BBC ready for Radio Four-letter words
BBC RADIO 4 must challenge political correctness to satisfy an audience that no longer “wears tweeds and plays golf”, its controller says.
Mark Damazer has declared that the principles underlying the station during his stewardship will be “dissent, excitement, thrills and fun”.Addressing the Broadcasting Press Guild, Mr Damazer also backed the Today programme, including the forceful questioning style of John Humphrys. He said: “Today is a large beast in the jungle and big beasts do not tread lightly.”
There was room for sex, not least in The Archers, ripe language and a commitment to find new comedy talent. The station, which has an average listener age of 54, will challenge the assumed liberal values of its audience.
Mr Damazer, a former BBC news chief, said: “Dissent must be one of the qualities of Radio 4. There should be a lack of political correctness and a willingness to challenge the foundations of political ideas. We won’t be afraid of the politically unorthodox.”
Does that mean you’ll be bringing back Frederick Forsyth, sacked because “BBC executives… objected to his political stance”, then Mark?
Angry viewers rap 0870 call costs
Government agencies make millions of pounds because people have to call 0870 numbers, newspaper reports claim. But they’re not the only ones using them – BBC News does as well, something that annoys viewers.
Brian Taylor told NewsWatch that the BBC should be more open how much the calls cost and, below, Michael Stock of Audience Services supplied some answers.
And rightly so – the proliferation of 0870 so-called ‘national rate’ numbers (in reality disguised premium rate numbers) is one of the biggest and best of all the scams that BT have managed to slip by the plodding regulators at Ofcom (and its comatose predecessor, Oftel). Even the BBC’s own consumer affairs programme, Watchdog, has the gall to use an 0870 number! But, amazingly, even with the huge potential revenue that 0870 nos. present to an organisation with as many callers as the BBC, get this, “the BBC doesn’t make any money from these calls. A rebate is available to organisations who use 0870 numbers – but the BBC has waived its right to this in return for better telephone services for the audience”. Utter clowns! Someone’s laughing all the way to the bank, and it’s not the telly-tax payers or phone bill payers!
And finally, now that the dust has settled (see Crime never pays – except when the BBC is newly flush with telly-taxpayers cash):
Burglar documentary to be shown
A documentary about Tony Martin, who was jailed for shooting dead a burglar, will be shown on the BBC despite controversy over payment to a criminal.
Brendan Fearon, who was wounded in the shooting after breaking into Martin’s Norfolk home, was paid £4,500 by the BBC to appear in The Tony Martin Story.
Interestingly, whilst Tony Martin’s conviction is covered at length, Brendan Fearon’s lifelong criminal record is barely mentioned, presumably for reasons of space.
More importantly, for concerned viewers, telly-tax payers and decent people everywhere, what of the idiot(s) who deigned to offer money to Fearon the lifelong career criminal in the first place (i.e. the real scandal here)? Have they been fired, disciplined or reprimanded? Is the ever accountable BBC going to tell us whether it has learnt the lesson of its Cash for Criminals scandal yet?
Americans are becoming more aware of bbc rubbish. This appeared in People’s Truth Forum:
“The BBC is cleansing broadcasts by refusing to credit specific attacks to Islamist perpetrators. Shockingly, they’re now generically labeling the Pakistani jihadists, suspected in July’s deadly attacks in London, as “bombers”.
I’m sure there’s a law in this country against criminals profiting from their crimes.
Liddle continues to gain respectability, though it’s a shame he didn’t see fit to blow the gaff at the time he was told to sack Freddy Forsyth. Here’s the good Lord Pearson of Rannoch, in that Telegraph piece:
The BBC won’t really do anything to upset the Government and the Government does not want the BBC to start any sort of lively debate.” He added: “The people who run the BBC are indelibly, hopelessly, Islington-dwelling socialists who think the European Union is wonderful. It’s no surprise that people like Freddy who have a critical opinion of the EU are sacrificed.
Glorious stuff, and let’s have more of it.
Liddle is clown. He talks a good game now that he`s employed by The Spectator and The Times but as the EDITOR of the Today Program , no effort whatsoever was made to rectify the institutional bias that is the cancer consuming the edifice of the BBC.
Liddle has said repeatedly in articles that the BBC “means well” or just “wants everyone to get along” but these positions are either naive or deliberatly deceptive. Although Liddle has written well at The Spectator, I get the feeling that he plays the tune of whoever happens to be paying the piper.
Well Rob, good luck to Liddle and his mercenary attitude. If only the BBC played the tunes of the piper paying public instead of demanding money with menaces and calling its own tunes.
The BBC is about two things and two things only;
1. Ripping off the UK citizens
2. Not upsetting the government
Unfortunately, there’s little that can be done about the first (how much is the TV licence for their crap now?).
My suggestions?
1. Boycott all things BBC
2. REFUSE TO PAY your TV licence (you don’t honestly think it is given back to you in “quality and unrepetative programs” ….. do you?)
Strangely (yet true), you DO NOT need to pay for a TV licence unless you are watching the BBC channels!!!. Yes I know, the other 3 channels are crap, but if it screws the BBC who cares? (and besides, if you’ve got broadband, you can get INTERNATIONAL television via the internet anyway)
Steven
Many (including me) are under the impression that the licence is a licence to own a TV. You must have one (damn, have I forgotten for 6 years now?!) simply for owning a TV, whether or not you watch the BBC or anything on it at all. Do you have any links regarding your statement: “Strangely (yet true), you DO NOT need to pay for a TV licence unless you are watching the BBC channels!!!.”?
Steven – I’m sure you’re wrong about not needing a TV licence if you don’t watch the Beeb. I think it was once tested in court, and whoever it was who argued that they didn’t have to pay because they didn’t watch the Beeb, lost. Shame. In other words, whether you watch the Beeb or not, just by owning a TV you still have to pay for their biased reporting and trashy “entertainment” programmes.
Below is the text of an email from the TV licence Gestapo when I asked them how I had to disable my TV so as not to be liable to pay the licence fee.
Dear Mr ,
Thank you for contacting TV Licensing.
If your television equipment is not used to receive or record television programmes, it does not need to be covered by a television licence. You must ensure that it is not connected to an aerial, cable or satellite, and does not receive a signal when it is switched on. If you have simply removed the plug from a socket, the set will still be classed as ‘in use’, and will require a television licence.
I trust this clarifies the situation
So you pay for the BBC if you watch any TV at all. My 2 friends in the USA are amazed by this.
BBC picks up on Galloway’s speeches:
Galloway praises Iraq ‘martyrs’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4744685.stm
He’s hardly recieving much condemnation though.
“Labour MP Eric Joyce said the comments endangered UK troops “in a small way” but Mr Galloway held little influence.”
Just endangering troops in a “small way”? Thats ok then. Wake me up when Galloway moves on to glorifying beheadings that endagers our troops in a ‘larger’ way.
The tories should be all over this guy. Why the silence???
“The tories should be all over this guy. Why the silence???”
They’re fugging crepe? In some ways I’m glad they lost. It gives the party a chance to die or get some proper conservatives MPs.
The bleeding heart terrorist huggers at the bbc wouldn’t dare to a story about Hamas summer camp. The San Francisco Chronicle did. Here are a few lines from the July 31 edition, something British taxpayers will never get:
“In this camp we learn the important things of life — good behavior, respect,” said Osama, who was spending the summer at a Hamas-run camp on the beach outside Gaza City.
They also learn how to sing “intifada songs,” including one urging them to “kill Zionists wherever they are, in the name of God.”
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s spokesman Ra’anan Gissin described the summer camps as “indoctrination camps” comparable to the Hitler Youth camps, and accused Hamas of taking advantage of Gaza parents’ desperate economic straits by offering to care for and feed their children while concealing the organization’s true motives.”
If you check out BBC website right now you will see they give a limited section of the second Al queda message today -limiting and chalking it all up to Iraq in their commentary. Whereas on the Sky website you get the full transcript.
Ike
Interesting post but the difference between the BBC and the San Francisco Chronicle is that you are not forced to fund or pay for the San Francisco Chronicle under the threat of imprisonment. If you like what they write, you can buy it. If you don’t, you dont have too. You have the choice.
The beef with the Beeb is that every single household in the UK with a TV has to pay them £126.50 a year whether they want to or not.
Infact I’d support the right of left wing or right-wing rags to write whatever they want – free speech and all that. It’s a completely different matter if I am forced to fund a broadcaster whether I like it or not.
On the BBC report, they miss out this bit:
“Our message to you is clear, strong and final: There will be no salvation until you withdraw from our land, stop stealing our oil and resources and end support for infidel (Arab) rulers.”
So we need to stop using oil too?
‘Bin Laden is seen as a hero’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4744865.stm
We should be more worried than the majority of people are. As soon as one of these Islamists get hold of a nuke, we’re f*cked.
The BBC also do not make it clear that leaving Iraq etc will be sufficient to spare us from the jihadists. We also have to stand by whilst Israel is crushed.
“To the people of the crusader coalition … our blessed Shaikh Osama has offered you a truce so that you leave Muslim land. As he said, you will not dream of security until we live it as a reality in Palestine, and until all your infidel armies leave Prophet Mohammad’s lands,”
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/41F14605-4546-4EFA-9DFF-41E356B3CBFB.htm
From the BBC piece on the al-qaeda statement –
Some critics, including MP George Galloway, said the war in Iraq had helped to spark the attacks on London.
Some critics wouldn’t include the BBC itself, by any chance?
This BBC article by omiting the full al-Qaeda demands shows why Blair has been unable to freely state the effect of Iraq on terrorist recruitment.
Blair knows that Iraq is all that the BBC & its allies want to talk about, the be all & end all. They are keen to mislead the British public into thinking that appeasing al-Qaeda over Iraq would bring us peace.
Al Qaeda Leader Vows More Attacks
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,164707,00.html
On Al Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri:
“He’s a fear amplifier,” said Bob Scales, a retired Army major general and a FOX News military analyst. “His purpose is to take a tragic event and make the most of it.”
Scales said what al-Zawahiri was trying to do was to “give some assurance to others in the Arab world that Al Qaeda is in charge and, frankly, try to extend or expand the psychological effects of what’s happened for the benefit of Al Qaeda.”
I have a problem with the BBC giving ‘equivalence’ to Al-Qaeda. They treat threats from terrorists like comments from opposition MPs. These guys are mass murderers. They need to be batted down by commentators on the BBC who represent the vast majority of the public. What about a few ex-military being paid by the Beeb to give some analysis, instead of the usual “Professor Further Left” from Socialist Worker University?
Al Zawahiri states “Hasn’t Sheik Osama bin Laden told you that you will not dream of security before there is security in Palestine and before all the infidel armies withdraw from the land of Muhammed”
Surely this lends credence to what Blair has said and makes the BBC look stupid? Iraq may be the excuse but the justification goes much deeper.
dan
Blair knows that Iraq is all that the BBC & its allies want to talk about, the be all & end all. They are keen to mislead the British public into thinking that appeasing al-Qaeda over Iraq would bring us peace.
Spot on.
and since when could Galloway’s “kill the Brits” rantings be described mildly as
“Some critics, including MP George Galloway, said the war in Iraq had helped to spark the attacks on London.” ?
It’s outragoeus that Galloway can get such constant publicity from the BBC as be held up as a ‘critic’ who merely suggests that Iraq “helped” to spark the attacks.
Galloway is inciting more attacks on us!!!! However as we know, ‘glorifying’ terrorism isn’t an offence yet and as for incitement I think Galloway would have to be pictured on film handing out Kalashnikovs and RPGs to Iraqi’s before our CPS would actually prosecute him. Stevens on the Question Time security special said that out of 20-odd reports re incitement sent to the CPS by the police for prosecution, 19 were knocked back as not enough evidence.
Galloway is a walking example of what you can get away with.
Re Miam’s posting ‘Bin Laden is seen as a hero’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/47…/uk/ 4744865.stm
The problem with so many BBC interviewers is that they are reluctant to challenge the ‘grievances’ of Moslems. Here, for instance, Dawood Gustave says: “I shouldn’t have to choose – and I don’t because I’m confident enough to be all of these things at once. We shouldn’t dictate to young Muslims that they have to either be ‘British or Muslim’.”
But no one is dictating to UK Muslims that they have to choose between being British and being Muslim.
Again, in the article Gustave is described as having been written off by his teachers as ‘just another black trouble-maker’ from a poor Peckham estate. As written by Dominic Casciani, of BBC News community affairs, this gives the impression of words said by teachers, but it is clearly Gustave’s perception of their attitude, which may be right • but then again, may be wrong.
Which People and Governments Are Helping Terrorists?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,163682,00.html
Bill O’Reilly
“Now you have the BBC, Mr. Pollock, on your list. I’ve been hammering the BBC over its coverage. I can’t quite figure this organization out.
POLLOCK: Well, to be fair enough, I have to give the BBC a little credit for inspiring lots of editorials when I worked overseas. Because I’d wake up, and listen to their broadcast, and write the opposite.
But look, this is an organization, which as you pointed out before, can’t even bring itself to use the word “terrorist” when it’s talking about things.
The other reason the BBC deserves to be on the list is because it’s heard everywhere. This is the Western media that, you know, Usama, if he’s still alive, is probably listening to in his cave.
O’REILLY: Right.
POLLOCK: …and saying, look, they’ve got no will in the West. They can’t even call us terrorists.
O’REILLY: So you believe that the soft coverage the BBC puts out worldwide on the radio particularly, because they have that bong sound…
POLLOCK: Absolutely.
O’REILLY: …you know, and everybody listens to them around the world, emboldens the terrorists?
POLLOCK: It absolutely emboldens.
O’REILLY: You really think so?
POLLOCK: Of course, of course. Look, if they’re listening to a broadcast that can’t even use that word, can’t even call them by their proper name, it’s too politically correct to do that, they see that as weakness. Absolutely.”
Good comments!
“I’ve been hammering the BBC over its coverage. I can’t quite figure this organization out.“
Join the club!
“Because I’d wake up, and listen to their broadcast, and write the opposite.
Lol!
Sorry, last ‘FOX’ post I promise but these guys are good.
Is A Controversial Muslim Cleric in London Keeping Company with Terrorists?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,163543,00.html
JOHN GIBSON, GUEST HOST: In the “Personal Story” segment tonight, Sheik Omar Baqir Mohammed is a Muslim cleric who’s lived in London for almost 20 years. Now that his city is under attack, so is he, and for good reason.
Sheik Mohammed has referred to the 9/11 hijackers as the “Magnificent 19”, and has repeatedly urged his young followers to join a global jihad.
Two days ago, he predicted another attack, a terror attack in London. And the next day, there were four attempted bombings.
Coincidence? Or is Sheik Mohammed keeping company with terrorists? The Sheikh agreed to come on the show tonight, but then he turned out to be a no-show.
But FOX News Military Analyst Colonel Bill Cowan joins us now from Washington. This guy, I’m not surprised he didn’t show up, Bill. Because my first question to him was going to be, why aren’t you in jail? Why haven’t they locked you up?
BILL COWAN, FOX NEWS MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, John, you’re absolutely right. No, no, I don’t blame him for not showing up. And you know, and because he would have taken heat and well, he should have just as you said. He has been out there, calling for a jihad against the Westerners, against those fighting in Iraq. And he’s called for a jihad abroad, of course, which we are, we’re abroad from Britain. And this guy’s a bad actor and he should be out of Britain and certainly shouldn’t be allowed to come here.
GIBSON: He also talked about – he said that – recently that he would probably leave Britain within the next several days on his own, possibly permanently. He would not say where he intended to go, but the quote is “after all, I could worship god here or I could worship god back in Lebanon. I could do evil here, I could do that back in a Muslim country.”
So do you think this guy’s just hot air or is he dangerous?
COWAN: No, John, I think he’s certainly dangerous. He’s had thousands of people as he himself said and the media’s reported, thousands of young Muslims listening to this guy. He’s a very militant. He’s certainly talking about hate, discontent, killing. And he has no positive value to anybody.
Not only that, but you mentioned, excuse me, that he’s been in England about 20 years. And he’s been on the public dole the whole time. He’s living out there on the country, on the government. So this guy, there’s no socially redeeming values to this guy at all.
GIBSON: He says that he does not recruit or train recruits for jihad or holy war. However, his group’s stated aim is an Islamic revolution in Britain and the establishment of a caliphate, a fundamentalist Islamic state, which his group says was destroyed by imperialist Europe.
So if he had stated openly — I want to overthrow this government and this society — how is it Britain allows him to stay there free, free to speak, free to wander around?
COWAN: John, I think we might be able to ask that same question here in the United States, because there’s no question but that we have Muslim extremists operating in some mosques around the country, have themselves that are doing this.
GIBSON: But we just sent one to jail for life.
COWAN: .offset recruiting.
GIBSON: We just sent one to jail for life. It was two weeks ago, a guy.
COWAN: Yes.
GIBSON: .one of these imams in Virginia was recruiting jihadis. He was tried, charged as a crime under federal law and is federal prison for life.
COWAN: John, that’s great. And listen, if I were running for Congress, I’d be somewhere out there talking about my platform being one where we would change the laws of the United States so that extremists who are standing up there on the podium of a mosque calling for a jihad were wrapped up, sent to jail, or moved out of the country.
GIBSON: Bill, explain something to me. How can the Brits be kind of so loosey goosey about, you know, rights for a guy like this and be so good when it comes to responding to an actual terror attack?
COWAN: Yes, they’ve waited – John, I think they’ve waited too long. They’ve let a lot of Muslims get carried away over there without cracking down on them.
Of course, they have a big Muslim population. And this is all going to change. Just like we’ve seen Saudi Arabia change dramatically and we saw Pakistan change. And maybe this is the wake-up call for the Brits.
GIBSON: Colonel Bill Cowan joining us tonight to talk about the no- show Sheik Mohammed. Well, you know, he’s afraid of us, Bill. He wouldn’t show up.
COWAN: All right, John.
GIBSON: Appreciate it.
I have got pictures of stickers taken from right next to a mosque supporting the “magnificent 19”.
They’ve been there for 2 years now.
A community that was offended by their content would take them down.
If anyone wants to email me I will send them the pictures.
Only 1 “magnificent 19” poster, I hope.
These English people in trouble for flying more than 1 flag.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/4614297.stm
(Via USS Neverdock)
Allen Esterson says ‘The problem with so many BBC interviewers is that they are reluctant to challenge the ‘grievances’ of Moslems.’ When you remember what happened to Salman Rushdie its not too surprising is it? Maybe the answer to the BBC funding scandal is to issue a fatwa against the driver of the local TV detector van.
And another thing about the BBC article on the al-Qaeda statement
Mr Blair denies his policies provoked the 7 July bombs, which killed 56.
What do the BBC mean by this formulation? 52 people were murdered, the 56 deaths include the murderers. Or do the BBC agree with that loon in Birmingham, & do not yet accept that there were 4 suicide bombers?
The tories should be all over this guy (Galloway). Why the silence???
Miam | 04.08.05 – 12:57 pm | #
Because they don’t want to alienate the Muslims who follow this guy – they are spineless.
It would be great if only those watching BBC had to pay for it, as they’d have been broke long ago. To get good information on how not to pay your TV license fee and get away with it visit http://www.tvlicensing.biz
To sign the petition against BBC Bias to be sent to Tony Blair visit http://www.petitiononline.com/bbbc/petition.html only 295 signatures so far and we need many more.
Pretty interesting (D)HYS on muslim women wearing the veil:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4744527.stm
Surprise, surprise – most of the comments are from muslims.
Im a bit confused about this “Muslim community” that is much talked about on the radio these days.
One seems to be this international muslim cummunity but Im sure if a muslim from Britian arrived at say Riyadh or Casablanca he would need the respective visa requirements,showing that these are countries and not an international community.
“Or do the BBC agree with that loon in Birmingham, & do not yet accept that there were 4 suicide bombers?”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4746381.stm
Poor Beeboid journos caught between their love of Shami of Liberty fame and their ‘rights’ for information. Turmoil!
To be honest as an annoying liberal leftie I find most of your ranting to be reactionary whinging – but to be fair I do enjoy reading it. But on the Freddie Forsyth thing you are dead right.
Freddie used to bloody annoy me every Saturday and make me mutter to myself. But I was glad that the beeb gave him air time cos it did give a sense of balance. Folk could make up their own mind as to whether it was arrant nonsense or otherwise.
Freddie was controversial, sometimes a little offensive but he never crossed the line into being bigoted so they should have kept him.
Anyway keep up the blog – I might disagree with nearly everything you say but it is well written and it is quite satisfying seeing reactionaries like you and those who post comments get all hot and bothered about things – I find it strangely comforting.
A lurker
I’m quite new to the blogging community, but I’m rapidly becoming addicted. Its like a daily Private Eye. Now that I’ve started to look out for BBC bias, I see it in nearly everything they do. My flatmate also agrees that it’s biased, but he agrees with their slant on the world and doesn’t consider it a problem.
Somehow we need to spread the word. Has anybody thought about entering an agreement with a newspaper? Something like: “Best of Biased-BBC this week”.
There are so many examples, that people would soon start to sit up pay attention.
Lurker:
So you’re probably a closet muslim? What do you make of George Gallawi (aka Galloway)? You probably adore him, right? And what does a leftie want on a BBC Bias website – I mean it’s bias favourable to your kind. You probably love the Beeb but come here to stir things up. Well… who cares.
To everyone else:
There are several people on Jihadwatch who, like me, think that Galloway has converted to Islam. Otherwise he would probably have not been allowed to marry a niece of Arafat. Any thoughts?
The Beeb aren’t learning the lesson. Here’s a very happy story about an imam in Preston: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4747359.stm
Will they ever tell people what the koran actually says? Will they ever tell people that Mohammed was a charlatan who just wrote down stuff that would help him live a great life (as Allah’s prophet)? Who actually thinks that islam is a religion, I wonder? It’s a cult and a very dangerous one at that!
It would take a relative of Arafat to find him attractive.
A Lurker: “Anyway keep up the blog – I might disagree with nearly everything you say but it is well written and it is quite satisfying seeing reactionaries like you and those who post comments get all hot and bothered about things – I find it strangely comforting.”
Thank you for your kind comments Lurker – I too find Biased BBC strangely comforting!
Joerg, you could be a little more welcoming and hospitable! Lurker may yet see the light – most people do, the more they see of life – at least the ones who are paying attention that is! 🙂
BRITISH SECRECY, a truly nasty disease with a seemingly incurable pathology, rears its head once more. Remember the Falklands when we had to rely on US media for real news? Well here we go again. The Americans were telling the British what those vicious bombs were made of. This is a good thing. It will help us be aware of certain substances! But the British authorities were enraged. How dare anyone tell secrets to the taxpayers. Let them be blown up rather than give them info. Of course, probably under some weird kind of British pressure, the US “admitted” it should not have disclosed the British secret!
What’s the beeb got to say about all this secrecy? Or is that a secret too?
Will Tony’s incitement stuff extend to al-Galloway?
Ike, there ıs currently an investıgation, questioning of suspects and an ongoing legal process whıch any idiot can see requires some level of secrecy. We can do without the hopelessly incompetent f**kıng American ıntelligence (oxymoron?) services ballsing it up. Hopefully someone will have words.
th
Was the last post an excuse to demonstrate you know what oxymoron means?. It was actually a NYPD disclosure. Leave the anti US misinformation to the Beeb – they’re professionals
This Frearon must be some sort of national hero. Too bad Tony didn’t have a proper weapon like a Glock 40 or an AKM so to kill both of those rats.
Miam,
I love that BBC article about disaffected Muslim youth. They must have looked hard for the lead: a black criminal punk who tries Communism, then converts to Islam and is now explaining other criminal vermin to us ignoramuses. Our prisons are bulging with scum like that!
Joerg wrote:
“So you’re probably a closet muslim? What do you make of George Gallawi (aka Galloway)? You probably adore him, right? And what does a leftie want on a BBC Bias website – I mean it’s bias favourable to your kind. You probably love the Beeb but come here to stir things up. Well… who cares.”
I think I need to respond.
1. I am not a muslim “closet” or otherwise. By these comments you seem to imply that being a muslim is something wrong or bad about being a muslim – which to my mind is a small minded, bigoted position. I am an atheist who cannot rationally believe in god. I believe religion causes a great deal of conflict but I am happy for others to have their own faith.
2. What do I think about George Galloway? I think he is a colourful character. I don’t necessarily disagree with all of his analysis on Palestine etc but I think he is a dangerous, egotistical, self serving hypocrite who does the cause he espouse no good at all. I heard on radio 4 this morning and shouting “shut up you wanker” which is a far greater reaction than I ever had when I heard Freddie Forsythe.
3. Why am I on this forum and why do I read this blog? Well although I’m a Guardian reader I do find reading a paper that panders to my prejudices boring. Plus I do actually want to read things that challenge my worldview as it either helps better define my own position against it or sometimes it alters my own position. It’s called being open minded. Give it a go you might find it useful. 😉
4. Have I come to stir things up? Maybe but a bit of debate rather than endless posts agreeing with one another is just self indulgent. Plus a little debate never did anyone any harm. Marx would say bit of dialectics never did anyone any harm and after all he was voted most important philosopher by Radio 4 listeners!
Andrew wrote:
“Joerg, you could be a little more welcoming and hospitable! Lurker may yet see the light – most people do, the more they see of life – at least the ones who are paying attention that is!”
Andrew – I’m not worried about Joerg – s/he seems a bit of a miserable narrow minded git, a condition that unfortunately confine itself to only those on the right. There’s plenty of pious lefties about who I would not wnat to spend the time of day with.
As to whether I will see the light about the biased Beeb – I saw some glimmers some time ago. I really like a lot of the comedy they have on Radio 4. Whilst the satiral shows such as The Now show and The News quiz do take a dig at all politcal parties the guests either aim their comedy from the left, such as Jeremy Hardy, Mark Steele, etc or from the middle ground ground such as Alan Coren.
There are hardly any comedians aiming their comedy from the right – you hear Jeremy Hardy attacking the Labour Party for not being left enough, you never hear anyone attacking the Tories for not being right wing enough as they scammble to the centre ground.
Even as a leftie I find it annoying that there are no right wing commedians on Radio 4. I don’t mean folk like Jim Davidson – he is just offensive. I know right wing people who are not racist, sexist or homophobic etc so surely there must be some funny right wing commedians who don’t make bigotted jokes. And to be honest if there aren’t the Beeb should bloody try to nurture some.
As to the rest of the Beeb being biased – sometimes maybe. But given that the majority of the mainstream media is so bloody right wing – so what. The bias only provides a little balance to the disproportionate affect of the rest of the media. Otherwise you just end up with US media which is not only very biased – but sentionalist rubbish. Fox News anyone? Surely not.
The majority of the mainstream media is right wing??? You do live in your own lil dream world, don’t you?
A Lurker.
Welcome to this weblog I enjoy your posts on coppersblog and I look forward to some of your intelligent comments on this one. I see also youhave managed to fall foul of some our less intellectual brethren …. but hey so what ….. that is what this site designed for FREE SPEECH.
As regards the subject matter, what I find so alarming is the amount of cover a murder in Huyton can generate as opposed to a murder on a london bus just because the victim was black in the one case and white in the other. BBC Don’t you realise it is precisely this kind of bias in your reporting that ferments unrest? are you so stupid / arrogant to think that it wouldn’t be noticed. Both murders are absolutely disasterous for there respective families and communities and do nothing to foster good relations. The BBC compounds this with it’s attitude to the reporting.
Whilst on this subject why is it necessary to keep reiterating the fact that one of the wanted men was the brother of a Manchester United player….. what was the relevance?
I welcome comment on the above
I am constantly amazed by how threatened the Liberal Establishment here in the States is by Fox News, Talk Radio, blogging etc. or maybe I’m not.
All of the above have broken the Liberal stranglehold on information distribution. They can no longer control what is covered or cover for their pals as the Clinton scandals and Rathergate demonstrate.
It seems dissent and open debate are feared by the Left….interesting isn’t it?