The Listening Post

Fidel Castro: Contested legacy, competing narratives

We analyse the competing narratives around Fidel Castro; plus, the UK’s new surveillance law, the ‘Snoopers’ Charter’.

On The Listening Post this week: Analysing the competing narratives around Fidel Castro. Plus, the UK’s wide-ranging new surveillance law that’s being called the ‘Snoopers’ Charter’.

Remembering Castro: A contested legacy

In death, as in life, Fidel Castro presented journalists with a quandary – some considered him a revolutionary hero, others saw him as a repressive tyrant. We look at the competing media narratives around Castro’s legacy.

Talking us through the story: Ann Louise Bardach, journalist and author; Fernando Ravsberg, journalist and blogger; Juan Tamayo, former reporter, Miami Herald; and Sergio Gomez, international editor, Granma newspaper.

On our radar:

The Associated Press, one of the world’s largest news organisations, has issued a directive in which it asked all its journalists to provide context when using the increasingly popular term “alt-right”.

A Moroccan television channel had to mount a damage-control operation after it aired a bizarre segment on how women can conceal the signs of domestic violence with make-up.

Six journalists in Tajikistan, all associated with the US-funded Radio Free Europe, have had their press cards revoked, after allegedly publishing stories that listed governmental positions granted to members of President Emomali Rahmon’s family.

2016 or 1984? The UK’s new surveillance law

The UK government’s new Investigatory Powers Bill – branded the ‘Snooper’s Charter’ by critics – provides the security services and police with sweeping new powers to surveil the British people. It codifies the monitoring and tracking of communications data. So why didn’t the media make more noise?

Talking us through the story: Madhumita Murgia, European technology correspondent, Financial Times; Duncan Campbell, investigative reporter; David Omand, former director, GCHQ; Carly Nyst, human rights lawyer; and Jason Parkinson, freelance video journalist.