The BBC are at it again. Yesterday I noted how the nationality and immigration status of a police killer is newsworthy if the killer’s American but not if he’s Somali.
Here’s the conviction of a bigamist and con-man.
“American William Jordan, 41, who has at least 10 children, wove a web of lies to con his victims, a court heard.”
Mr Jordan is a naturalised British citizen. But apparently he’ll never be British enough for the BBC.
Here’s the conviction of some killers.
“South Londoners Diamond Babamuboni, 17, his brother Timy, 15, and Jude Odigie, 16, were convicted of manslaughter. The four will be sentenced in February.”
The “South Londoners” are Nigerian nationals and illegal immigrants, but that doesn’t get a mention in the BBC report.
Probably just not relevant or newsworthy. After all, it’s not as if foreign criminals are a big news story.
Jon:
My point is that your media is making enemies where friends should be or at least were. I do have one friend who cancelled a trip to Europe recently after watching the BBC for an extended period. His exact words were, “Screw ’em, I wouldn’t cross the street to visit people who hate and slander me, why should I cross an ocean?” I guess what I’m trying to do is warn you (out of concern for our collapsing friendship), that the mood over here is changing. Unfortunately, we are seeing too much of one another now and we are not loving what we are seeing. We are very confused by the hate that we see coming from Europe, afterall so many of us see ourselves as your offspring: can it be possible for a parent to hate its child? We hear constantly how your people call Tony Blair our “poodle.” We don’t understand that as we have a great deal of affection and respect for him. It is demeaning to him and you to call him that. Now I realize that there are domestic issues with Mr. Blair, but we would not presume to comment on what is private to you. If Tony Blair wanted to, he could convince this nation that the sun comes up in the west such is the respect that he enjoys here.
The “Yo, Blair” thing was a cultural misunderstanding. We wouldn’t think of saying “Yo” anyone unless we considered them a close and affectionate friend.
We have nothing but contempt for the French I don’t think you would find too many Americans who would be willing to wipe their shoes on a Frenchman. The Germans don’t even register on our radar screen as far as most of us know. But we have always had a special place in our hearts for the British. That is changing. Our theory is that if there were no appetite for all of the anti-American tripe, then it wouldn’t exist. Also, many of us of us see the EU as an enemy just waiting to declare itself. Over here our leftist media exists barely, I might add, mostly on the backs of our old hippie generation who actually think it’s still “cool” to hate the establishment, and we have so many alternative outlets for news that the old media is losing market share and are on the verge of dying. There won’t be many to cry at its funeral.
Many in Europe think that Fox news is a Republican only news source. Wrong, I don’t watch Fox because they are too far left of center for me, but compared to the rest they are considered “more fair.”
I appreciate this blog and what it is trying to accomplish, but the BBC, online newspapers and the internet have a far greater reach. I will stop now and not post here any more as it seems that I am contributing to the problem that I’m sounding the alarm for. I hope our countries will always be friends, but I have serious reservations about that. I wish you well, and have a Happy New Year. Good bye.
Jon | 30.12.06 – 3:39 am
For someone who is complaining about sloppy proof-reading, you made quite a few errors in your own post. Yes, I know we aren’t paying you to comment. But still……
Actually the BBC News website employs rather fewer people than would be represented by the population of even a small village in Co Durham.
130 staff last time I looked. Working shifts to provide 24/7 coverage. Most are young, ‘entry level’ types, as you’d expect for a new medium. Which means that they’re under a lot of pressure. Of course there are checking systems. And, of course, they sometimes break down. If you were to look at the corrections columns in newspapers, you’d find they made quite a few mistakes too. Is all your work perfect?
John Reith
Tut, tut, tut.
“… sloppy editing, not bias …” you say, on more than one occasion.
Is a poor excuse, for two very obvious reasons. I assume that one as articulate as you would be aware of them.
If I do my job badly, people could die, including me. They would die very directly, and I would be held to account. When a BBC editor, paid a lot more than I am, does a bad job, the effects can be just as harmful, if not as directly. In fact when they spread an incorrect assessment of the academic words of the Pope, people did die. No-one at the BBC was held to account. There is no excuse for doing an important job sloppily, and news dissemination is an important job, vital to democracy.
Secondly the sloppiness is, in itself, the reason for BBC bias.
It is well-established that the BBC is staffed primarily by people who have a left-wing view of the world. That would not be a problem at all, if they were competent in their jobs.
I could write an article from a balanced viewpoint, even though I would only agree with part of it as I acknowledge that I have a right-of-centre political view. My own view need not mean my writing is biased that way – if someone paid me the comparatively large sums BBC editors earn to write a balanced view then I would write carefully. This very sloppiness, while not the root source of the bias, is the reason that it is presented in the BBC’s final output.
Asp Speaks
Please do not read into our news media the views of the general public. If the British people are anti-American sometimes, it because of the media bias, not media bias because people dislike the US. The BBC recently admitted in a private meeting, from which certain comment leaked, that it is completely unrepresentative of the views of most Britons. Another classic example is the EU. Poll after poll shows that the majority in the UK distrust the EU, and will never trust it despite what the media will tell them. Yet the BBC still insists on as positive a view as it can possibly give.
I hope you and your fellow countrymen can keep some faith in the UK. Most here have far more fellow feeling with your countrymen than with anyone in southern Europe or Germany. Northern and eastern Europeans have far more positive view of the US than southern Europeans and Germans, and those are the areas that most British people get on best with. Unfortunately France and Spain tend to bleat most loudly, and Germany and France have a lot of political power within the EU and UN. “Liberals” and socialists always had teh loudest mouths, but they are not representative!
Reith,
“Actually the BBC News website employs rather fewer people than would be represented by the population of even a small village in Co Durham.
130 staff last time I looked. ”
Do you ever stop to read what you write?
The BBC website was originally conceived as complimentary to the broadcasting and when it was launched it carried program scheduling and articles relevant to the program output. It has now morphed into a behometh with a staff that rivals in size the complement of some of our national newspapers and that doesn’t include much of the journalism which is supplied courtesy of the broadcast side of the enterprise and by outside agencies. What the hell do they all do? What is the justification for this sprawling monster funded at public expense?
John Reith wrote: “For someone who is complaining about sloppy proof-reading…”
Proofreading is one word 🙂
Further to the above:
Reith, do you ever read what you write? (cont)
If one wanted to put together a rival to the BBC website it would take:
1. Office space,furniture etc for staff(rented)
2. Provision of telephone lines & internet connections.
3. A job lot of 2nd hand PC’s from E-Bay Some Pentium 3’s should be man enough for the job.
4. A couple of thousand pound’s worth of web publishing software.
5. A rental agreement with a server.
6. A kettle for coffee breaks.
That’s it.
OK, let’s accept your 130 staff, we’ll need more than one kettle.
Where do hundreds of millions of pounds go?
JR – I did not say that the BBc “web site” employed more people that the population of Co. Durham I said BBC employed more people that the population of Co. Durham
CONCERNING ANTI-AMERICANISM…
As a member of Xbox Live from its inception I have to tell you we Americans are not hated or disliked as the media would have us believe. I have people from all over the world on my friends list and have been told many times by Brits that if I ever got to the UK they want me to stay with them and take me out to dinner. I even have a few French friends and before I hated the French because the media had me convinced they hated all of us. Xbox truly has made the world smaller and I recommend everyone to look into it.
If anyone is on Xbox Live and wants to send me a friends request my Gamertag is Locrian.
John Reith: The point has already been made, but bears repeating. You say, “the NUJ, the Press Complaints Commission and the BBC have guidelines prohibiting the identification of a person’s race/ethnicity/country of origin etcetera – unless it is directly relevant to the story.”
How interesting. Better not show their photgraphs then. Might give a clue as to their ethnic origins.
What else is prohibited by these guidelines unless “directly relevant”to the story? Can we look forward to items such as PERSON KILLED ON LEVEL CROSSING: AGE, SEX AND OCCUPATION IRRELEVANT?
Journalists are paid to answer the questions Who? What? Where? When? How? They have no business to withhold information on the grounds that we are not to be trusted with it.
The killers’ ethnic origins and immigration status were – rightfully – mentioned multiple times on the news on the BBC radio news that I listened to.
Oh I cannot believe that you are not all reading what you are writing on this stupid ream of comments.
Do you not all realise that this Will Jordan was a) a paedophile of the most disgusting type who sexually assaulted his 13 year old step daughter and went to prison already in 1997 for that b) he was in possession of a dangerous firearm b) he conned numerous men and women and UK companies out of hundreds of thousands of pounds and finally, was a bigamist too.
Tell me why, the BBC or any other media party should not state that he is American or any other darned nationality that he may have been. Tell me why British taxpayers should pay to now keep him free of charge in prison and by the way he is very used to living off of other people by defrauding everyone that he meets out of money and property.
Finally, how do I now all of this. Well, answer that question yourselves.
You really should stop complaining and read the articles properly…
Regards
A very annoyed person
Denise | 05.01.07 – 10:51 pm
Oh I cannot believe that you are not all reading what you are writing on this stupid ream of comments.
You only think it’s stupid because you have missed the point. Go back and read the comments with an open mind and you might see the light.
It’s not about the nature of the crimes or the criminal, it’s about the information that the beeb chooses to tell us about the event.
In short, they avoid identifying perpetrators as muslim or palestinians but have no compunction about identifying someone as American or Israeli, because they hold Americans and Israelis in low regard.
That’s one of the ways by which we judge the beeb as biased.
Denise: Will Jordan killed nobody. The vicious teen gang now rightly convicted for their crimes killed at least one victim and committed their other crimes with maximum violence and vicious enjoyment. Both are villainous, but the Nigerian killers are worse. And the BBC is careful to conceal their real identity. That is the point. If, however, you do not want to see the point that the people murdered or brutalized by the Nigerian teens are just as much victims as yourself, then I am afraid you are on your way to becoming one of the BBC’s favourite subjects – a professional victim wallowing in her victimhood and using it for moral blackmail. I am not saying you are, but you seem to have written without stopping to think that manslaughter is worse than rape and robbery with extreme violence just as bad (in that it is intended to degrade and demean the victim). How do I know that? Well, I have my reasons.
To those who suggest ethnicity should be stated when reporting on crimes committed. Why? If it was not a racially motivated crime ,how is it relevant? Unless the suggestion is that a person’s race or ethnicity predisposes them toward crime or violence. That is inherently racist.
Imagine this headline: “A man was today convicted of the kidnapp and murder of his wife. He had ginger hair.”
I don’t know about this “inherently racist” business, shock, horror.
If race A is a hundred times more prone to terrorise people than race B, then I’d expect a responsible news organisation to let me know about it.
The BBC, on the other hand, will do everything in its power not only to hide these facts from me, but to make it appear that race A is actually less inclined to terrorise people than race B.
If my shortest route back from work late at night is through race A’s area, I’ll be in real trouble if I have naively swallowed propaganda from the BBC’s social engineers.