broadcast their own videos to the world (youtube.com).
Wikipedia: A contributor-built online encyclopedia; anyone can edit or add to an article (en.wikipedia.org).
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