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Is #kerryout the Future of Campaigning?
Posted by Sara Scarlett (@sscrltt)
Monday, 4th January 2010
Today marked the launch of the #kerryout campaign. New Labour’s poster girl for New Media, Kerry McCarthy, is being fought in an increasingly heated battle by her own weapon of choice: Twitter.com.
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However, there have been cries of foul play. Naturally the Left have counter-attacked and there have been accusations of “bullying” and “playground tactics”. It’s not bullying at all, in fact, but it is negative campaigning. Why, for instance, is the campaign #kerryout rather than #shafiin (Adeela Shafi is McCarthy’s Conservative opponent in Bristol East). It essentially boils down to the fact that McCarthy was the first to stick her head above the new media parapet where the more experienced and well-funded snipers are the opposition.
Regardless of the content, as a style of campaign there can be no doubt about its effectiveness. For the effort and expense required (a website and a video of clips mashed together with some music) coupled with a pre-existing party fundraising mechanism (myconservatives.com) the campaign has been documented by all aspects of the blogosphere. Pithy video-clips can be made without much expertise in the space of an afternoon and there is potential that they can go viral and get airtime on television.
Ultimately the true test of this battle will be whether Kerry is, indeed, ousted at the next General Election. If she is not it will be due to the public adverse reaction to a negative campaign rather than to the methods and mediums used. Make no mistake, although it is a shame that the first example of this type of campaigning is a negative one, we are seeing the future of campaigning.
