It took me ages to get that last post out, if I have at all. (It’s not showing up when I look at the blog, but that’s not conclusive.) There is little point in emailing me at the moment. My apologies.
I’m having computer, internet and email problems.
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Hi Natalie – nice to see to see you back. Drop me an email with your phone no. if you’d like any help or advice on resolving your computer troubles.
Not so much a mention of bias, but to point out the sort of people behind the bias:
BBC put Libyans’ lives in danger, says watchdog
http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,1298417,00.html
“The BBC was today severely criticised by television watchdogs for unnecessarily endangering the lives of a Libyan tour guide and a singer who featured in a major BBC series without their consent.
Media regulator Ofcom said the BBC had “put at risk” the tour guide, Mr Muhunned Al-Mungoush, after failing to inform him the video footage it was taking was not for a holiday video but a BBC series.
After Libyan authorities learned that Mr Al-Mungoush had been involved in the programme he was arrested, interrogated and beaten up. He also lost his job.”
This is well worth a http://www.bugmenot.com signup for MediaGuardian.
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The MediaGuardian report has been edited, perhaps justifiably given its international reach, to remove a section that could lead to fatal endangerment – courtesy of the BBC – for another Libyan.
The BBC, in its disgusting, weasel attempt to justify its appalling actions to Ofcom, actually ‘outs’ someone else! :
Click to access al_mungoush.pdf
The clueless arrogance of the BBC is quite astonishing.
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For me, the key phrase in this judgement is: “The BBC’s risk assessment seemed to have concerned only the safety of the journalists, not himself” (Mr. Al-Mungoush).
I noticed a similar example elsewhere in Ben Anderson’s output.
I watched this journalist’s programme on Iraq (made when Saddam was at the helm). In that he reports that he is told that he cannot photograph one of Saddam’s palaces located right next to an historical site that he is visiting.
However, the journalist slyly poses for a “tourist” picture, with Saddam’s palace in the background. “Click”, the image is recorded and broadcast on the BBC.
The consequences that this picture might have had for the journalist’s “minder” from the regime do not seem to have occurred to the Beeb or the journalist.
Talk about going to a place and not understanding the sort of thing that goes on there!
Also significant is the BBC interview with Ben Anderson that includes the telling phrase “the Bush regime”:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/axis.shtml
The guy is detained for a week by the Iranians and threatened with torture, but still we have this equivalence between the US and the rogue states featured in this documentary series.
The Bush regime, of course, would never jail and threaten journalists on flimsy pretexts.
OFF TOPIC
BBC Radio 4 7:15 am Today 08/09/04
James Naughtie finessed Kerry’s poor poll showing with the words “the mistake Kerry made was not coming back soon enough over those Swift boat campaign ads” – To which listeners whose main news source is R4 might well ask ‘Could we be allowed to know what those ads said?’, while those with internet access will be asking ‘what come back was that then?’. By underplaying Kerry’s problems for a UK audience the BBC will just make the US electorate, if it rejects Kerry, seem mysteriously irrational or contemptibly sheep-like, – having been manipulated by slick (Republican) spin. On the same piece, Naughtie also opined that the post-convention Republican bounce was due to their “being able to define the agenda” … nothing substantial then …( I am not American BTW )
An unfortunate set of circumstances for Ms. Lapin. I would certainly deplore heavy-handed treatment of her or any other hack.
But “flimsy pretexts?”
What an irony that so many investigative journalists appear to be unaware of the requirements for entering the US • a bit of investigating on US entry regulations wouldn’t go amiss.
I’m sure if she’d had the correct documentation, she would have sailed through Immigration without delay.
But to a customs official, a Moscow-born journalist entering the country minus the correct documentation would surely raise cause eyebrows to be raised.
Contrast this with Anderson’s experience (“during this interview with the students these three guys burst in”) it appears he was being monitored while moving around the country, not just while passing through immigration. I doubt if I interviewed some students in the US on my camcorder that I would expect some guys to burst in. Not even at West Point.
“An unfortunate set of circumstances for Ms. Lapin.”
Not really, its a combination of her incompetence, arrogance & whinging.
Why do journalists think they can travel as tourists when working? I knew about journalists’ visa requirements a year ago & I’m not a journalist.
She is then an ideal candidate for the Guardian to do a bit of US bashing.
Why do journalists think they can travel as tourists when working?
Anyone in any other line of business can fill out a visa waiver form on their way into the US. Only journalists can’t.
It was remiss of Ms Lapin not to make checks, but I think she assumed that civilised countries don’t make life hell for people just because they happen to be employed as writers.
“Anyone in any other line of business can fill out a visa waiver form on their way into the US. Only journalists can’t.”
A quick search of the US Gov. web site (apparently beyond the resources of Grauniad journos):
“The ‘visitor’ visa is a nonimmigrant visa for persons desiring to enter the United States temporarily for business (B-1) or for pleasure or medical treatment (B-2). Persons planning to travel to the U.S. for a different purpose such as students, temporary workers, crewmen, journalists, etc., must apply for a different visa in the appropriate category.”
It doesn’t inspire confidence in the fact-finding abilities of these hacks.
Take a minute, john b, to realize that the world has changed a bit since you last pulled your head out of the sand. The tactics of terrorists should provide a bit of a clue. No one is safe (not even children) from these beasts. Some of them happen to be females and might even call themselves tourists or journalists. I hope you would not be among the first to condemn ‘lax security at US airports’ the next time another outrage comes to pass, but maybe it would be expecting too much.
Truly desperate displacement, john b.
A clear ‘official’ BBC transgression of grisly proportion. Your response: ‘hey, look over there, it’s George Bush!’
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Oh, come on – how else can one respond to a post like Michael Gill’s? The report on Libya wasn’t clever, although the reaction to it above seems more than a little hysterical on the basis of the Guardian story. BTW, PJF – your PDF doesn’t work.
Guy W’s point, meanwhile, takes nonsequiturs to new extremes.
It’s good that it’s (marginally) harder than before to get on a plane while tooled up with knives and guns, and it’s true that terrorists often travel on fake ID. However, how does forcing journalists to register with the government in advance or face jail and deportation impact on this?
“However, how does forcing journalists to register with the government in advance or face jail and deportation impact on this?”
How about ensuring that the journalists entering are indeed genuine? Often journalists have access to places that ordinary members of the public don’t have. We wouldn’t want a hoaxer getting into a White House briefing now, would we?
Regarding the equivalence of Iran and the “Bush regime”, here is a BBC story about a woman who photographs the exterior of a prison in Iran and winds up dead:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3070895.stm
It puts Ms. Lapin’s ordeal into perspective.
It wasn’t my PDF, it was Ofcom’s PDF. The reason it ‘doesn’t work’ is that the file has been removed. Also removed is any reference to the ‘judgement’ on the Ofcom website.
I suspect (hope) the reason the whole thing has disappeared is the same reason the Guardian article was edited – that the BBC defence tactics endangered the life of another Libyan. It was basically along the lines of, “No, we weren’t really naughty at all. After all, we didn’t mention that (identified individual) made derogatory comments about Colonel Gaddafi.”
Shameless.
I am able to ‘prove’ my point, but frankly, having johnb regard me as hysterical is a lot less important than adding to the risk to the life of someone living under a real evil regime.
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“Oh, come on – how else can one respond to a post like Michael Gill’s?”
Do you mean this:
“The guy is detained for a week by the Iranians and threatened with torture, but still we have this equivalence between the US and the rogue states featured in this documentary series.” ?
If so, I would respond by affirming that equivalence of the USA and said states is absurdly misplaced. I certainly wouldn’t respond in the opposite by linking to a story that essentially confirms Michael Gill’s point; and in using terminology like ‘Bush regime’ that makes me look like a naive adolescent overdosing on Marxist propaganda.
The notion that the USA is equivalent to Iran is preposterous to a, yes, *hysterical* degree.
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