Andrew McCann has written of his attempts to put his views across to the Beeb over Sweenygate. I am referring, of course, to the bullying, hectoring behaviour (caution, highly entertaining stuff) of the BBC’s fearless sleuth, John Sweeney, as he ventured into the deep hidden danger facing us all from Tom Cruise’s religion, Scientology. McCann’s words are well worth reading. Summary account of the incident here.
He points out the BBC’s complacent reliance on the freedoms accorded them in the US and UK. He demonstrates what true objectivity might mean- the fearlessly equal treatment of all on an equal basis. His analogy was the most obvious one going- between the BBC’s treatment of Scientology and its treatment of Islam- but the point is a deep one.
Talking of his approach to the BBC’s phone-in minders he says:
“I posed a rhetorical question as to whether Sweeney would have lost his temper if treated in the same way by Muslims outside the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca. In other words, would Sweeney have behaved that way had it not been for his own prejudices and the environment in which he found himself?”
Indeed. PS. I notice that Sweeney has done investigations in Saudi Arabia, but one does indeed wonder if he treated the Saudis as imbeciles as he did so, or whether it was their religion he was interested in targeting.
Guardian Graduate:
Why has the BBC News stopped showing those engaging climate warming clips with desperate newscasters overtones of impending end of the world as we know it?
Because the weather this month doesn’t support the meme of MMGW. April being warm, on the other hand, was replete with doom-laden stories.
Give it until the weather gets warmer again and the usual bollocks will resume.
hillhunt
Excellent points. I do hope Buck reflects upon your words, and accepts that there is no such thing as Biased-BBC mindset.
why dont you try arguing some of the points bio.d and others bring up about bias at the beeb instead of all the smartarse comments,john reith and others seem to manage it,why cant you ?
boringnow…
More than one way to skin a cat.
The BBC and its Hatred of America.
Guantanamo Australian flies home
The plane had to fly via Mexico as the United States refused to allow it to enter American airspace.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6673557.stm
Strange how only the BBC out of every news article on this story seems to post the(inaccurate) fact the Yanks made the Aussies fly the long way round. What is even stranger is the fact that for the plane to fly into American territory would have been the same as flying from A to B via D. (in other words the flight would have had to go out of its way in which to fly through American air space)
As depicted by this illustration.
http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/9859/flightsa6.jpg
The line at the top would be a flight plan used by a plane flying from Cuba to Australia.
(2728 miles to San Diego.8196 from SD to Adelaide. A total of 10924 miles)
The line at the bottom is the most direct route.
(10145 miles)
The fact the plane refuelled at Tahiti tells me the shortest route was picked.
It appears that somebody at the BBC has invented a story in which to have yet another dig at the US.
The BBC and its Hatred of America.
The BBC and how it defends Terrorists.
Guantanamo Australian flies home
He admitted he had very briefly fought Western troops in Afghanistan at the end of 2001, before selling his gun and trying to escape by taxi to neighbouring Pakistan.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6673557.stm
What is funny is how Hicks was caught in Nov 01 in the city of Kunduz.
And here is how the BBC reported the news from the area in Nov 01
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1669567.stm
The BBC and how it defends Terrorists.
Vox Populi – Tolerant Muslims speak out:
http://internet-haganah.com/harchives/006062.html
must have slipped out at 3.00am on one of the local radio channels when no one was listening
Suppose they could have, but the usual bias still continues even at that hour.
R5 at 4am had news of Hick’s return to Oz. The BBC presenter questioned their local man from the premise that Australians would be rejoicing at Hick’s return from hell. We had an interview with Hick’s lawyer & were told that his Adelaide cell would by 4mx2M, “twice as big as at Guantanamo” – so cells at Gitmo must be coffin sized – can that be true?
With all this in fighting, the ‘Palestinians’ just can’t help turning on there own:
http://internet-haganah.com/harchives/006062.html
pounce:
Once again you blow a hole in the BBC’s facade. Well done:
“The BBC and its Hatred of America.
Guantanamo Australian flies home.”
If there’s one thing likely to turn our kids into school-bombing jihadis, it’s the thought that the BBC says American airspace was closed to a private plane carrying a convicted terrorist.
will:
Do get some sleep. Listening to Five Live at 4 am is the purest torture for anyone.
You can rest easy. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, a replica of Hicks’s cell has been on display locally, 1.8m wide, 2.4m long.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/18m-x-18m-living-like-hicks/2007/03/19/1174152949136.html
Pounce:
Re. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6673557.stm
Not sure if you noticed the caption underneath the third picture: “Many Australians disagree with the way Hicks has been treated”
Let’s count the number of Australians in the picture. One, erm, two… so that’s “many Australians” according to Al Beeb. Interesting.
Disillusioned German:
Bang on, mein herr.
Stick it to those Boibeeds for their oh-so-literal picture captions.
You were also absolutely right to ignore the Australian opinion poll which showed that 71% of voters wanted Hicks back. Oh and the other one that showed a hefty majority of Liberal (ie Conservative) Australians wanted the bludger brought home, too.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/leader-pledges-to-bring-hicks-home-quickly/2006/12/13/1165685753125.html
The Age has consistently maintained that the form of justice represented by Guantanamo Bay is a mockery of the rule of law and a sad comment on the fragility of democratic principles.
no agenda there then…
Mr Rudd’s pledge on David Hicks came as a Newspoll of 1200 people conducted this week found 71 per cent of Australians — including two-thirds of Liberal voters — agreed with the call to bring him home.
who commisioned the poll,the age?
the article fails to tell,
hefty majority of Liberal (ie Conservative)
how on earth did you work that one out.
hefty majority of Liberal (ie Conservative)
how on earth did you work that one out.
sorry forget this bit,i see what you mean now….
ben:
You’re so right. Legitimate opinion poll companies inevitably suck up to the people commissioning them. Otherwise, how would they get any business? Their professional credibility is never important.
Hefty majority of Liberal (conservative) Ozzies? I must have misread the line that said “two-thirds of Liberal voters”.
Thanks for putting me right.
PS. My first name is really Isaac!
found it
A Newspoll survey commissioned by the activist group ‘GetUp’ has found 70 per cent of Australians want Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks returned to Australia, even if he cannot be tried here.
PS. My first name is really Isaac!
i thought your sir name began with an H not a C.
Cillhunt?
On the off-chance that someone is keeping account (and referring back to our recent comments about the BBC and the IPPR), today’s World This Weekend ran some fluffy nonsense about whether we need secretaries of state for the Celtic tribes and featured one of the IPPR’s talking heads without identifying the organisation in any way beyond its bare title.
My rough score makes it about four unqualified appearances to every one in which its political status is revealed.
A Newspoll survey commissioned by the activist group ‘GetUp’
you ignored this bit.
cillyhunt.
Isaac:
“A Newspoll survey commissioned by the activist group ‘GetUp’
you ignored this bit”
So I did.
And I’m pleased you ignored the bit about the professionalism of poll companies.
Imagine: Gallup telling the Telegraph one week that the Tories have a lead of 70% and the Guardian next week that Labour are 70% up. Get them a lot of future business, wouldn’t it?
You were also absolutely right to ignore the Australian opinion poll which showed that 71% of voters wanted Hicks back. Oh and the other one that showed a hefty majority of Liberal (ie Conservative) Australians wanted the bludger brought home, too.
question…..
what other one
only one poll i can see here,
were do you get two from….
Mr Rudd’s pledge on David Hicks came as a Newspoll of 1200 people conducted this week found 71 per cent of Australians — including two-thirds of Liberal voters — agreed with the call to bring him home.
Y-e-e-e-s
Scrub the Ozzie Tories, then. That result must have been a mirage.
Does it say whether they want him back in a bodybag or alive?
Imagine: Gallup telling the Telegraph one week that the Tories have a lead of 70% and the Guardian next week that Labour are 70% up. Get them a lot of future business, wouldn’t it?
not so sure about that cilly,i just figure guy wear sandals and cheesecloth bit of a beard,hmmm looks like a hippy
i’ll ask him what he thinks about hicks….
including two-thirds
from the same poll you cillyhunt….
Isaac:
I’ll join you in the poll business. We’ll do well.
For the first week at least.
and there you was thinking opinion polls was scientifik like….
For the first week at least.
oh i dont know,i used to work in a gallup polled shop,just made up the sales data as i went along each week…it was really scientifik…..
Isaac:
Y-e-e-e-s.
The pop charts. Easily confused with political polling.
ask gordon cilly
Does it say whether they want him back in a bodybag or alive?
disillusioned_german | 20.05.07 – 10:19 pm
That’s a very good point, dg.
Don’t think Mr Cilly and I have ever been introduced.
The pop charts. Easily confused with political polling.
same principle though eh cilly,if one is open to corruption and human error….
ben, ben:
I give in. The entire Ozzie enthusiasm for Mr Hick’s return – just the two geezers in the BBC News photo.
And the Beatles never really sold many records either.
Ben, re: cillyhunt – shouldn’t it be called cillick hunt?
My name is Isaac Hunt.
I wish people would stop impersonating me.
tee-hee
I have an alter ego.
With low self-esteem, by the sound of it
And the Beatles never really sold many records either.
and neither did robbie williams…to begin with,its called giving away your first number one…we give you free copys you put numbers in machine,
its very scientifik y.e.e.e.s
Bryan: As long as we get “those poor Gitmo prisoners” from our MSM all the time people will sometimes sympathise with the terrorists. The message needs to go out loud and clear: “David Hicks is a terrorist” and “Propaganda outlets like Al Beeb paint them as victims”. It might see it differently should I ever end up in Gitmo but then I don’t spend my vacation in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
ben:
My opinion poll says 127% of people here believe you’ve won the argument.
And -5.1% rate Robbie above the Beatles.
My tip for the top:
The Hold Steady, touring the UK shortly.
http://www.theholdsteady.com/
?
good night cilly
disillusioned_german | 20.05.07 – 11:13 pm,
The BBC’s default position: sympathy for terrorists.
it’s just a tiny tiny thing I know.
“Lebanon is home to more than 350,000 Palestinian refugees, many of whom fled their homes when Israel was created in 1948.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6675163.stm
Those people who fled at the time are at least 59 years old now. And probably they are not the majority of the population anymore. Has the writer of the article thought about this, or these things are now automatic? Sometimes I wonder.
“But isn’t this alarming?Multiculturalism is now official state policy in many countries, together accounting for hundreds of millions of people. Isn’t it disturbing that millions of people are subject to a radical ideology that is almost impossible to comprehend, and thus to criticize? Many of its proponents seem to know that it cannot be rationally defended, which is why they simply shut critics down with charges of racism and shame them into silence whenever they sense some opposition. In fact, it is now more or less illegal in some countries to criticize it, although it could mean the most massive transformation of our countries in modern history.
We should allow immigrants the right to keep their culture “provided that they adhere to the central core of our values and follow the rules in our legal system.”
OK, but Muslims don’t do that. They don’t share our “core values” of freedom of speech to rationally criticize all religious creeds, as they have demonstrated on numerous occasions, from the Salman Rushdie case via the murder of Theo van Gogh to the Muhammad Cartoon Jihad in 2006. So what do we do when we are faced with cultures which specifically reject ideas about mutual tolerance?
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/2140
Hettie:
“Lebanon is home to more than 350,000 Palestinian refugees, many of whom fled their homes when Israel was created in 1948.”
These things are automatic like referring to Gaza overcrowding. What wasn’t said was that Palestinians in Lebanon have it tough. Far tougher than Palestinians in Israel, Jordan or for that matter Britain.
Simon Haddad says: Since their arrival in Lebanon nearly 50 years ago, the experience of Palestinian refugees was one of marginalization, suffering, repression and armed violence. They were considered a threat to the Lebanese people and were treated as second-class citizens. Unlike Palestinian refugees elsewhere, Palestinians in Lebanon have been denied basic social and economic rights for a substantial portion of their 52 years in exile. The Palestinians were kept apart from the Lebanese population, not allowed to assimilate even if they wanted to.
If these Palestinians were car-burning French or bus-bombing British I have no doubt the BBC would find a way to blame ‘social/economic conditions’ for their ‘understandable’ rage.
In Lebanon …?
Deegee, I’m sure they’ll get around th blaming Lebanon’s christian population soon enough. You know, the one that’s slowly being driven out by the syrians.