The tabloid BILD is the country’s most powerful medium – even in the age of the internet. It determines what’s discussed in Germany. To what extent is the editorial team contributing to the rise of populists? How does it treat minorities? And in what ways does it manipulate the public?
Journalists Mats Schönauer and Moritz Tschermak have been observing and analyzing how BILD works for a decade. As the former and current editor-in-chief of the multi-award-winning BILDblog, they tirelessly uncover the tabloid’s editorial team’s misdeeds. They find that, under BILD’s new boss Julian Reichelt, the paper has become even more brutal, inhumane, and populist. Using hundreds of examples and evidence – meticulously researched and written up with analytical acumen – they explain how BILD systematically stirs up fears of anything foreign, destroys the reputation of innocent people, deliberately torpedoes democratic institutions, and has helped the rightwing AfD party into the Bundestag.
They give victims of the coverage a chance to speak and talk to people who know BILD from the inside. An exciting record of the work of a medium that has no regard for consequences.
