Newspapers don’t publish

Newstands and paper racks across the world were utterly bare yesterday, after news organisations worldwide failed to publish a single newspaper because “nothing bad happened”.

“As we all know, traumatic, horrifying, shallow or fear-mongering stories are our bread and butter,” said News Media Expert Ngud Gnuus. “But yesterday, there was no war, no famine, no murder, no rapes, no burglaries, no car accidents… nothing. How can we make a 24-page newspaper if no one dies or does something that makes you want to draw the curtains, stay locked indoors all day or just straight-out kill yourself?”

Gnuus went on to say that, despite the ever-worsening conflict in the Gaza strip and between Israel and Palestine, deeping strife and socioeconomic disparities across the seven continents and rampant crime rates, there was somehow nothing bad enough happening out of which to make an endlessly repeating loop of controversy and stern-anchored news coverage.

“It makes no sense, we know, but nothing bad happened. Usually there are any thousands of examples which we can shock and horrify you with, but yesterday it was only good stuff. How can we possibly sell papers with that?”

However, some newspapers have decided to rise to the challenge, releasing small online reports in spite of yesterday’s paucity of source material.

“We’ve decided to put a different spin on it,” said Editor of CNN Deborah Hardings. “We have headlines like World braces itself for inevitable explosion of crime, death and Bus full of School kids will definitely careen off road into ravine and blow up tomorrow, say experts. If the news media knows one thing, it’s how to turn no story into the top story of the day. Just look at any news story where our cameras and microphones are outside in the street or at a press conference or even outside a hospital where a royal baby is about to be born. Usually in these spots, we are just waiting for something to happen. That’s news, baby.”

Muse and Abuse will keep you updated today, as more nothing happens.

ISIS launches “most successful recruitment videos yet”

Following on from previous successful recruitment strategies and PR tactics, fundamentalist Jihadist group ISIS has today announced the launch of their most successful series of calls to anti-West, anti-Imperialist arms yet.

“All those scary bomb videos and grunts training with ak47s and rolling in the dust, leopard-crawling under barbed wire and past burning tyres, these only go so far,” said head of the pro-Islamic-caliphate movement Thea Rorrist. “If you really want to instil a burning, irrevocable hatred for all things American and its deluded, privileged, detestable citizens, then you have to go that extra mile.”

As such, ISIS is delighted to announce the release of American Idol Season 426 and America’s Got Talent Season 283. It has reportedly been a resounding victory.

“I was watching TV the other day when [the ISIS recruitment videos] came on,” said one American man. “After just four minutes of that pretentious, exploitative ‘it’s my dream’ crap, and all that shallow, deluded narcissism guided by a desire to be worshiped by thousands for being what is actually a talentless shmuck, even I, a God-fearing, rootin’, tootin’ Texan, was denouncing the hedonism of my culture and calling for the death of all American men and women.”

Media analysts agree.

“If we look closely at the hateful, pro-extremist-Islam propaganda, we see tropes designed for maximum effect,” said Television studies lecturer Harold Cress.

“Every four seconds, we are battered with stirring, nationalistic music and endless images of waving American flags. You know, scenes more patriotic than an exploding, bible-clawing, red-white-and-blue Bald Eagle shooting laser beams out of its eyes and ejaculating furiously on a pile of nukes and Chevy trucks emblazoned with the words ‘democracy’, ‘liberty’ and ‘freedom’.”

These images were enhanced by other hate-mongering tactics.

“Then they add little inserts, like the glaringly knee-jerk emotional shallowness of having an obviously-ineligible four-year-old child singing Home of the Free for the AW-factor, and the talentless douche judges who have even less singing or acting ability than those they scorn and deride, not to mention the sickening product-placement. Really, it makes my machete-hand very twitchy indeed.”

In spite of some controversy over the images, ISIS remains steadfast that these depictions of American culture are far less horrific than than they how the West portrays their particular ideologies.

“Hell, the media might give us a bad rep, but at least we don’t belittle people and destroy their hopes and dreams before we behead them," said Rorrsit. “We like to think we’re a little more respectful than that.”

ISIS would like to thank CNN, BBC and Sky News for giving them an audience of millions of readers, listeners, and viewers on dozens of different channels, formats and social media platforms to spread their messages and videos across the globe.