Tom Leonard has followed up his article in the Telegraph yesterday (see post below) with an excellent article today, BBC language that Labour loves to hear, where he writes that:
Within hours of the explosions, a memo was sent to senior editors on the main BBC news programmes from Helen Boaden, head of news. While she was aware “we are dancing on the head of a pin”, the BBC was very worried about offending its World Service audience, she said.
BBC output was not to describe the killers of more than 50 in London as “terrorists” although – nonsensically – they could refer to the bombings as “terror attacks”. And while the guidelines generously concede that non-BBC should be allowed to use the “t” word, BBC online was not even content with that and excised it from its report of Tony Blair’s statement to the Commons.
Ah yes, we mustn’t offend the non-tellytaxpaying World Service audience, must we! I wonder which parts of the World Service audience might be offended by calling a terrorist a terrorist? And why should the BBC pander so desperately to the sensibilities of people who might be thus offended anyway? Surely the BBC’s job is to tell it like it is, as understood by the highest standards of British common-sense and decency, whether or not it offends those who are so backward or primitive that they regard the random murder of civilians (in London or anywhere else) as anything less than terrorism.
Whether funded through the telly-tax or the taxpayers money given to the World Service, the BBC is supposed to be the British Broadcasting Corporation – it is high time for the BBC’s voluminous news output to reflect and represent the views, values and standards of those who are forced to pay for it – the great British public – particularly since the BBC’s enormous tax-funded dominance stifles all but the most hardy of alternative news providers, thus perpetuating the BBC’s distorted White City Goldfish Bowl view of the world throughout Britain’s broadcast media (for instance, almost every broadcast journalist in the UK (with a few well-established exceptions*), whoever they work for, has to stay relatively close to the BBC line, unless they want to severely curtail their future career options). For the good of our democracy and our society it is time to break-up the BBC’s enormous monopoly of broadcast and online news in the UK.
All is not lost though – there are still some sensible, decent people speaking out within the BBC – as Tom Leonard continues:
A row has now broken out with a handful of the corporation’s most senior journalists and news executives, fighting what one described yesterday as a “disgusting and appalling” edict. He was particularly angry, he added, because most World Service listeners don’t even pay a penny for the BBC.
and:
The same senior BBC journalist who expressed contempt for the “terrorist” ban was withering about the corporation’s current Africa season. The BBC’s interminable series of programmes highlighting poverty in Africa has been a “disgrace”, he said. “We’ve simply been advancing Gordon Brown’s agenda and in an entirely unsophisticated way.”
Do read it all for the full story. Stephen Pollard has also been asking So whose side is the BBC on? Writing in the Daily Mail, he says:
But terrorism is not a value judgement. It is recognised as a crime against humanity under international law. Professor Norman Geras defines it as “the deliberate targeting of civilians with a view to killing and maiming them and if possible in large numbers”. To describe Thursday’s bombers as terrorists is merely to observe the reality of human rights law.
This is, of course, about far more than labels. The refusal to use the word terrorist goes to the heart of the BBC’s world view, in which such murders are simply a response to the West’s provocation.
It is all our fault, according to the BBC’s ‘experts’. On Friday night, a Newsnight correspondent, Peter Marshall, informed us that “What the war on terror was supposed to prevent, it has brought about.”
Turning to the BBC’s Frank Gardner, Pollard writes:
Speaking on Radio 4 on Monday, Mr Gardner declared that Western policies in Muslim countries, and ‘harassment’ of suspected Islamists in Britain and Europe, was ‘offensive’ to Wahabis. But what Wahabis find offensive is the very existence of the West, which they are committed to destroying.
He then remarked that that it was extraordinary that they planted a bomb in Edgware Road, since this was a Muslim area. Yet not only did they not plant a bomb there (it went off in a moving train), they have as long a track record of murdering Muslims as they do of killing apostates.
Mr Gardner concluded that it was “doubly tough for Britain’s Muslims…it’s more of a blow for them than for everyone else”. Really? The relatives and friends of the victims might disagree with that.
Interestingly, it seems that Peter Marshall is unimpressed with Pollard’s analysis – as demonstrated in his thoughtful response, recounted by Stephen Pollard today:
When I pointed out that I did not distort a word of what he said, he responded thus: “You fat fuck. You fucker” and terminated the conversation.
I wonder what the BBC’s PC Thought Police would make of such ‘fattist’ language? Aren’t those who are undertall entitled to the same respect that the BBC extends to the sensitivities of those who think that suicide bomb terrorists are mere ‘militants’, ‘extremists’ or ‘insurgents’?
* e.g. Andrew Neil, Adam Boulton, Nick Robinson – but they are very much the exception among the vast army of broadcast journalists reporting for the UK.
Radio 4’s news output tonight is a disgrace. They are effectively proselytising for islam (religion of peace) with great concern over the imminent spate of ‘hate crimes’ against muslims.
Miam
As you say, the BBC used the T word in reporting on Chirac’s statement. But that is a slippery side of their policy – they can use the T word in direct quotations – but only if they put them in quotes. The BBC policy is not to use the T word itself.
As the world now knows, the BBC refused to use the T word in their main report on Blair’s statement, even though he had used it umpteen times. They did not even use it in quotations. It went down the memory hole.
Worse in a way, they did not even use it in the reports I saw on the appalling murder of 25 or more children in Iraq yesterday.
Sick, twisted, spineless. When I tell friends in New Zealand, Australia, America what the BBC has been doing this past week, they can hardly believe me. That is how low the BBC has sunk.
Many people have referred to the Blitz spirit. I wonder what Churchill would have done if the BBC in wartime was altering the words he spoke. But that is hypothetical – the old BBC would never have dreamed of such a thing.
Dan, the fact is, that by going in with the Americans to free Iraq we have put ourselves top of the terrorist target list. At the same time, we have made attacks a lot less likely. By taking the war to the terrorist’s backyard the terrorists have been forced to divert resources from here to there. A number of British and European based Al Qa’eda terrorists have been sent to Iraq instead of staying here to launch attacks. Bin Laden is terrified of Bush’s strategy of defeating terrorism with democracy. He is on record as saying that if democracy succeeds in Iraq it will destroy and humiliate him. Of course, we could have followed the French, German and Spanish strategy of not only leaving the fight to others but slagging them off for it to make themselves doubly safe, but we British would rather have a country we can be proud of. As Maggie Thatcher said in her final speech to the Commons in the run up to Gulf War I: “Our history shows that when evil rises in the world, Britain will bear arms to oppose it”. When the history of the War on Terror comes to be written, we will stand proud with the rest of our allies in the US Coalition, while our ‘allies’ who not only hid behind our coattails but kept kicking us in the shins while we we were being bombed and shot at will earn the undying contempt of all free men worthy of their freedom.
Hal – I would not deny the possibility that our involvement in Iraq has increased the Islamists fury against us & made attack more likely.
What I object to is the BBC’s certainty. They know what fired up the lads from Leeds, in fact they always claim to know what is going on in peoples heads, or if they don’t know, then unnamed sources/critics/etc do.
Dan, I fully understand the point you are making; the BBC are regurgitating enemy propaganda blaming us for the attack. The point I’m making is tangential to this, as I think it worth making due to the BBC’s enemy propaganda effort. While we may have been attacked because of Iraq, Iraq has made us safer. Though obviously not as safe as the cowards and hypocrits who not only make themselves safer but refusing to fight terrorism but make themselves doubly safer by supporting the enemy’s propaganda efforts against us. It’s one thing for the French, Germans and Spanish to do this, but when our own people do it they are committing Treason and should be locked up as security threats or face trial for it. When is Blair going to organise an MI5 investigation of the BBC for supporting the enemy’s propaganda efforts?
The BBC’s decision not to call terrorist, terrorist, stems from their fear of insulting the Muslim world while Palestinian homicide bombers kill children in malls. Anyone watching a BBc broadcast after a bombing in Israel can tell you that the words “militants” and “activist” are favored vonacular of BBC reporters. Their failure to call a spade a spade has led to their inability to do so on 7/7.
I’ve just suffered an hour & half frustration with BBC Look North. A half hour prog on Leeds bombers was a repeat of shock, all pull together & Iraq, iraq, iraq.
This was followed by 1 hr webchat with Prof Rogers (Peace Studies Bradford U). It was apparent that very few online as some questioners taken more than once. Not me however. It was …. yes Iraq, Iraq
Perhaps only 1 question in hour that did not toe the BBC (& Prof Rogers) line. and he has cheek to say at end that he was put thru it!!!
omg! .. that Tamimi guy is on Newsnight right now, spouting the usual crap
UK Muslim leader barred from US
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4684489.stm
Well done!
pete_london
always good posts
Joerg
you are the fu**ing Best.
Miam
Excellent!
Cockney
Wan* Wa*k W*nk *ank
Johninlondon
Top Man
Allan@aberdeen
Always Has the money shot
Teddy Bear
Incisive, Like Paxman but more focused
Susan
You go girl!
Joerg
So good we named him twice!
Roxana Cooper
Tastes Like Honey!
Out of control
Taki
I was on a fast beam, sailing under high winds and a choppy sea off the north coast of Corsica, when the bombs went off in London. We heard about it when George Duffield called his mother, Vivien, to tell her he was fine. Political correctness forbids me to repeat the conversation which ensued with my guests and crew; suffice it to say that my half-Corsican captain’s remarks made a lot of sense. ‘We welcome Muslims on the island,’ he said, ‘but they have to try to act like Corsicans. No veils, no preaching against our faith, and, if they do, we handle it ourselves. The police are never called in. Muslim criminals are almost non-existent.’
Hear, hear! Multicultural pieties aside, the Corsican model of Islamophobia seems to be working. For both sides. In fact, London’s Mayor could learn a thing or two, when he’s not busy welcoming people with lotsa blood on their hands like Gerry Adams and this al-Qaradawi cleric, that is. Let’s face it. Extremists like Omar Bakri Mohammed — yes, another cleric — have been playing to ever larger audiences while he calls for holy war against Britain and America and exhorts young Muslims to join the fight in Iraq. He even went so far as to announce in 2004 that a London-based group was ‘on the verge of launching a big operation’ here.
But my bone is not with these ‘clerics’. It is with the politicians and the puffed-up pundits of the Left who defend such people. Throwing Sir Oswald Mosley and his wife Diana into jail was not Winston Churchill’s finest hour. The Mosleys were as likely to aid England’s enemies as I am to embrace Islam. But it was politically correct at the time. This bunch of yo-yos, starting with Tony Blair, want it both ways. They show off their tolerance, while refusing to extradite terrorist suspects; allow terrorist networks to flourish inside Britain; and then make brave pronouncements how terror will never win etc., etc., etc.
Part of the reason Britain is suffering from these attacks is that her leaders are completely out of touch with the facts on the ground. Blair, Prescott, Brown, the egregious Strawman, do not ride on the Underground or take buses. They do not live in ethnic areas and are protected at all times by bodyguards. What they do is to use their flunkeys and spin-masters to aggrandise themselves, with soundbites telling the world how civilised we are and how united we are with our Muslim brethren. What bullshit! There are 500,000 illegal immigrants on the loose, and these clowns are telling us how civilised we are. The Toynbee woman is going around pontificating about how wonderfully multicultural London has become, and piles on the bull by saying how clean, safe and almost Utopian the place is. Crime is out of control, as is alcohol, drug abuse and uncivilised behaviour, and this Blair groupie is telling it like it ain’t.
To be fair, Britain did not start this war. Indirectly, the Saudis did. Then Bush and Blair made their colossal blunder by attacking one of the few secular powers in the Middle East, and the rest is very bad history in the making. In the years since 9/11, I have heard many Muslims whispering approval of Osama bin Laden, and these were not poor Muslims in the slums of Indonesia or Pakistan, but in places like Geneva, Paris, London and Los Angeles. These people were not zealots. They saw Bush and Blair as being obsessed with soundbites and with crafting shortsighted policies to serve big business rather than the citizenry at large. They happen to be well-to-do and Muslim, but are not extremists. Yet most of them believe that the war on terror is a war on Islam. Go figure, as they don’t say in Mecca.
Imagine, then, what the less privileged are thinking. Starting with London. Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, Ahmed Omar Sheik, who murdered Daniel Pearl, Abu Issa al-Hindi, who plotted attacks against both Britain and America are all British citizens. There are estimated to be 15,000 British Muslims who support al-Qa’eda or related groups. I say there are many more. Britain has been a soft touch for more than 20 years, and British-born men are being drawn to the cause of fundamentalism as I write. Blocking Al-Jazeera or Al-Arabiya would be a very small step but a good starting point. Don’t hold your breath. It would be politically incorrect to do so.
What is to be done? Easy, but I will not write it down because the editors will not publish it, so why waste the time? Just keep in mind that to this day no major Muslim cleric or religious body has issued a fatwa against Osama bin Laden, and also keep in mind that what many Muslims say about Islam being a ‘kind’ religion is hogwash. Only the Muslim world can root out terror, and it’s as likely to do this as the House of Saud is to give up paying protection moolah to murderers
taki
I am amazed tht piece got throgh withot being spiked !!!
meanwhile here is the BBC once more giving airtime to supporters of terrorism :
http://hurryupharry.bloghouse.net/archives/2005/07/15/getting_the_right_voices_heard.php
OFF Topic – FreelanceUK: “Mark Thompson’s(and also other executives) annual pay packet, including the rejected bonus, now stands at £560,000 • three times more than Tony Blair’s annual salary.”
How, on earth, have we got to a place where an unelected person, working within a nation’s civil service (misinformation) bureaucracy, gets to be paid more that the leader of the very same nation?
Defund the BBC.
From the Telegraph:
“Early reporting of the attacks on the BBC’s website spoke of terrorists but the same coverage was changed to describe the attackers simply as ‘bombers.”
What a display of cutting edge reporting – to call someone who uses a bomb a bomber. Thanks for clearing that up for me guys. So I guess someone who betrays is a betrayer, and someone who manipulates is a manipulator, and some who fabricates is a fabricator, and … well, you know what you are.
Lump on a Blog
While driving to work on July 13th, BBC Radio news had these as the main items
1. Police have identified the bombers as British.
2. 60 police were injured in Belfast in clashes between Protestant and Catholic marchers.
Immediately after the news was a plug for Jeremy Vine’s broadcast from Nigeria. Jeremy Vines along the lines.. Nigeria has an ethnic conflict in progress in which thousands have been killed.
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the BBC.
I thought a demon got into my hearing orifices this morning. The T word was all over the Today Show! I suppose they couldn’t shut up their interviewees, and how could they not mention the Prevention of Terrorism Act?
You chaps might want to check out Richard Littlejohn’s diatrabe in the Sun this morning, along similar lines to much comment here but with a nice cartoon as well. I didn’t really buy it, someone had left it on the seat – honest!
TJJJ – thanks for your succinct summary of my contributions. Made my morning so far. Far be it from me to suggest that someone still obsessed with T-Rex in 2005 might have more need for solitary entertainment than myself…
Cockney
As always. You do not make any sense. Perhaps there was some point you were trying to make in there?
Cockney
The Littlejohn article is not available online. Would you please post the highlights ?
Thank you.
Lumpy are you missing the point ? The BBC used the T word on early reports on 7/7 but then went back and ALTERED their reports/headlines to excise the T word. And then on Monday they excised 10 or 11 uses of the T word by Blair in their main report on his statement to the Commons.
The BBC is becoming a joke overseas as well :
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=18770
But it is not a joke, it is literally deadly serious.
John, I’ve left it on the train for the enjoyment of others so can’t quote accurately, however it was a pastiche of the country dealing with WWII along the same lines as our response to the bombings.
The BBC reported that the Blitz was motivated and justified by British atrocities at Dunkirk and that only a small minority of Nazis showed extremist tendencies.
Schoolkids singing derogatory songs about Hitler’s testicles were arrested for demonstrating Naziphobia.
Prime Minister Churchill said ‘do not under any circumstances fight them on the beaches, we are all victims’
etc etc. Worth 30p of anyones money.
Bob, is English your second language? What part don’t you understand? Whilst on the topic of comprehension, what’s with the full stop between ‘as always’ and ‘you don’t make any sense’?
Cockney
Thanks.
You may want to look at the Harry’s Place blogsite. I find there is a lot of intelligent discussion there, if you filter out the crazies.
It is run by pro-war Labour people, as far as I can tell.
Cockney
Buy that paper, read Littlejohn’s words of wisdom and free your mind, baby. It’s your north London liberalness which prevents you from having an open mind, from seeing the other side, from accepting and (yes, yes!) tolerating a diverse range of opinion.
Look upon reading the Sun as an alternative lifestyle choice. Open up and embrace, Cockney.
muslims islam muslims islam muslims islam muslims islam the religion of peace boring boring boring. I thought the BBC charter was to provide a range of varied programming yet all we’ve had from the beeb all week is muslims islam muslims islam muslims islam. Does anyone else think that the Christian church has lost it’s way. No-one has spoken out for the Christian victims in this tragedy all we hear is muslims islam muslims islam. Thank you to the American news channels, without them we would never hear what is really going on over here. If anyone has Sky, news channel 540 has British Muslim leaders saying totally different things to what they are on the British News channels.
This article
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=SHQCUTYKKEWZPQFIQMFSM5OAVCBQ0JVC?xml=/news/2005/07/15/ncleric315.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/07/15/ixnewstop.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=21253
appears to state the al-BBC position on the matter quite well:-
it is accepted without debate that the West…is responsible for creating the conditions that lead to terrorist atrocities such as the London bombings.
DAW
What is Channel 40 on Sky ?
I know from elsewhere that a lot of those guys say sharply different things to different audiences.
OFF TOPIC:
BBC news website reports the Killing of a Catholic Bishop in Kenya and some related stories of tensions between the Borana and Gabra people – this is related in terms of disputes over water, cattle and land.
However as the tribes seem (from my brief research) to have differing religious backgrounds (one christian one muslim) there may be a religious angle to this conflict. BUT I cannot find any reference to a religious dimension on the BBC website. The religious angle may well be irrelevant OR Is this another example of the BBC airbrushing it’s reports to protect muslim sensibilities???
Joerg “UK Muslim leader barred from US”
I wonder if it as simple as him travelling on a tourist visa when he was going to the US for paid lecturing?
We have had previous examples of journalists writing angry pieces after being refused entry when they were at fault for thinking they could waltz in to work without formalities.
Trawling the web, there are numerous critical references to the BBC’s policy on the T word and its doctoring of blair’s statement. It is even in a major article in the ultra-liberal Los Angeles Times :
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-boot14jul14,0,7471446.column?coll=la-news-comment-opinions
Natalie, Andrew etc
This issue has turned into something of a blogstorm/media storm, putting the BBC in a very bad light. This is one of the few times I have seen so much challenge to the BBC’s image of competence and reliability. Even people who defended the BBC over Gilligan (often becaiuse they were anti-war) are saying that the BBC looks really stupid.
How else can we keep the blogstorm going – to reiterate the message of your blog that the BBC is BIASED as well as stupid! That the BBC has failed to inform the British people properly.
Pete,
I’m not convinced that you represent the best role model for open minded thinking and appreciation of alternative viewpoints. Funnily enough I read the Sun every morning and have met Mr Littlejohn at the Lane on a number of occasions.
You’ll be pleased to hear that I’m in agreement that the BBC’s ‘opinion’ coverage has degenerated into a desperate attempt to erase any blame from anything vaguely Muslim, however I think the factual coverage has been pretty good, avoiding the spread of unsubstantiated rumour and mawkish gawping at families of victims.
I’d be interested to read what you would consider an unbiased factual account of the atrocities to date?
…apart from the apparent change in policy over the use of ‘terrorism’ of course, which is ludicrous.
JohninLondon,
“That the BBC has failed to inform the British people properly.”
No it’s much worse than that! The BBC has actively and deliberately misled the British people because the truth about Islam clashes with it multi-culti mindset.
Quite so.
And whats to be done?
Is unstoppable force about to encounter immovable object?
Current BBC producer guidelines are hampering proper debate and discussion about Islam on BBC output. That’s why it’s all PC Gardener and ‘victim’ status all round – absolutely NO critical voices.
Unfortunately to critise, you may offend, and you’re not allowed to do that at the Beeb.
BBC Editorial Guidelines
Section 12 – Religion
“Contributors should not be allowed to undermine or denigrate the religious beliefs of others.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/guidelines/editorialguidelines/edguide/religion/religioneditori.shtml
“undermine” is far too wide ranging.
So, the proposed new UK law that will see any criticism of Islam banned, has already been implemented by the thought police at the BBC.
Here is some quotes from Rowan Atkinson on the proposed new UK law.
“To criticise a person for their race is manifestly irrational and ridiculous but to criticise their religion, that is a right. That is a freedom.”
“The freedom to criticise ideas, any ideas – even if they are sincerely held beliefs – is one of the fundamental freedoms of society.”
“A law which attempts to say you can criticise and ridicule ideas as long as they are not religious ideas is a very peculiar law indeed.”
Peculiar, but those rules are active and enforced by the BBC – NOW!
So, in effect, there will be no real critical discussion about Islam and it’s links to terrorism on the BBC. It’s against their rules.
OK Cockney.
(You are the ‘Cockney who thinks’ the Serpentine’s in North London aren’t you?’)
Where the hell’s “the Lane”?
Unless of course you mean Petticoat Lane (and no, don’t look for it on a map ’cause it only exists on market days)
But you can’t mean that.
Cockneys would always talk about “down the Lane” like we say “up the West End” not “at the Lane”
And careful with the Littlejohn familiarity. I was a neighbour of the learned scribe when he lived back of the Pally.
Reckon you only know St Martin’s Lane ’cause you seem to be the sort of tosser that hangs around the wine bars in Covent Garden with the tourists and the ‘Londoners’ who go home on the 11:45 to Croydon.
To Rob Read Reader,
“And whats to be done?”
The BBC serves the world service and the U.K.
“He who serves two masters has to lie to one.
Portuguese Proverb”
I would suggest canceling your direct debit.
Oi dangly, leave Cockney alone, us yids stick together ;-).
The Lane is the home of the beautiful game don’t ya know…
LOL Play nice !
I understand that the Director of Radio 4, our most important radio channel – is Mark Damazer. His name cropped up a lot in the Hutton enqiry – he was a sort of news policy mandarin. He was on the Feedbck progrmme earlier today defending the ludicrous decision to shelve Part 2 of the Classic Serial, Greenmantle by John Buchan, as it might upset sensitivities. Bloody idiot – it was the cancellation that upset OUR sensitivities. “Stuff the loyal audience – who cares”.
And then I find that this Damazer geezer was responsible for the early framing of the no-T-word policy. He decided after 9/11 that the BBC should not describe the WTC atrocity as terrorism :
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ukresponse/story/0,11017,593697,00.html
His weaselly appeasing reason ? It might upset some people around the world to describe 9/11 as terrorism.
And now this guy is made Head of Radio 4 !!!!
They are putting the lunatics in charge of the asylum.
LOL Play nice !
A bit more on the T word.
I understand that the Director of Radio 4, our most important radio channel, is Mark Damazer. His name cropped up a lot in the Hutton enquiry – he was a sort of news policy mandarin. He was on the Feedback programme earlier today defending the ludicrous decision to shelve Part 2 of the Classic Serial, Greenmantle by John Buchan, as it might upset sensitivities. Idiot – it was the cancellation that upset OUR sensitivities. “Stuff the loyal Radio 4 audience – who cares”.
And then I find that this Damazer geezer was responsible for the early application of the no-T-word policy. He decided after 9/11 that the BBC should not describe the WTC atrocity as terrorism :
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ukresponse/story/0,11017,593697,00.html
His weaselly appeasing reason ? It might upset some people around the world to describe 9/11 as terrorism.
And now this guy is made Head of Radio 4 !!!!
They are putting the lunatics in charge of the asylum.
dangles,
us unrepresentative ‘liberal’ elite are just as entitled to call ourselves londoners as you uncivilised plebs. there’s some pretty sophisticated entertainment options in covent garden if you know where to look, but obviously your budget only stretches to the punch & judy. and the serpentine is an active part of north london for those of us with proper jobs who can permanently afford to put a bit of distance between us and the suburbs.
ciao
oh and by the way, before you question by true ‘Cockney’ creditials by dredging up one of the myriad definitions let me speculate that you are not actually a dog’s testicle either.
i think it’s a fine demonstration of London’s resilience that despite terrorist atrocities we can all get on with flinging gratuitous abuse at each other.
Cockney and Andrew Paterson
Be assured, ‘the Lane’ becomes the home of beautiful football but once a season, when the Wenger Boys arrive at the downmarket end of the Seven Sisters Road to hand out a good old fashioned thrashing to the locals.
Cockney
I see you wish to shun Littlejohn and The Sun in favour of remaining small-minded and bigoted. Let me recommend then today’s Daily Mail (let no-one say I’m nothing if not well-read) and Quentin Letts on page 14. Headline:
I am white, middle class, love my wife, own my home and adore traditional TV sitcoms. So why does the BBC hate me?
Sounds rhetorical to me.
You may have guessed the identity of anon above. If not, t’was me.
Natalie, ndrew etc
I think the BBC have backed down under the pressure of ridicule on the ridiculous T word policy.
This would be a WIN for the critics of the BBC – the T policy is just a symptom of its spinelessness.
If it is win, this change of policy needs to be trumpeted a bit. Otherwise the smirking BBC gets away with just another bit of stealth-editing.
Hang on, me ol’ Cockney sparrow:
us unrepresentative ‘liberal’ elite are just as entitled to call ourselves londoners as you uncivilised plebs.
Did you once say you live in Edmonton? And you call someone else an uncivilised pleb? Cockney, tell me where you live, I’ll send you a quid.
And today’s Daily Mail.
Pete
All part of kicking their loyal audience – and Britain generally in the teeth.
Suicide bomb views ‘were tested’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ukfs/hi/newsid_4680000/newsid_4686200/4686295.stm
“I believe it was legitimate to stage an intra-Muslim debate in response to the London attacks, and revealing to show that some of even the most moderate Muslims support the notion of suicide bombing in the context of Israel.”
“…even the most moderate muslims..”
moderate? supporting suicide bombing innocent people in Israel – thats a moderate view??
The BBC should NOT be giving airtime to those who condone/approve/celebrate terrorism against innocents. Anywhere. Period.
Not a good week for the BBC. Now they are seen consorting with or laughing at a senior Palestinin terrorist :
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3113222,00.html
But of course there is no such thing as a terrorist.
The BBC line is that everyone condemns the bombings, and that the world is united against the bombers:
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/61d897d4-f015-11d9-bd3b-00000e2511c8.html
Hmmm…the BBC have been telling us that China is harmless and friendly.
I was hoping for a special edition of Question Time this week in which Britain is blamed for the London bombings, but alas no.