: at one time, a desire to denigrate Wilberforce was a sign of liking slavery. Now it is the latest thing in politically-correct chic. “In Search of Wilberforce” (BBC2, 21:00 – 22:00, Friday 15th March) was actually in search of ways to belittle him. His memorial states that
… his name will ever be specially identified with those exertions which, by the blessing of God, removed from England the guilt of the African slave trade, and prepared the way for the abolition of slavery in every colony of the empire: in the prosecution of these objects he relied, not in vain, on God; but in the progress he was called to endure great obloquy and great opposition: he outlived, however, all enmity … [1]
but he has not, it would seem, outlived the enmity of presenter Moira Stewart and suchlike politically-correct BBCers.
The belittling was pursued by the usual PC techniques of demeaning emphases and questions (“He is called …”, “But did he actually …) and the setting up of straw men to be demolished. One of these was the fact that Wilberforce began by devoting himself to abolishing the slave trade. The presenter’s attitude to this reminded me of Kipling’s lines
Lesser men feign greater goals
Failing whereof they may sit
Scholarly to judge the souls
That go down into the pit
And despite its certain clay
Heave a new world towards the day
Lesser women too; the presenter was “much puzzled” at the distinction. The idea that you have to start somewhere seemed beyond her. The great difference in death rate and physical misery between the slave ships and the colonies was beneath her politically-correct notice. Wilberforce, like anyone who means to do real good, not just strike a pose, pursued a strategy that would work; that meant attacking the greatest evil – the trade – first.
Repeated absurdities supported this straw man:
- “In Britain most people don’t realise that Wilberforce bill only made the trade illegal. Slavery continued in Britain’s colonies.” This was repeated over and over. Most people, if you ask them sensibly, can tell you that the trade was abolished first, slavery later, and that Wilberforce campaigned against both, which does seem the main point.
- “Wilberforce believed the abolition would improve the lot of Africans in the plantations” but “it has been proved to me that it did not”. The so-called proof consisted of the presenter’s visiting the Caribbean and discovering that after the trade was prohibited slavery was still slavery, which was still bad. Wilberforce knew that; that’s why he campaigned for abolition. (See also footnote [2] below.)
- Wilberforce died shortly after learning that the bill abolishing slavery had passed its third reading, usually seen as a fitting moment for the close of his life, but not by the presenter, to whom it was just a demonstration of how irrelevant he had become: “Wilberforce did not have the driving role”, “he was a figurehead” was her attitude to the anti-slavery speeches of his final years. The implication seemed to be that several decades campaigning in parliament and out simply wasn’t good enough for the reputation he had; he shouldn’t have grown old and died before all was done.
A second straw man was made out of the famous Wedgewood cameo, in which a kneeling slave pleads, ‘Am I not a man and a brother?’ The presenter “had great difficulties” with this image, both the original and a copy in a stained glass window; it was “a travesty of the Africans who have fought for their freedom” since it shows them “as only a supplicant.” If she had been more observant she might have noticed a kneeling white man, as well as a kneeling black man, in the stained glass window example that particularly aroused her ire. A better historical sense (or a look at other kneeling figures in churches) might have reminded her that Wilberforce must have knelt every evening and every Sunday, and that the posture was not then seen as her narrowly modern mind sees it. Finally her knowledge of slavery might have told her that slaves are people deprived of power, people who must plead for compassion; that the image (as well as being very effective propaganda for its cause) expresses a simple truth about the overwhelming majority.
Another straw man was that, “For Wilberforce, the slave trade was a sin for which Britain had to repent, but he was not alone.” The presenter complained several times that he was but one of many in the movement. Oh yes, we all imagined that Wilberforce fought slavery without the help of anyone else, just as we imagined that Churchill fought the Nazis alone while the rest of the nation just watched! Anyone who knows the history knows about Clarkson and others she mentioned. Wilberforce is simply the name you remember first and forget last.
Listing all the programme’s follies would make this already long post gargantuan. Let us turn to the question why. Why does a politically-correct BBCer want to demean a man who in his day was sneered at by slavers? Whence comes the visceral dislike that was so plain under the urbane commentary, from the very first questioning sentence to the final grudging partial admission of his deeds? I thought I saw two reasons.
The first could be seen underneath several remarks. “It’s been proved to me – they were not mere supplicants grateful for a morsel of pity.” A statue of a Jamaican slave who led a slave strike crushed in January 1831 was a “monument to people the Jamaicans regard as the true abolitionists.” The unstated implication seemed to be that Wilberforce real crime was to be white and to be British. His actions deprived the African tribes of the dignity of someday ceasing for themselves to sell the losers in their wars, and deprived the slaves of the dignity of someday freeing themselves by revolt. Put another way, his crime was to be part of the real history of the victory over slavery, not of a more emotionally-satisfying myth history.
The second arises from the ugly necessities of modern politically-correct ‘multiculturalism’, committed in theory to the equality of cultures but in practice to despising the culture to which Wilberforce belonged. This prompted some minor distortions of details [3]. But more fundamentally, with this mindset the real achievement of the anti-slavery movement, which went far beyond ending specific cruelties of British traders and British colonists, simply cannot be faced. “During three to four hundred years the entire world saw the slave trade as legal.” No, during 6000 years of recorded history, every culture, every race, every continent, saw slavery, and the trade in slaves, as legal. Some tried to mitigate it: the Old Testament proclaims laws that try to restrain the worst horrors; so did the Indian king Asoka. Some personified callousness: “Sell old and sick slaves”, wrote Cato. Always, slavery was legal. “The strong do what they can; the weak endure what they must”, said the Athenian general to the Melosians before enslaving them. Over two thousand years later, the African chief Comoro said much the same to explorer Samuel Baker: “The good people are all weak: they are good because they are not strong enough to be bad.” [4] Sometimes slaves rebelled or escaped. Rarely, they were successful: the Messenian helots eventually drove out the Spartans; the slaves in Haiti triumphed; some in Surinam escaped. More often they failed, sometimes after victories like Spartacus, but usually by being swiftly crushed. Either way, the idea of slavery went on.
The anti-slavery movement, born of a society that had eliminated first slavery and then its lesser cousin serfdom centuries earlier in its homeland, taught that slavery was wrong, not just for citizens or for people like them but for absolutely everyone. They made this conviction a practical reality, backed by preaching, by the force of law and above all by their power, especially their navy. “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.”, said Lincoln. It is an obvious thought to us; who would deny it? Answer: most of the past. Wilberforce and the movement he led stand at the fulcrum of that change. Our minds inherit their achievement. “I cannot understand why for so many centuries mankind allowed such a trade”, said the presenter (“for so many millennia”, she should have said). We share her feelings, if not her limited timespan, easily, without needing a trace of Wilberforce’ moral grandeur because she and we live after Wilberforce, not before. But to the politically-correct mind, that origin of this knowledge is unwelcome; better to sneer at him.
Footnotes:
[1] The ‘great obloquy’ included threats and even physical attacks so that at one time Wilberforce had to travel with a bodyguard.
[2] For what it is worth, the claim that abolishing the trade offered no benefits to existing slaves in the Americas can easily be seen to be false, even in its own irrelevant terms, by comparing survival of the main groups.
- More than twice as many African slaves travelled the short, ocean-current-assisted route to Brazil and South America than went the long passage to North America. The route was easier and in use longer, only finally being shut down when the Royal Navy raided into Brazilian harbours in the 1850s. Yet while there is a population of mixed race there, the purely African descendants of these slaves are rare. Their treatment seems not to have been good enough to favour forming families and raising children. Cultural differences may have played a role but the fact that it was so much cheaper to buy a new slave off the dock is surely relevant.
- More African slaves were sent to the Arab world than went to the whole western hemisphere. The trade (often straightforward capture by Arab slavers, not ‘trade’ in any sense) began even earlier and lasted even longer. Only in the second half of the 19th century did the Royal Navy mount effective blockade of the key Zanzibar depot and stifle the sea-borne trade; intercepting small Arab dhows in the shorter passages of Africa’s east coast was a harder task than interdicting the west coast trade. Effective action against the land route to the near east had to await imperial annexations (archeology can still trace the routes by the clusters of skeletons around water holes, perhaps representing a last desperate effort by the captives to reach water). Yet the near east today has almost no descendants of these slaves. Their treatment – obviously so for the thousands who were made harem guards but apparently also for the rest – seems not to have been of a kind to favour it. The much greater ease of obtaining fresh slaves, relative to any part of the western hemisphere, seems highly pertinent to this.
- (The majority of African slaves never left the continent of their birth. There is no immediate way of assessing the survival of those who lived and died in Africa. Treatment appears to have been harsh in the plantations in the eastern part of the central axis, and of course those chosen by the king of Dahomey for his annual execution spectacles did not survive. Estimates of overall numbers enslaved and numbers shipped to other continents can be found in e.g. ‘Conquests and Cultures’ by Thomas Sowell. Alternatively, the reader can verify that the above ratios are generally correct simply by checking the durations of the various slave-taking activities, looking at the relative distances on a map, and reflecting on the difficulties of transport in a pre-industrial society.)
Thus Wilberforce’ opinion that ending the supply of new slaves might also be of some benefit to those already enslaved was obvious common sense with support from the evidence. However his main motivation for campaigning against the trade was disgust at its cruelty and injustice. He then campaigned for abolition, clearly not thinking the possible collateral benefit to slaves of ending the trade was remotely sufficient in itself.
[3] Examples include the following tendentious descriptions:
- “Merchants came here to buy or capture people”, she stated as though ‘buy’ were not the overwhelmingly standard mode of operation. I know of no historical instance in which a British slave trader obtained slaves from Africa by capture. Capture by Portuguese traders was extremely rare but in their longer – four centuries – history in the trade one or two instances are known.
- “This African complicity is hard to accept” said the presenter about the selling of slaves, which doubtless helped her accept the claim that the tribal wars in which winners sold losers were fermented by the British; as though such events were not endemic before and after the period.
[4] Alan Moorehead, “The White Nile”.
Quotations from the programme are from notes made while watching it.
and may i add – the english ended it decades before anyone else.
thats what makes the english contribution to abolition stand out. you folks took the lead. thats something to be proud of.
it took the yanks another 50 years, and they had to go through a civil war to abolish it. and another 100 years to give civil rights. none of that happened in britain. thats something to be proud of. says a lot about the british character and civilisation.
and i say that as an irish nationalist – and we’ve had our run-ins with the english (as you well know!) but on the slavery aspect, you have nothing to be ashamed about. you took the lead and went with it. i simply cannot understand the po-faced , depressing “abolition” crap coming out of the bbc right now. i really dont know how you british folks put up with it. its an utter disgrace to the memory of the british abolitionist movement.
“Fr Tim Finigan ”
christianity doesnt exist in the BBC world. its confined to Sunday morning programs. or if the Pope says something bad about Islam. or if Rowan Williams says “iraq war is bad”..
thats about it.
(hence newsnight tonight dividing iraq into sunni/shia – and no mention of the iraqi christian community, which is probably the oldest christian community in existence…the christian assyrians. )
Did Al-Beeb mention that their friends the Saudis didn’t officially end slavery until 1963 ? No, I thought not.
“I can’t see anything on the BBC site that implies that “the slavers and abolitionists were part of the same morally polluted pot”. The evidence that the website presents for slavery supporting the economy of Britain seems compelling.
If you think it is wrong could you provide links that support your case.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) ”
errr.. have a look at the abolition adverts that the BBC is running constantly. about the 150 slaves being thrown overboard, and that it was just an “insurance” issue.
it was the abolition of slavery that happened in 1807 – not the start of it. but the bbc spins it to make us all feel guilty rather than feel proud about the abolition itself, which went against the entire grain of the world at that time. america went to war over this , and lost 600,000 souls. we didnt. does the BBC ever stand back and just ask , why there wasnt an English civil war after 1807?
“terry johnson | 20.03.07 – 2:31 am”
thats because it still goes on. they get radicalised , find “allah” and go blow themselves up in iraq.
dubai is a similar set up. slave labour but dressed up for the 21st century so that it doesnt appear as slavery.
Jon:
“But that does not distract from the point I was making – which was how can someone be personally affected today from the fact that one of their ancestors was sold into slavery 200 years earlier?”
Can’t speak for the UK or anywhere else, but in the US, particularly the South, or much of the lower belt of the Midwest and Southwest (which were originally largely populated/influenced by peoples from the South and parts of the Midwest) most certainly carried on oppressing and disenfranchising the recently emancipated slaves and their descendants. For generations, even, and I expect there is no need to mention certain racist, national organizations and their dubious achievements in this regard.
Jim Crow laws, as well as the general racist “they are lesser beings” attitude of many in power in the aforementioned regions (where the majority of blacks lived until the early part of the 20th Century) most certainly continued to contribute to, at the very least, the broken-down, nihilistic, self-defeating attitude prevalant among many blacks in the US. I certainly do not absolve today’s slave-descendants (the vast majority of blacks in the US) of their own culpability in the degenerate state of much of what is considered to be today’s black culture. There are of course many reasons for concern. However, there often seems to be a whiff of “no longer our fault” in these discussions of how we should all get over something that happened so very many years ago.
As has been pointed out in other posts above (in defence of Wilberforce, in fact), just because a law was passed, it doesn’t mean that the world is instantaneously transformed according to the most optimistic designs of that law, and if not then the law is pointless.
According to this logic – which seems sound to me – then just because slavery was abolished on a given date (in Britain or the US), it does not universally follow that all the dehumanizing aspects of the philosophy/mindset that accepts/practices slavery in the first place are also immediately vanquished. To state that slavery in the sort-of-distant past has little or no effect on blacks today is not logical.
in addtion to this, in many parts of the South – most notably Atlanta, Georgia – the Civil War is referred to as the War of Northern Agression. The overriding principle of what they also call the War of the States, according to today’s textbooks in the region, was the defence of localized “states rights” against the overreach of the federal government. Of course, what they fail to tell the kiddies is that the specific state’s right which was supposed to be defended by blood was the states’ right to slavery. One need not point out what an awkard moment it is in class when some smart-ass student brings that up. This sort of BBC-like groupthink is felt in the region to this day.
Once again, in no way do I mean that all problems of blacks today are solely due to slavery. Having said all that, however, I must also point out that Al-Beeb are well out of order when they swan about as if we may as well still be putting them in chains and keeping them down, dirty, and illiterate.
As was also pointed out above, this line of reasoning refuses to acknowledge any development other than full-blown spontaneous manifestation. Not at all logical, or helpful in solving the problem.
Something to consider.
Jon:
“But that does not distract from the point I was making – which was how can someone be personally affected today from the fact that one of their ancestors was sold into slavery 200 years earlier?”
Can’t speak for the UK or anywhere else, but in the US, particularly the South, or much of the lower belt of the Midwest and Southwest (which were originally largely populated/influenced by peoples from the South and parts of the Midwest) most certainly carried on oppressing and disenfranchising the recently emancipated slaves and their descendants. For generations, even, and I expect there is no need to mention certain racist, national organizations and their dubious achievements in this regard.
Jim Crow laws, as well as the general racist “they are lesser beings” attitude of many in power in the aforementioned regions (where the majority of blacks lived until the early part of the 20th Century) most certainly continued to contribute to, at the very least, the broken-down, nihilistic, self-defeating attitude prevalant among many blacks in the US. I certainly do not absolve today’s slave-descendants (the vast majority of blacks in the US) of their own culpability in the degenerate state of much of what is considered to be today’s black culture. There are of course many reasons for concern. However, there often seems to be a whiff of “no longer our fault” in these discussions of how we should all get over something that happened so very many years ago.
As has been pointed out in other posts above (in defence of Wilberforce, in fact), just because a law was passed, it doesn’t mean that the world is instantaneously transformed according to the most optimistic designs of that law, and if not then the law is pointless.
According to this logic – which seems sound to me – then just because slavery was abolished on a given date (in Britain or the US), it does not universally follow that all the dehumanizing aspects of the philosophy/mindset that accepted/practiced slavery in the first place are also immediately vanquished. To state that slavery in the sort-of-distant past has little or no effect on blacks today is not logical.
in addtion to this, in many parts of the South – most notably Atlanta, Georgia – the Civil War is referred to as the War of Northern Agression. The overriding principle of what they also call the War of the States, according to today’s textbooks in the region, was the defence of localized “states’ rights” against the overreach of the federal government. Of course, what they fail to tell the kiddies is that the specific state’s right which was supposed to be defended by blood was the states’ right to slavery. One need not point out what an awkard moment it is in class when some smart-ass student brings that up. This sort of BBC-like groupthink is felt in the region to this day.
Once again, in no way do I mean that all problems of blacks today are solely due to slavery. Not even close. Having said all that, however, I must also point out that Al-Beeb are well out of order when they swan about as if we may as well still be putting them in chains and keeping them down, dirty, and illiterate.
As was also pointed out above, this line of reasoning refuses to acknowledge any development other than full-blown spontaneous manifestation, with anything less being labelled a complete failure. Not at all logical, or helpful in solving the problem.
Still, it doesn’t mean that once slavery was abolished that the attitudes towards fellow members of the species which allow slavery to happen also disappeared with no cultural legacy whatsoever. That’s just faulty logic.
Something to consider.
Michael in America | 20.03.07 – 12:15 am
Notice how Nick ignored my questions?
Yes. Recently, as one of the people who drew up the BBC’s guidelines, he wanted to know why I objected to the BBC’s policy on the T-word. (i.e. the BBC’s sanitising of terror by calling it something else.) He said he would be “interested” in my response – which I promptly posted and he proceeded to ignore. He ignored a similar comment of mine on The Editors blog.
terry johnson | 19.03.07 – 11:45 pm,
I sometimes wonder if BBC hacks are fully aware that they are pushing to create a society which will enslave people to a failed ideology.
Unfortunately the BBC currently has the whip hand. May that situation change drastically, and soon.
Jon:
“But that does not distract from the point I was making – which was how can someone be personally affected today from the fact that one of their ancestors was sold into slavery 200 years earlier?”
In every generation, we must see ourselves as if we personally were liberated from Egypt.
The Torah speaks of four types of children: one is wise, one is wicked, one is simple, and one does not know how to ask.
The Wise One asks: “What is the meaning of the laws and traditions God has commanded?” (Deuteronomy 6:20) You should teach him all the traditions of Passover, even to the last detail.
The Wicked One asks: “What does this ritual mean to you?” (Exodus 12:26) By using the expression “to you” he excludes himself from his people and denies God. Shake his arrogance and say to him: “It is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt…” (Exodus 13:8 ) “For me” and not for him — for had he been in Egypt, he would not have been freed.
The Simple One asks: “What is all this?” You should tell him: “It was with a mighty hand that the Lord took us out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” (Exodus 13:14 )
As for the One Who Does Not Know How To Ask, you should open the discussion for him, as it is written: “And you shall explain to your child on that day, ‘It is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.” (Exodus 13:8 )
From the Passover (Pessach) Haggadah (Book of prayers and customs recited every year, in every place by Jews for centuries)
http://thumbsnap.com/v/PF8P3FTN.gif
In the illustrations above, God appears to Moses in the burning bush and below Moses and Aaron confront Pharaoh and transform their staff into a snake which then devours the snakes of Pharoah’s magicians.
From the Sarajevo Hagaddah 14th Century
200 years for the blacks ~ 2000+ years for the Jews!
Michael in America:
I didn’t respond to your comment as it seemed off topic and you didn’t provide any evidence to support your opinion. I don’t tend to respond to comments which are simply assertions of opinion.
However here is a BBC story about Iraq that you might like:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6463529.stm
There is also a blog post currently on the BBC’s Editors Blog which is Iraq related.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2007/03/iraqi_opinions.html
Richard:
Your argument appears to be “we can’t trust the BBC and this proves we can’t trust the BBC”. I posted the links to the Abolition website to show that the Moira Stewart programme was just one of many different perspectives on Wilberforce being broadcast and published by the BBC as part of the abolition season. Including the Melvyn Bragg one which is praised above.
The purpose of the Abolition season, as I understand it, is not to celebrate the ending of the slave trade. It is rather to explore the subject in some detail and complexity inclduing different points of view.
Bryan:
I can’t remember whether I read your comment on the Editors Blog. I have explained the BBC’s policy on the use of the word “terrorist” in the past both on this blog and on the Editors Blog, and responded to specific points made. Here is a link to the last time I did so:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2007/02/so_whose_side_are_they_on.html#c778270
I am not afraid of responding to points made in the blogosphere if they are backed up with evidence. Unfortunately biased BBC’s comments function is not searchable so I can’t easily link to those places where I have done so.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 20.03.07 – 11:40 am,
No time now to dig up the link to The Editors post I mentioned or the thread on this blog re your lack of response to my comment.
Well, at least you are interacting with people. Let’s hope this trend continues. It’s about time the BBC got off its high horse and became accountable to the public.
Nick Reynold’s comments on this site should really be seen for what they are – the first signs that the comrades at the Corporation are getting worried . For years they’ve forced their Leftist , multi-culturalist worldview down our throats unopposed but, thanks to the internet, people are starting to fight back. Thanks to the sterling efforts of bloggers, it’s already common knowledge amongst the Republican base in the States that Al-Beeb is anti-US and anti-Israel. Their very name has become, in some circles, a byword for leftist propaganda.
Keep spreading the word B-BBC ! Every day wins more converts to the truth about the Corporation. Let’s all look forward to the day when we are no longer patronised by the likes of Reynolds whose wages we have to pay while they resent our very culture. Don’t mistake Reynold’s oh-so-polite, oh-so-concerned “interaction” here for anything other that what it really is…the panic of an organisation which senses that the jig might be up….Do we really think he would have descended from the lofty heights of the self-hating white, liberal elite to “converse” with those he despises unless he really thought he had to ?
ULTRAVIOLENCE
I was trying to make the point that I do not need feel the need to apologise to Ms Stewart for my ancestors when it is likely that her ancestors of two hundred years ago wither white slave owners that raped thier female slaves, or black African chieftans that sold their own people, were worse than any of my ancestors.
It is not for me to say what other people should be grateful for. But it is a fact that most blacks in this country are better off than most black in Africa.
If I did not believe what I say or if I only cared about not upsetting others I would not have put my real name at the top.
“The purpose of the Abolition season, as I understand it, is not to celebrate the ending of the slave trade”
That is obvious – so the BBC use an anniversary not to celebrate the abolition bill – for which people can feel proud – that would be too much to ask. This is just another excuse for the BBC to bash the British people for the sins of their fathers.
I notice the BBC can highlight any anniversary which they can spin into their anti-British or Anti-American views – I cannot remember when the BBC used an “anniversary” of something or other to celebrate any British achievement.
Even Trafalgar Day was very low key in case they offended their EU friends.
I don’t resent or despise anyone on this board, or their culture. I certainly don’t post comments here because I have to, nor am I in a panic about anything. I hope people do not find my comments patronising as they are not meant to be.
I do try to be polite. Perhaps Terry would prefer it if I were rude.
Ultraviolence: Sounds like a case of “you should be grateful your ancestors were kidnapped in the past”?
Your point being? As Mohammed Ali said after a visit to Mother Africa ‘Thank God my granddaddy got on that boat!’ Dr. Walter Williams agrees. ‘Slavery was bad for my ancestors but good for me.’
The simple fact is the Black family and community were more cohesive and law abiding under the vicious trials of Slavery and Jim Crow they are now after the Civil Rights revolution. Sorry, you can’t blame either slavery or prejudice for the current state of the Black community.
Nick Reynolds,
Here’s the comment of mine that you were apparently interested in and then didn’t come back to me on:
Nick Reynolds,
Yes, I’ve read the guidelines and they go to the heart of what is wrong with the BBC. I’ve responded to your stance previously, on The Editors blog on the post by Vicky Taylor on the use of the “dhimmi” word:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2006/07/no_offence_1.html#c061656
Here’s my comment on the issue:
· 16.
· At 11:05 PM on 13 Jul 2006,
· Bryan wrote:
·
In light of the fact that the BBC has virtually obliterated the word terroristfrom all its media,
it’s interesting that the comments section of your Have Your Say blog is liberally sprinkled with the word – as can be seen in topics such as the Mumbai bombing.
So do tell, why is terrorist not on your automated list of blocked words? Could it be because ‘abusive, offensive and provocative’ comments like Israel and America are terrorist states – also liberally sprinkled throughout your blog – would then be automatically deleted?
Have Your Say has made a good deal of progress towards transparency but you have a long way to go before you can truly say that you are unbiased in your choice of which comments to publish and which to delete.
Here’s your response:
20. At 12:13 PM on 14 Jul 2006, Nick Reynolds wrote:
Just to remind people of what the BBC’s policy on the use of the word “terrorist” is, as opposed to what some people seem to think it is.
The BBC’s Editorial Guidelines state:
“Our credibility is undermined by the careless use of words which carry emotional or value judgements. The word “terrorist” itself can be a barrier rather than an aid to understanding. We should try to avoid the term, without attribution. We should let other people characterise while we report the facts as we know them … We should convey to our audience the full consequences of the act by describing what happened. We should use words which specifically describe the perpetrator such as “bomber”, “attacker”, “gunman”, “kidnapper”, “insurgent, and “militant”. Our responsibility is to remain objective and report in ways that enable our audiences to make their own assessments about who is doing what to whom.”
Click here for the relevant section of the Editorial Guidelines.
I work for the BBC’s Editorial Policy Unit, who draw up the Guidelines.
Here’s my response to your response:
22. At 04:20 PM on 14 Jul 2006, Bryan wrote:
“Just to remind people of what the BBC’s policy on the use of the word “terrorist” is, as opposed to what some people seem to think it is.”
Thanks for trying to put us straight on this issue, Nick. But ‘some’ of us don’t judge the BBC’s policy on the use of the word ‘terrorism’ by guidelines drawn up out of view of the public. We are under no illusions as to what that policy is because we can evaluate it by the way in which it is applied to terrorist acts – such as the atrocities committed at the Beslan school by those who can only be described as terrorists.
As I’m sure you are well aware, the panel of the Israeli-Palestinian Impartiality Review recently concluded that the BBC’s policy on the use of the word ‘terrorism’ was wrong. It seems that the decision hasn’t even made a dent in your insistence on distorting the meaning of words like ‘militant’ and ‘gunmen’ by applying them to vile acts of terror.
Your denial on this issue has reached such extraordinary proportions that your staff now feel free to replace ‘terrorist’ with ‘militant’ even when quoting people, such as spokespeople for the IDF • who regularly have words put in their mouths by BBC reporters. This is inaccurate, misleading and unprofessional. It’s also appears to be a misinterpretation of your guidelines • which apparently allow ‘terrorist’ to be used in attributed speech.
The matter has got totally out of hand and you should revise your stance on this issue.
From your second link:
Unfortunately, there is no agreed or universal consensus on what constitutes a terrorist, or a terrorist attack. Dictionaries may offer definitions but the United Nations has again just failed to reach agreement. The obvious reason is that terrorism is regarded through a political prism.
All this proves is the BBC’s slavish adherence to every whim of the UN • which is of course comprised of a number of terrorist states such as Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iran. Naturally they would not want to accurately label themselves. That would entail taking an honest look at their sponsoring of terror worldwide and that is the last thing they will do.
The BBC thinking it can occupy some imaginary middle ground between terrorists and their victims would be bad enough. But the BBC in fact leans more in sympathy to the side of the terrorists • witness its reporting on Saudi Arabia, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas, Fatah, Iran, the Taleban, Chechnya and so forth – and in so emboldening them it helps undo the fabric of civilization itself.
Bryan | 30.01.07 – 9:24 am
“I do try to be polite. Perhaps Terry would prefer it if I were rude.”
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 20.03.07 – 10:12 pm | #
To be honest , Mr. Reynolds, I don’t really give a damn whether you’re polite or rude. Did the Russian citizens in the Soviet era care if those who worked for Pravda were rude or polite to them ?
What I and many like me are concerned about is not politeness but the way your organisation has used our money against us. The Corporation has actively connived to present radical islam in the most favourable possible light, it has connived to present the State of Isreal in the worst possible light, it has connived to try make the native inhabitants of the UK ashamed of their colour, their culture and their history , it has connived to make the USA seem our enemy rather than our ally.
The drip, drip, drip of Al-BBC’s propaganda , it’s omissions, it’s bias , it’s very existance – it now seems – are actually political acts by an urban , liberal elite determined to impose their idea of how Britain should look , think and behave. We realise now that this elite sees the majority of our country as “hideously white” and our culture as an abberation that needs to be replaced as rapidly as possible. All that is bad enough in itself but what really fuels our hatred of the Corporation is that it forces us to pay for it’s sorry existance. WE finance the lies used against us, WE finace those who call terrorists “activists”, WE finance those who whitewash people that wish us harm, WE finance those who daily insult our heritage. And that is the real insult, Mr.Reynolds, that is the insult that takes all this beyond the realms of mere “politeness” or “rudeness”.
From this oh-so-bloody-typical , read it and weep Al-BBC report on the “sad plight of young blacks in Britain (young whites, of course, having no problems and not worthy of concern to Al-Beeb ….
“Lee Jasper, equality advisor to London mayor Ken Livingstone, describes what Reece is experiencing as the result of being born into a post-slavery society.
“The legacy of racism is strong and I think the legacy of slavery impacts negatively upon black communities”, he says.
Looking at present day black descendents in Britain shows us how the generations that followed slavery rebuilt their communities.
This has been especially difficult when they live in the country that was heavily involved in the trading of their ancestors.
A recent BBC News survey suggested half of the British public believed Britain to be a racist society.
Where does this leave black Britain in their view of the only home that most of them have known?
“The institution has long been abolished but the legacy of it remains. It’s imperative for young black British people to have an understanding of their history,” says Lee Jasper.”
Still doesn’t explain why young black men seem to be so drawn to sticking knives into one another in today’s groovy, 21st Century, multicultural Britain. How about an article talking to old white people who are now minorities in their own cities ?How about an indication from the hacks at Al-Beeb that black immigration into this horrible, racist country was entirely voluntary. How about the racism of West Indians against Asians, or the gang wars between the descendents of West Indian immigrants and newly arrived African immigrants ? Were any of the African immigrants involved in various knife or gun crimes in the UK affected by the slave trade of two hundred years ago ?(God forbid that we should ever find out that some of their families once profitted from the slave trade by selling fellow Africans to the evil white man!) Oh silly me – of couse ! Any crimes committed by young African immigrants to our country are caused by colonialism ! And any muslim suicde bombings are caused by our islamophobia and the terrible ravages of the Crusades.
Remember folks, according to Nick Reynold’s and his fellow comrades at the Corporation ALL today’s ills and problems are caused by the evil, racist whites that make up the majority of Al-BBC’s tax payers. How they can soil their lily-white liberal hands by accepting this blood money from such a racist bunch is anyone’s guess. Don’t they know that almost all Britain’s wealth came from slavery ? That the money that funds them is tainted ? The shame ! The shame !!! So the next time someone is stabbed to death outside a tube station by a young black man we must remember that it’s OUR fault. He cannot be held responsible for his actions because evil whites made him do it.
Bryan:
I did see your comment on the Editors Blog. I didn’t respond because there didn’t seem anything useful I could add. You obviously diagree with BBC policy on the use of the word terrorist. I doubt there is anything I could say that would persuade you.
There is an error in Terry’s post where he mentions the phrase “hideously white”. Greg Dyke used it to describe the BBC, not the majority of people in the UK or its culture.
Nick,
I did see your comment on the Editors Blog. I won’t respond because there doesn’t seem anything useful I could add. You obviously agree with BBC policy on the use of the word terrorist. I doubt there is anything I could say that would persuade you.
“Any crimes committed by young African immigrants to our country are caused by colonialism ! And any muslim suicide bombings are caused by our islamophobia and the terrible ravages of the Crusades.”
In denying that the Africans and Muslims bear any personal responsibility for their actions, the Beedboids are denying these groups’ possession of the essential human faculty of free will. They are therefore denying the essential humanity of these groups – which is precisely the same thating that slavers and Nazis and Communists have done down the ages.
Re Terrorism: “We should convey to our audience the full consequences of the act by describing what happened. (Nick Reynolds)
I find that statement typical of the disingenuousness of the BBC.
In general the “full consequences” of an act are not given by the mere description that act, no matter how comprehensive it is, which it very rarely is when it’s given by you beeboids. Some analysis needs to be applied in order for most consequences to be foreseen.
And oh boy do you lot give your analyses and mix them straight into the description. You don’t report — you editorialise.
We can do without your [deleted] little bozo lefty analyses and we can do without your poisonous BBC.
—
Terry Johnson,
Your posts are excellent. You speak for me.
.
Edited By Siteowner
TomL:
You could show me some examples that prove the BBC’s policy is wrong.
Thank you so much moira, you have brought me back too life.
I enjoyed your strategic approach to getting the opposition to talk openly in front of the camera about the real side to William Wilberforce, and to
Confessing to the truth.
A lot of the opposition do not know the true story of Toussaint ‘L Overture, who, along with other African slaves, managed to gain Hattie’s independence by defeated three of the worlds super powers, English, French and the Spanish.
I would more than love to see you cover that story.
At present, Danny Glover is directing the film as we speak.
Once again Moira, the black communities in Manchester are, very grateful for what you have done…
Love and peace my people.
The struggle continues!
Michae Mc…
“There is an error in Terry’s post where he mentions the phrase “hideously white”. Greg Dyke used it to describe the BBC, not the majority of people in the UK or its culture.”
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 21.03.07 – 11:00 am |
Au contraire, mon brave. The fact that Dyke sees the mainly white, self-loathing liberals at Al-Beeb as “hideously white” because they are the majority would seem to imply that he finds whites en masse as “hideous”. Would he ever say that the UK rap scene is “hideously black” or the Muslim Council of Britain “hideously brown” merely because those are the skin colours of the majority in those groups ? Of course not. In Dyke’s mind “white” is obviuosly a “bad ” thing. This mindset would seemed to have seeped throughout the Corporation – how else to explain articles like the one I quoted a couple of posts above, which held whites as “responsible” for black knife crime ?
I think that we should give compensation to descendants of slaves and to any other descendant of any atrocity our country has commited in the past IF they can prove that they themselves would ever be in existence.
IE; that ALL their ancestors on BOTH sides of their parents families would have met up at the time they did and propagated the family line.
I think that if you wish past history took any different course you write yourself out of existence.Why people think they would be born at all , never mind born into a life of riches and happiness if only such and such tragic happening didn`t take place amazes me.
Nick Reynolds,
I did see your comment on the Editors Blog. I didn’t respond because there didn’t seem anything useful I could add.
This seems a strange way to opt out of debate. Here’s something useful you could add: you could explain why BBC reporters put words in the mouths of IDF spokepeople and others who use the word terrorist by claiming they said militant, or some other PC misrepresentation. You have your staff so wrapped up in PC-speak that they no longer know how to quote people – if they ever did. As I mentioned, this misquoting is against your own guidelines, apart from being abysmal journalism. That should bother you. Evidently it doesn’t.
Another thing you could add is an explanation of exactly why you feel justified in ignoring the recommendation of your very own Israeli-Palestinian Impartiality Review to take another look at your avoidance of the T-Word.
Facts are facts, no matter how hard the BBC tries to distort them and represent them as something else. And terror is a very real fact in today’s world. And no matter what you or the UN might say, it is really quite easy to define.
Nick Reynolds; 12.43 PM. The BBC’s editorial guidelines are flawed. They attempt to give spurious intellectual justification for a pusillanimous reluctance to use certain words whose meaning is perfectly clear and could not possibly present a “barrier to understanding” let alone a “value judgement.”
In particular, the guidelines say, “We should try to avoid the term [terrorist]”.
Nick, if it makes you feel better you call them anything you like: Republicans, Loyalists, Militants, Palestinians, etc. etc. These are called euphemisms; nice words substituted for the nasty words you don’t want to say.
OK then, you chaps use the nice, comfortable words and then you won’t have to make any nasty value judgements. Meanwhile we grown-ups will talk amongst ourselves.
The question is which is more accurate: “suicide bomber” or “terrorist”?
“Suicide bomber” is more accurate and just as nasty.
“Terrorist” is not easy to define as it’s often bound up with emotional and partisan judgements.
In my personal opinion, the independent review of our middle east coverage either didn’t read the BBC’s policy, or misunderstood it, like many people do.
It was an independent review and the Governors were not bound to accept everything in it.
“Terrorist” is not easy to define as it’s often bound up with emotional and partisan judgements.
Bryan: if you can provide me with examples where the BBC has changed the wording or misquoted IDF spokespeople then I will try and do something about it.
I read the BBC news website, and the sites of British newspapers (Usually the Telegraph, Indie, Guardian and Financial Times) almost every day. As I’m working abroad at the moment, all these sites give me a welcome link to my own country and culture.
I’m white, from an entirely white family and lived on the Fylde coast – an almost entirely white, conservative area – most of my life. I see nothing on any of these websites which makes me feel in the least bit alienated, despised or marginalised in terms of race or culture.
Despite leaning towards the left in economic terms I’m very patriotic in a non-jingoistic way. I’m perfectly at ease with my own background – not in any way self-loathing.
I read this site regularly in great amazement because I simply don’t see what the rest of you seem to, no matter how hard I look.
Vicky,
Its lots of little things. Just yesterday on the Radio4 “Today” news programme, we have the presenter saying – in passing – “how can anyone portray Mrs Thatcher sympathetically”.
Then sometimes its bizarre things like the episode of the children’s programme Balamory where the children went on a special school treat to – would you believe – a mosque.
They have never ever visited any other religious place.
Now its the big obsession with slavery. Not celebrating the formal outlawing of slavery. No that’s no good. Instead we have the usual ethnic whinge-fest. Everything is our fault. Nostra culpa, nostra culpa, nostra culpa.
“Terrorist” is not easy to define as it’s often bound up with emotional and partisan judgements.”
Sure, who is Nick Reynolds or any of the liberal “elite” at Al-Beeb to pass judgement on the actions of terrorists? As far as they are concerned if a guy decides to strap on a bomb and detonate himself in a crowded marketplace he’s just expressing himself . And if a bunch of guys go out and behead three schoolgirls ? Why, that’s just part of their culture and can’t be seen in that oh-so-old-fashioned colonialist way as “bad”. It’s just another way of doing things , it may not be our way but we must never condemn it. Moral equivalence – where everything is acceptable.
terry johnson | 23.03.07 – 12:16 am |
indeed. except that this moral equivalence is not universal in its application: there is, for example, no question that the bbc holds america and many things american, in moral contempt – no equivocation – or moral equivalence – there…
we seem to have some kind of selective moral equivalence, then – which is of necessity some kind of oxymoron, i’d say
which really means, at the end of the day, that the moral equivalence game is not even that, but rather something much more sinister.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 22.03.07 – 11:52 am,
Bryan: if you can provide me with examples where the BBC has changed the wording or misquoted IDF spokespeople then I will try and do something about it.
This is something I’ve noticed on numerous occasions. I don’t have the links at hand and not much time right now but I’ll have a look. Meanwhile, let me suggest that with the vast resources at your command you could quickly and easily find out what IDF spokespeople say as opposed to how they are reported by the BBC.
You could even (shock, horror) divert a tiny fraction of the resources you devote to broadcasts in Arabic to take a look at the terminology IDF spokespeople use in Hebrew. Hint: the word for terrorists is mehablim.
The question is which is more accurate: “suicide bomber” or “terrorist”?
“Suicide bomber” is more accurate and just as nasty.
When you think about it, suicide bomber says nothing about the fact that victims are involved – which makes it, in that sense, less accurate, though more narrowly specific, than terrorist.
And the fact that you think of both terms as nasty speaks volumes. What’s nasty about the truth?. All we are asking you to do is to stop disguising and minimising the impact of terror by refusing to name it.
On the subject of accuracy and specifics, the BBC becomes strangely coy and vague when it comes, for example, to black and asian/Muslim killers of white victims. It looks anywhere but at the fact of the race and religion of the killers. Switch it around and the BBC trumpets the race of white killers of asian and black victims to the heavens.
We are not fooled. The BBC is driven by its own narrow agenda – which of course is extraordinary for a publicly-funded broadcaster.
Writer Isabel Wolff, has an excellent long article on the importance of THOMAS CLARKSON in anti-slave trade history.
” ..the abolitionists’ prime mover, its powerhouse was Thomas Clarkson”
“How did the real hero of the anti-slavery movement get airbrushed from history?” ( by Isabel Wolff, 23 Mar. ).
http://www.dailymail.co.uk
It seems pretty clear that a suicide bomber that kills no one but himself, in the middle of nowhere, causing no damage, is indeed a ‘suicide’ bomber: A person who commits suicide by blowing themsleves up. Easy.
Equally clearly, a person who chooses to do this in a restaurant, market place, checkpoint, whatever, has more than ‘suicide’ on thier mind.
The deliberate and determined act of randomly killing civilians in an attempt to further an idealogical goal is not a suicide, it’s something else…
…I wish I could remember the word.
“How Not to Promote Social Cohesion:
the Debasement of a Marvellous
Bicentennial” ( by David Conway ).
http://www.civitas.org.uk/
Here’s one sentence from this excellent article:
(The government) “has chosen to mark the occasion in a woefully tendentious way that distorts the event and its significance, and makes the occasion something divisive, indeed, positively racist.”
Bryan:
I disagree. “Bomber” implies bombing others, and implies victims or targets. Someone who used a bomb to commit suicide in a empty field somewhere would be a “suicide”, not a “suicide bomber”. A suicide bomber is out to kill other people with a bomb. It’s a more accurate and truthful term than “terrorist”.
Vicky:
Thanks for posting a comment. You cheered me up.
Re: ‘suicide bombers’, ‘terrorists’, in jihadi context, see discussion of ‘ISLAMIKAZE’ by Andrew G. Bostom at frontpagemagazine, over 3 years ago (12 Dec. 2003):
‘Caliphate Dreams’ by Andrew G. Bostom ( A review of Raphael Israeli’s book, ‘Islamikaze – Manifestations of Islamic Martyrdom’).
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11231
@Nick Reynolds
If a suicide bomber is out to kill other people with a bomb (and we all agree that he is), then the point of the attack, by definition is not his suicide but the killing of other people.
So, we return to the important question: The raison d’etre behind his violent death is what?
I’ll make it a little easier for you:
a) His girlfriend has just left him
b) He has a huge credit card bill
c) He’s getting bullied at school
d) He is a terrorist
You choose.
(If you want to phone a friend the number for the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is London 0207 225 3000)
TheCuckoo | 23.03.07 – 11:22 am and 23.03.07 – 3:11 pm,
Well, I guess if we can’t get through to Nick Reynolds with logic and facts, humour might just do it!
On the other hand….
OK, so using the BBC’s definition, what difference is there if any between a Japanese kamikaze pilot and the characters who killed 52 people on the Tube on 7/7?
I presume none. They’re both just suicide bombers, right?
For bonus points – what crime could young blacks widely commit that al-BBC would agree was wholly the fault of young blacks? We’ve established that murdering each other is whitey’s fault, so is there anything which definitely isn’t?
If al-BBC can’t think of anything, isn’t this prima facie evidence that it comes to such stories with an embedded prejudice?
I have always found the expression suicide/homicide bomber slightly cumbersome but helpful. Tells you all you need to know about the person in question and avoids the terrible t word. Ahem, would BBC like to use it? Just so that we know they really know that there are other victims out there and not just the terr … wooops, sorry ….. suicide bomber in question.
Yes, it is cumbersome, though accurate. I would just call them terror bombers because their suicide is completely eclipsed by their acts of terror.
Re this idea that young blacks are chopping each other up because of the slave trade: why didn’t their parents do it then? And why haven’t the Irish gotten out the carving knives – they were cruelly subjugated by the English for 700 years.
Sucide bombers may not be an accurate way to describe terrorists – but what about people who kill children in a school in Russia?
“The hostage-takers were clearly not going to get independence for Chechnya.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3625744.stm
Greencoat : “the Irish being cruelly subjugated by the English for 700 years.”
No doubt this is the reason why there are now twice as many Irish Catholics living in England as are living in the Irish Republic — and hundreds more arriving by every boat.
And what words do the BBC use to describe al-Qaeda and their like to impressionable young people.
“Small groups of rebels (called cells) are using foreign hostages as a way of making things difficult for the coalition forces and the Iraqi interim government.
The rebels are opposed to foreign involvement in Iraq. Some rebels, like Tawhid and Jihad group are believed to have links with al-Qaeda.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_3670000/newsid_3679800/3679844.stm