CNN Censorship and the Saga of Ren Gill

This will be the third and last piece on the topic of Big News and the way it screws people over. The first one dealt with the dismissal of Tucker Carlson from Fox, the second dealt with Lemon getting fired from CNN. And now I’m going to discuss how CNN is trying to destroy Ren Gill, a more recent musician from Britain who has risen to a level of notoriety on the internet for his talent playing an acoustic guitar, his powerful singing voice, and music that mixes many genres into a blend that is, in my opinion, truly unique. He blends rap, classical guitar, a fifties vibe and a seventies grove with just a dash of punk.

I’ve already shared my thoughts on CNN, I will share that link here:

https://wordpress.com/post/tiredmidnightblogger.com/5936

These are the articles I’m going to site:

https://www.reddit.com/r/rengill/comments/12tr9or/ren_fans_go_to_war_with_cnn/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-3485588/Lyme-disease-forces-musician-dream-career-Sony-devastating-symptoms-leave-bedbound-23-hours-day.html

https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/12/09/pfizer-spending-twice-as-much-on-selling-than-research/?sh=394187b04b37

Let’s dig in:

What You Could Learn Without Reading Tired Blogging

The Redditt article tells you very little. “CNN did a hit piece about TikTok that happened to include a brief clip from “Hi Ren” (Shadow Ren saying “you’ve gotta kill you if you wanna kill me”) and taking it as a reference to suicide with no other context.”

They then leave the link to the Ren’s comments on YouTube, and THEN they leave the link to the actual video, sharing this comment: “But Ren fans are blowing up the comments on the CNN video. Don’t bother watching the video, but at least 90% of the comments are people taking CNN to task for misrepresenting Ren:”

I disagree personally. While the video WOULD BE a waste of time but for the attempted hatchet job on Ren, I think it is worth watching once or twice just to get some idea of how journalism works these days.

Who is Ren and Why Does He Matter?

The Daily Mail shares this about him, well over a year ago: “A young musician who was recently signed by Sony has been forced to give up his dream career after his body was ravaged with Lyme disease.

“Ren Gill was healthy and active, spending six days a week in the gym, until one morning in 2009 he woke up thinking he had the worst hangover he’d ever experienced.

“He has spent the last seven years trying to find out what was behind his devastating symptoms which leave him bedbound for up to 23 hours a day.”

One reason that I’m so interested in him (besides the possibility that he is related, albeit very distantly to me) is that his experience is so similar to my own. Young talented person, on the cusp of true success, is struck down by a mysterious illness that is misdiagnosed for years. Fortunately for Gill, he was finally correctly diagnosed. I don’t think I have the SAME malady, but the similarities are, to me, uncanny.

The Daily Mail continues: “He said: ‘My life changed overnight, I woke up one morning feeling like I’d been spiked – my personality disappeared, I was having muscle spasms and I kept having panic attacks. 

‘I thought it was just the flu but the feeling didn’t fade.”

‘I used to go to the gym six days a week and was generally quite active but now my leg muscles constantly ache and I’m always so drained.

‘I stay in bed for around 23 hours of the day, some days are better than others but a lot of the time even when I’ve woken up from a long sleep I can feel like I haven’t slept in months.’ On a side note, I am ALL too familiar with this feeling.

“Mr Gill, from Brighton, had dreamed of a career in music all of his life and was approached by a record label after being scouted when he was busking in Brighton in 2009 – just as his illness started.”

Daily Mail continues: “But despite being left with next to no energy he said recording music from his bedside is what has kept him sane and he shares his self-penned songs with thousands of fans on YouTube and Facebook.

“Music has always been my life, I’d always dreamed of having a career in it and I feel like it’s really kept me going through all of this – even now I try to make music from my bed when I can

‘I’d always had a gut feeling that there was something physically wrong with me, I knew I wasn’t depressed and the antidepressants I was prescribed were just giving me insomnia.

‘When I was finally diagnosed with Lyme disease everything just seemed to make sense, it answered a lot of questions I’d had about my health.

‘Music has always been my life, I’d always dreamed of having a career in it and I feel like it’s really kept me going through all of this – even now I try to make music from my bed when I can.

‘My one hope is to raise awareness of Lyme disease, I hope it becomes more widely known so people won’t have to go through what I have – I’m so lucky to have had such amazing support from my mum and my girlfriend.’

You can read the rest of the article if you want, it is about his struggle from about five years ago. I will, however, share the link to Ren’s GoFundMe page, in case anyone would like to send anything to help him with his medical bills. I’m kinda hoping the upward trend of his music continues and he won’t need it much longer, but I would have wanted someone to help me when it was my time, I feel I should do what I’m able to do for him now: https://www.gofundme.com/f/62ruzv7w

The Price of Success

In the last five years, the man has struggled, made amazing music, amazing videos that I knew nothing about until about two months ago. As you know if you are either a close friend or a reader of my stuff, I’ve been trying to form a team of people to start a business. I hate the thought of dying without having done anything to make the world a better place. And yeah, I could lean on my excuses, and I’m often tempted to, and honestly I likely succumb all too often. Just lie down. The sleep will be sweet. The world hates you anyway, sleep and dream about things that are sweet.

One of these folks who I am attempting to persuade has been kind enough to share some things, and one of them was the video “Hi Ren.” I’d actually seen some of Ren’s stuff pop up in my YouTube feed before, but I never clicked on it. I’m about to share part of the darker side of Curtis. I would always skip because he looked too young, too handsome. I thought in my arrogance that this was some punk kid, probably never suffered a day in his life. He is labeled a rap artist. I thought he was probably spoiled and was ranting about crap that he had no real experience with. What did he know?

I doubt he ever does, but Ren, if you ever read this, please consider this my formal and heart felt apology. I listened to “Hi Ren” and broke down in tears like a child who, separated from a loving parent, is finally restored to them. This man knew the pain in my heart. This man knew my struggles. This man had wrestled with demons even worse than mine, and while the struggles had in fact stolen so much from him, he had still done so much more than I have to make the world a better place.

A month or two went by. I struggled myself with depression. Honestly, I’m scared to death that my own bout with ME may be coming down the pike soon. It’s been four years, and five years is about as long as I can usually hope for. I have medications that help, but the tiredness that I just can’t explain to someone who has never felt it…I felt it this weekend. I’m fighting hard, but as his song says, the harder you fight, the worse it goes. And I’ve immersed myself in his music. I don’t doubt some of the loa types will say (and for all I know they are right) that since I am focusing on the illness the illness is coming back. So I blogged and wrote and fumbled and stumbled and read and listened to Ren and went on two dates (one went well, one went not well at all), and one day, the Sunday before last, I woke up to this video playing on YouTube (I sleep to YouTube….success through more YouTube programming):

The movement online in support of Ren is INSANE. The very next video (and it was only a few hours old and had thousands of views already) was somebody reacting to THIS video. And the very next one was a newer video with many thousand MORE views where a pastor does a reaction video to this one, supporting Ren and agreeing that CNN should not be throwing someone under the bus who is actually trying to be part of the solution.

I woke up instantly after that. The fog that usually envelopes me after my coma/sleep was nowhere. I shared the videos on Facebook. I made notes about what I wanted to say here. And then other big news stories happened, and right or wrong, I’ve wanted to tie them together. Because to me…this is the issue. Big corporations vs us.

The grass roots effort to support Ren

If you look at the original CNN video, the VAST majority of comments (including a few I left) was in support of Ren against the megalith CNN. The criticisms?

The story purports to be scientific, but all it is is a reporter agreed to take over a TikTok account of a volunteer family who had a 14 year old…heck, just watch the video. Or at least the first minute or so. If you don’t understand how shoddy this story is, even ignoring the jab at Ren, I really don’t know what to tell you.

Conspiracy Theory? Don’t Mind if I Do!

I’m hoping you watched at least those two videos, or will when you finish this post. Why did I tie this with the other two stories? While the other two made the most waves in the world, I think this is head and shoulders the most important story of the three. As Ren points out in “Sick boi,” “Money Game,” and other songs, our medical industry is a JOKE. Money is all that matters, and the patient is irrelevant. Whether we get better or not doesn’t matter, what matters is we keep buying, the stock prices keep increasing, and the profit margins remain obscene.

Likely the reporter wasn’t thinking, “this Ren guy criticizes Pfizer, so I’m going to crucify him.” But I think there is a strange irony here. Who pays the most in advertising to CNN? Anyone care to take a guess? Ok…I honestly don’t KNOW that it is Pfizer, but take a gander at this stuff and you be the judge:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/254404/us-ad-spending-of-pfizer/

https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/02/business/pfizer-earnings/index.html

Thou shalt not criticize Pfizer. But Ren DOES criticize that whole industry. And the big corporate juggernaut comes out guns blazing.

Fine Curtis! Life Sucks and Then you Die! Then What in Sam Hill is the Solution?

As Ren points out in his videos and his comments, WE are the solution. Don’t imitate me in my anger and hatred of the forces that helped destroy me. Be like Ren. Do what you can, where you can. Make music and put it out there. Write a blog and put it out there. Bake a cake and give it to your neighbor or sell it somewhere. Become a part of your community. Shut OFF CNN, and FOX, maybe for just a day or two, and watch something that actually edifies your life. Better yet, walk your dog, or take a walk with your wife and tell her you love her and you wouldn’t know what to do without her.

I’m being a bit simplistic, and yes, there needs to be more, but that is the start. Start where you are now. Do what you can now. Stop being complacent. Quit being a lemming. Stand up from the wheel chair the pig butcher corporations want you shackled to and sing your song. It may not seem like much alone. And no, alone, it isn’t. But even the corporations are mortal. Their day is coming. And if millions or billions of us rise up as one, not in hate, not in mindless rage, but in the righteous anger of God’s sword of justice, we can make change. Don’t wait for someone else to lead. Lead yourself. Lead you household. Take an evening alone or with your spouse or with your whole family or with some trusted friends and talk it out. What is the most important thing you could do now, with what you have, that could make a difference?

Then do it.

Don’t stay in the bed and die. At least I have ME as a bad excuse, what the hell is yours? If that makes you angry, good! I don’t apologize. Be angry. But have the anger of love, and not the anger of hate. Have the anger of justice, and not the anger of revenge. Have the anger that propels to a better tomorrow, and not the anger that brings down twin towers and destroys innocent people.

How it all ended

Ren posted this on his YouTube channel two days ago:

“After pushing back on the misrepresentation by CNN they updated their video to include more of my song & included a quote at the end of their video. The fact we’ve been able to pull up a major network and positively create a more balanced narrative says a lot about the power of this community The force is strong. Thankyou 🙏”

Major victory? Maybe not. Has justice truly been served? Maybe not. But the masses responded in waves to the pain of this man. It may only be a small thing, but if we continue, maybe we will yet live to see a world where human beings heal human beings, instead of corporations feeding at the pig troughs and devouring our hopes.

That is what your Tired Blogger thinks. What do you think? Is Ren all that and a bag of chips or am I full of it? Is Phizer a villain or a provider of hope and healing that should be respected? Do drug companies rip us off, or are 1000% markups legitimate when the costs of research are considered? Please leave comments.

In the next issue, I intend to do another Tired Blogger deep dive into Oklahoma education. Please feel free to share any information you think would be helpful or any constructive criticism about how I could have given a better experience on this blog.