about BBC editorialising within news items (a habit I often notice and fail to raise consistently owing largely to time constraints). Having reported that Mr Green had been cleared of ‘inciting hatred against homosexuals’, the BBC went on to say ‘He has shown little regret for his comments when addressing the media. He has also said his comments referred to a homosexual lifestyle, rather than individuals.’
Remind me, what was the definition of ‘acquittal’ once again?
The Beeb’s rather lavish and more precise coverage of the Roman Catholic Church’s latest pronouncement concerning homosexuality is something I wrapped into a post about the BBC’s science at my own personal weblog. Please ignore my apparent plug unless this topic interests you enough to follow.
Ed Thomas
Just get that final sentence:
Some religious groups have argued that a conviction would be a threat to freedom of religion and speech. Others said an acquittal would open the door to fiercer attacks against Jews, Muslims and gays by right-wing extremists.
Shutzpa, spelt B-B-C.
The BBC obviously expects a more enlightened attitude to the gay issue from the Catholic church than it expects from a certain other religion I could mention. Reminds me of the higher standards of behaviour the BBC expects from the USA than from other countries. I thought expecting lower standards of behaviour from some peoples than from others was racism, but if the BBC does such a thing it can’t be.
open the door to fiercer attacks against Jews, Muslims and gays by right-wing extremists.
So the Jews have only the right wing extremists to worry about, have they?
Re The Swords of Truth Brigade claimed the hostages were undercover spies and showed the passport of the British man, 70-year-old Norman Kember.
BBC1 News at 6pm commented that hostage taking had been on the decline, but that insurgents were perhaps taking this action because they were coming under increased pressure from the Iraqi/Coalition forces.
What? I thought, no progress being made, ever increasing violence, descent into civil war & quagmire were the words of the BBC view on Iraq.
Can active heterosexuals and “supporters of straight culture” become priests?
Neil:
Why would they want to? They’d be surrounded by people who do not believe in the Bible and apologists who keep saying sorry for the crusades….what about a wee ‘sorry mate’ for ruining the Spanish tourist industry all those years ago until Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren swung by and sorted the black cloaked guys out?
Initially, I wasn’t going to post this.
But I was looking round some other blog sites and I came across an item which made me change my mind.
BTW
My apologies: it is definitely off-topic.
On BBC R5 this morning, before 11:00am, the BBC covered the protest by Greenpeace against any further building of Nuclear Reactors.
The protest involved two Greenpeace protestors clambering about the wrought iron work in the Hall of the Business Design Centre, used by the CBI for its conference.
After spending half an hour thrashing this subject to death, the BBC decided to ‘investigate’ the subject of “Protestors who Risk their Lives Protesting”.
(and just a minute; how come the BBC had this topic lined up; with studio guests and everything? Surely Greenpeace hadn’t tipped off dear old Auntie?)
Anyway back to the story
Enter Jo Wilding and Tony Harrison
Tony Harrison explained that he was part of a flour bomb attack on Tony Blair by ‘Fathers for Justice’.
Jo Wilding had much more exciting fare to put before the listeners.
She’d protested against the war in Iraq. She’d gone to Fallujah to drive an ambulance and bring succour to the women and children of that benighted town.
She told tales of US atrocities, how the town was bombed and how her ambulance was shot at by US troops.
She explained how she was held captive by rebel iraqi fighters.
Then the truth came out.
This was a full time protestor – an Activist.
She had been before the courts.
She had been to protests at Aldermaston, demonstrating against the ‘obscenity’ of Nuclear Weapons
She had been to protests against Nuclear Power, to ‘save our children’ from the poison of Nuclear Waste
She had been to protests against Iraq war (and thrown rotten fruit at PM, she was exceptionally pleased with this one; it got her into the newspapers)
She protests against the presence of a Halliburton subsidiary in the oil fields of southern Iraq
She had protested against Coca-Cola ‘Killing its Workers’ in Columbia
This was a 7 minute tirade.
Unquestioned by the ‘interviewer’, with no-one checking the validity of any of her allegations.
Everyone of these items was a BBC sponsored ‘free hit’
How did this happen? Why was this activist allowed to use the BBC as a channel for propaganda?
Surely it contravenes the BBC policy of impartiality?
NO!
Because these were not the subject
The subject was to do with placing your life in danger to make a protest.
Whatever she said would be valid in that context.
The BBC can air its agenda in the guise of another topic.
There were a couple of interesting points to come out of this.
Ms Wilding was hammering on all the right buttons:
Nuclear Disarmament
Anti-Nuclear Power
Anti-War
Anti-Blair
Anti-US (especially US Military)
Anti-Big Business
(there’s one missing: but more later)
Ms Wilding is a courageous, strong, independent mother (yes, she curtailed her more dangerous activities because it would be unfair to her little one; so add responsible to her list of attributes).
Tony Harrison – Fathers for Justice; one of the flour throwers, had about a minute to speak and relate his experiences. Why wasn’t he given more time to speak? He was a guest and it was bad manners not to give him a couple more minutes on air.
But poor old Tony.
A male (and a rapist according to that wonderful miss Dworkin)
And Divorced – which makes him instantly suspect. (did he beat his wife?)
And he wants more time with his kids(????????!)
Sorry Tony, not a chance. You were lucky to get a minute and you only got that cos you messed up Blair’s suit.
Such is the world of the BBC.
The answer of course lies in the control room.
And why do I suspect the control room?
What the ‘interviewer’ did was to come back at the end of Ms Wilding’s piece of agitprop and dissociate the BBC from the remarks concerning Coca-Cola.
The legal eagles were listening.
In a contest between ‘the Real Thing’ and the BBC, I think the Beeb might come off worse.
Oh and the missing topic?
Another protestor was invited to speak later.
He was a musician and thus a sensitive, creative soul and helpfully supplied the missing piece to the BBC’s mosaic of prejudices.
He was anti-GM
A road protestor,
Anti-Murdoch
and of course Anti-war,
But most importantly, he had been to the ‘occupied territories’, risking his life, and was ‘Pro-Palestinian’
I said at the start of this rant that I found something looking round other blogsites
Try this:
http://ussneverdock.blogspot.com/2004/04/formal-charges-against-bbc-formal.html
At the BBC nothing EVER happens by accident.
The word ‘Terrorist’ is replaced ‘because it is emotionally loaded’ even though factually correct.
‘Suicide Bombers’ become ‘misguided criminals’.
Murderous anti-semites are ‘palestinian militants’
If the BBC exercises so much care over its own language, you can be certain they have an iron grip over what goes out over the airwaves.
Ha! Charlton Heston as El Cid, gleefully slaughtering Moors by the thousand. What’s the bet that’s not on BBC1/2’s movie schedule for the forseeable.
well said Paulc.
I remember Ms Wilding & her amazing Iraqi clown show, discussed here before.
simo writes:
“What’s the bet that’s not on BBC1/2’s movie schedule for the forseeable.”
Yes, aren’t Radio 4 listeners still waiting for Part Two of Robert Buchan’s Greenmantle?
It was pulled from the schedule earlier this year, with no warning, on the fatuous grounds that it might somehow offend Moslems or inflame tensions, or somesuch rubbish.
Listeners who had enjoyed part one were palmed off with the usual BBC blandishments about it reappearing later, that it was impossible to rearrange the schedule hurriedly (a blatant lie – they do it easily enough when it suits them) and the rest, as they say, is silence.
Still, it left another free hour in the schedules for more nonsense agonising about the “plight” of homegrown terrorist murderers.
Seems some people can’t abide the freer access to (D)HYS. As the top recommendations support nuclear power, we get this from a Greenpeace fan
I would just like to point out that this forum has probably been infiltrated by pro-nuclear PR personel. Some of the comments are just PR and should be treated as such.
Simon marchant
Like a lot of L3s he thinks his view is not only correct, but unarguable & always held by the majority.
Now even the Leftys Client Groups are turning on them.
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=2310662005
SiN: I keep wondering how many within the Anglican / Protestant Church these days are actually Christians. Some seem to be more secular than atheists. No wonder only very few people go to church on a regular basis.
Dan,
Seems some people can’t abide the freer access to (D)HYS.
Yes, I’ve seen that as well. How about this whinge from the topic titled ‘What will border deal do for Gaza?’:
Added: Saturday, 19 November, 2005, 14:28 GMT 14:28 UK
It’s amazing how both in this forum and the France-riot forums the higher the anti-Arab flair of the post the more recommendations it receives, and by far.
This doesn’t have to do with objectivity. It’s fascism and is mighty frustrating to see being so darned common. People side with the anti-Arab without apparent reflection, and regardless of topic. If given a chance they’d chastize Arabs for their own prejudices. Makes one wonder what’s so great about humans.
He should have a look at the highly-recommended comments on the anniversary of the death of Arafat.
That would really curl his hair.
D_G: I’ve often wondered the same thing. I’m pretty sure church attendance would be a lot higher if there were more hellfire-and-damnation preachers in the pulpit. People seem to like that sort of thing.
As an example, my own vicar. He’s been chastised by the church huierarchy for actually believing what he preaches, as if that’s somehow wrong. Now and then he’ll tell us about his meetings with the bishop of stockport (who, it must be said, does agree with our vicar on a lot of things). At the moment he’s unemployable anywhere else in the entire CofE simply because he believes in what he preaches. Oh, that, and he doesn’t see why our church should be subsidising “dead” churches filled with the kind of people you’re talking about. So he’s withholding most of the church’s tithe until the church hierarchy gets a clue and, meanwhile, investing the money in to some decent outreach projects, like converting the bar down the road in to a ministry and function centre. With beer on tap!
Speaking of which, the electrics in that place are a nightmare. I have to get them to comply with the bizzare EU-inspired Part-P specs just so a bureacrat can tick a box to say I’ve done a good job…
OT
Slightly more important:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=XDIA0ZVESV3R5QFIQMGSFF4AVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2005/11/30/neu30.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/30/ixportaltop.html
So what did THE French promise him?
President of Europe?
You get nothing for nothing from Blair & Co.
What a complete and utter bastard!
Scuse french…
We’re already paying more in to the pot than any other EU country, and yet they want even more from us. And he’s giving it! Is he completely insane?
[Deleted]
Can’t we sue him – it’s our money after all….if politicans were made liable for the screw ups and the billions wasted they would soon be a lot more accountable and careful!
> “Is he completely insane?”
No just completely self centered. His ambition comes before the job he was elected to do, namely do what is best for the British people.
One good point about it is that wasting this money via the EU will bring the day of economic reckoning forward for the UK. Lets just hope enough people still work in the free-market to get rid of the parasite-politics of socialism.
Yawn,
‘World’s greatest liar….delusional tyrant….country’s greatest enemy….parasite-politics of socialism.’
And yet somehow life is perfectly content for a greater proportion of Britons than has ever been the case previously. Alternatively we could elect David Davis for a realy brown trousered ride on the economic cycle… I’m not that much of a thrill seeker personally.
non scientific untestable hypothesis supported by BBC in attack on non scientific untestable hypothesis.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4482174.stm
God v Gaia.
Cockney,
The credit card bill for last year was 65 billion.
Your parasitic politics are coming to an end.
Life in the UK better under this bunch? Who ARE you trying to fool?
Life is “comfortable”, but not overly so, and the slow but steady decline in the economy is showing that people have less disposable income than they previously had. That’s why they’re living on credit, incidentally. Their actual wages are taxed to the hilt, leaving them less than they need to live on.
So the Jews have only the right wing extremists to worry about, have they?
And Iranian homosexuals too…
Rob,
My parasitic politics? Personally, I’d like to see a more liberal free market economic policy and I have my concerns about the current direction. I certainly am no great fan of Blair but ‘parasite politics of socialism????’. It’s b*llocks, no more accurate than the ‘Bush is a Nazi’ brigade.
Some of the stuff which you propose around the web is frankly hilarious. In the real world, government requires more than a word for word regurgitation of the output of the ASI.
Lazy knee jerk criticism (or hysterical abuse) is BBC territory. Do you have a mortgage or a business requiring financing? If so consistently friendly interest rates and a relatively stable economic climate can’t have done you much harm.
Archonix – that’s a slightly more realistic analysis which I’d at least partly agree with.
The debilitating effects of the Blair government are more subtle than those of past Labour administrations. They have managed to keep the income tax rates unchanged, but have shifted the burden in other ways, such as increasing National Insurance, stamp duty, higher fuel duty among others.
The most sinister tactic of theirs, though, is their currying favour with favoured groups, so as to create a massive new Labour-voting block which would keep that party in for many years.
If you compare the election results of 2005 with October 1974, various factors had helped Labour to use their vote more ‘efficiently’ and secure their majority:
1) The vast increase in public sector jobs has created a large Labour-voting bloc in formerly Conservative county towns.
2) New building projects in the ‘Shire’ counties as proposed by John Prescott to create a growing Labour-voting presence in formerly ‘true blue’ counties.
3) Tactically voting LibDem in seats where Labour has no chance, to ensure that the Conservative stays out. Generally, a high LibDem vote does Labour less damage.
4) Out-of-date constituency boundaries, meaning that the depopulating inner cities are over-represented.
For the record:
National Vote share in 1974 Oct
Lab 39% Con 35% Lib 18% Others 8%
National Vote share in 2005
Lab 36% Con 33% LibDem 22% Others 8%
Archonix wrote:
We’re already paying more in to the pot than any other EU country…
Actually not. Germany pays the largest amount (by far) into the EU pot; Holland pays the most per capita.
Pete_in_London, other posters, and whoever else involved in these posts ……………
I’m complaining about the end of your post on Tony Blair, namely
“God speed his heart defect”
I regard that as abhorrent, deeply offensive and totally unnecessary. And please keep God out of wishing people dead.
Hazel, Chill.
Hazel, I’ve deleted Pete_London’s comment – it was stupid and offensive, as well as off topic.
To avoid the credibility of Biased BBC being tarnished by a small number of thoughtless/rabid/over-enthusiatic commenters such transgressions will be dealt with firmly, up to and including banning specific commenters and/or introducing pre-moderation of comments.
If you (all) wish to maintain this forum in its current form please be reasoned and considerate, and, ideally, not too far off-topic – this isn’t a playpen for those who are narked at the world in general – those who wish to do that can set up their own blogs.
Thank you.
Thank you Andrew.
I agree that this forum is not the place for such vitriolic views about anything. It’s a place for drawing attention to, and reasoned discussion about, BBC bias.
And it’s my favourite blog.
Cockney’s post illustrates a point that has troubled me for the past few years here in paradise; the economy is clearly in trouble yet so few people seem to see it. We have low inflation and low interest rates because of Thatcher’s legacy and China’s contribution to manufactured goods keeping prices low yet we seem to have chosen to reject the opportunity this offers for wealth creation, and the benefits that would bring We have not chosen this as a policy, we have drifted into it, any arguments in favour of restricted growth on environmental grounds have been muted and after the event – if this was policy we would have heard. We have terrifyingly high unemployment, disguised only by Brown loading the public payroll to keep the statistics friendly (net increase of 1 million in government jobs since 1997, plus a similar number moved off balance sheet to the likes of EDS, Capita etc., with no discernable improvement in services, so add 2 mil;lion to the official jobless balance), yet no one argues when Brown is presented as the greatest chancellor since chancelling was invented! We have moved from having larger pension provision than the rest of the EU combined, to being below average (not all Brown’s fault; the market collapse of 2001 accounted for about 20%, leaving 80% of the problems with No 11, unless we hold Brown responsible for at least part of the collapse), so we may be working until 68, or more. You cannot fool all of the people all of the time, but can get enough of them to be elected.
[Apologies this is off topic, but it is consistant with the development of the thread]
MarkE
Good stuff. I’m lining you up for No 11 if I ever get in. (Rob-Read is going to Foreign Office and Ian Barnes to Defence). Oh and Cockney is going be made Editor of The Sun so we get some real life truth in that blasted rag!
David (not Davis and certainly not the BBC’s favourite Cameron!)
Unemployemtn in the UK is rising. Labour are importing more and more Labour Voters, sorry, I mean Economic Immigrants……but there is no jobs to give them….
The sad thing is Labour have re-introduce slavery into Britain, and the Labour supporters just love having little slaves to do all the dirty work. Yet these workers from overseas like the Chinese Cockle Pickers that drowned, are earning 20p a day, and liveing 10 to a cravan……it makes a mockery of the minimum wage……
Labour inherited a 50 Billion surpluss in funds from the Tories, yet have managed to turn into into a 250 Billionpound loss, and we’re now in debt……and not just the Government, the “public” are in debt to the tune of 1 TRILLION pounds……
And unemployment is rising, manufacturing is dying, and more and more people are coming looking for work……
It’s not going to be a recession, it’s going to be a civil war…….maybe even a World War, started in Europe yet again as this disaster collapses around our ears…..
OT
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4484392.stm
It seems that the poor old Beeb still hasn’t got over the Hutton reports findings
Re A summary of Michael Howard’s time as leader of the conservatives:
”There were also some lows, particularly when he failed to deliver a serious blow to the prime minister over the Hutton report.”
Mark E,
I think that’s a perfectly valid analysis, although I’d disagree with some of it. Bringing things back into B-BBCdom I can’t remember the last time that the Beeb did a decent analysis of the state of the economy, drawing on the range of sensible economic viewpoints. It’s all half arsed political soundbites, bullsh*t nutcase leftwing ‘what about the poor’/’what about the environment’ type rubbish, and populist knockabout ‘how much will your pint cost’ stuff.
It’ll be interesting to see if the pensions report coverage goes down the lines of various clowns declaring that ‘we’ve worked our whole lives so we obviously DESERVE a vast state pension’ with no pointing out of the fact that irrespective of how deserving someone is money doesn’t fall from the skies.
btw if I was editor of the Sun, ‘Dierdrie’s photo casebook’ would be expanded to at least 5 pages. Pure comedy gold.
If I was the editor of The Sun I’d make sure to give Ross Kemp a good slapping. Oh, hang on, that’s already been done… 🙂
News24 have just broadcast an interview with someone who appeared to be an Iraqi emigre.
He was seeking to contact Kember’s kidnappers.
He was going to impress on them that as Kember had opposed the war “he was a friend of the Iraqi people“
This statement, of course, went unchalleged by the BBC interviewer.
So someone who wanted the continuation of the Saddam family rule is a friend of the Iraqi people, not a friend only of the insurgents.
Cockney,
Sorry for pre-judgeing you. I have to say that I stand by my claim that socialism is parasitic. The host i.e. most-workers receive no net benefit from the vast majority of their tax spend.
I would bet all my money that people would not willingly choose the state as a provider if they had a choice.
Thus I stand by my claims.
I beleive most of the “growth” in the economy of the last 2-3 years has been from debt (the Enronomics of PFI etc.). When looked at temporally, we are much worse off.
I beleive most of the “investments” the chancellor has directed taxpayers money into will show negative rates of return.
I beleive state spending is totally out of control, and cronyism abounds, destryoing yet more wealth.
”There were also some lows, particularly when he failed to deliver a serious blow to the prime minister over the Hutton report.”
yoy
Yes it is a history re-written that the BBC were exonerated by Hutton. All those charges against the government by the BBC determined as “unfounded” by Hutton were of course just whitewash.
The boy Gilligan was in a BBC4 documentary about documentaries the other night.
He objected to having been shown in a documentary as having changed his notes after his meeting with Dr Kelly.
Gilligan claimed to have been competely exonerated by Hutton. Asked why he hadn’t sued the documentary maker, he replied “Well nobody believed the accusation in the film”.
& that’s because the media prefered to side with their own & Howard made the strategic error of thinking that Blair was a bigger enemey than the BBC. Whereas Blair is a here today, gone tomorrow politician, the BBC will oppose the Conservatives for as long as it is part of the public sector.
With all that negativity above about the UK economy it is surprising that the blue in tooth & claw, Irwin Stelzer, backs Brown over Cameron in today’s theguardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1653669,00.html
“With all that negativity above about the UK economy it is surprising that the blue in tooth & claw, Irwin Stelzer, backs Brown over Cameron in today’s theguardian.”
Hardly surprising. If he hadn’t they wouldn’t have printed it….
Further to my above post refering to
He was going to impress on them that as Kember had opposed the war “he was a friend of the Iraqi people”
The man on News24 may have been this fellow –
Anas Altikriti, an MAB spokesman, said: “Mr Kember and his party are well known peace activists who were against the war in Iraq and who worked to alleviate the subsequent suffering of the Iraqi people.
“Kidnapping them serves no cause and achieves no benefit for the pursuit of freedom and sovereignty the Iraqi people are engaged in.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4484234.stm
And who are those people engaged in that pursuit? It sounds suspiciously like the insurgents.
And talking of suspicious, Altikriti, now there’s a name worth a moment’s thought.
Mr Bush said victory would come “when the terrorists and Saddamists can no longer threaten Iraq’s democracy, when the Iraqi security forces can provide for the safety of their own citizens, and when Iraq is not a safe-haven for terrorists to plot new attacks on our nation”.
This was a partial redefinition of what victory might be, and potentially highly significant, our correspondent says.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4484330.stm
Well our correspondent doesn’t make it easy for us by spelling out the “highly significant” change in policy.
I must not have been paying enough attention, because I cannot see how Bush is moving the goalposts.
Any sign of this story on the BBC? Do I need to ask?
Christian doctor ‘was forced out’
An eye specialist has accepted undisclosed damages after claiming that he was forced out of his job by Muslim colleagues.
Joseph Erian took the United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust to an employment tribunal, stating that he was made to resign from the ophthalmology department of Pilgrim Hospital, Boston, after staff there discovered that he was a Christian. The tribunal, which started earlier this month, ended when the trust offered an out-of-court settlement and admitted that the problems surrounding Dr Erian’s case “were not his fault”.
Dr Erian pursued his claim privately after the British Medical Association refused to back the case, Jane Jelly, his lawyer, said. He brought his case under the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003, which make it illegal to discriminate against someone on the grounds of their religion or beliefs.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1897087,00.html
Returning to the church (earlier in this thread). I note that this morning there was an extensive BBC TV relay of the induction of the Archbishop of York. All very laudable and I’m sure that he is an excellent churchman and the broadcast was well worth it. But …. am I being a bit sceptical in saying that if he was Bishop de Vere Wynne from Barsetshire the BBC would have given the same coverage as someone who originated in Uganda?
Moderators –
My post of 11.15am was deleted. Just so I know; was it my [deleted – that should answer your question]?
Andrew
I read on and saw your later post. Sure, mine was off topic, but no more so than 80% of others in thread. As for being stupid and offensive, I reject stupid and can state categorically it was meant to be offensive. I didn’t think ‘offensive’ was a reason to delete a post but well, you live and learn.
I hope that nobody objects to a return to the Greenpeace protest at the CBI’s AGM but I couldn’t help but notice that the protestors high in the roof beams were not wearing harnesses. Given that this is a breach of Health’n’Safty regulations and that this dangerous and reckless act was approved by Greenpeace, then haven’t Greenpeace left themselves a little exposed? What would have happened if one of those chaps had fallen off and broken his neck, or worse, killed someone below. What would Cherie’s angle be?