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The BBC its love for terrorists and half a story
Letters demand detainee’s release
A Sussex MP is to present letters demanding the release of a law student being held in Guantanamo Bay to the home secretary. Omar Deghayes, 37, who was born in Libya but lived in Brighton, has been held in detention since 2002. Brighton Kempton MP Des Turner will hand John Reid letters from 140 organisations demanding Mr Deghayes’ immediate release. Mr Turner also wants his immigration status clarified if he is freed.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/sussex/6236238.stm
Yet again the BBC tells half a story in which to defend a yet another Soldier for Allah. Missing from that report;
1) Deghayes left his Legal Practice Course behind after becoming radicalized by an extreme Muslim group at Huddersfield UNI
2) He went on a round the Muslim countries world tour ending up in Afghanistan in 2001 were he married an afghan and had a child. Now I’ve heard of taking a gap year, but a gap year doesn’t entails dropping out of uni.
3) His brother is the leader of a radical Mosque in Brighton
4) He left England to live in a pure Islamic country. (Afghanistan)
The BBC its love for terrorists and half a story
Bard of Barking, resolute Labour supporter, defender or minorities and immigrants moved to a little village deep in Tory Dorset some 7 years ago. A man who talks the talk but refuse to walk the walk…
Incidentally the BBC were happy to publicise his tactical voter website in the hope of dislodging Oliver Letwin:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/vote2001/hi/english/features/newsid_1347000/1347766.stm
But Billy Bragg isn’t all bad news. Kirsty McColl’s version of “A New England” probably put a smile on even Paul Dacre’s face….
The BBC, its portrayal of Islam and half a story.
The BBC runs an article on how an Islamic school in Kenya is redressing an image problem by teaching a moderate form of Islam.
They then show picture after picture of cute little girls wearing the Islamic head and body covering.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/07/africa_madrassa_makeover/img/1.jpg
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/07/africa_madrassa_makeover/img/3.jpg
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/07/africa_madrassa_makeover/img/6.jpg
Well for a start, what the BBC don’t inform the public is that Madrassas means religious school. So the nearest equivalent to the Western model would be Sunday school (but on a daily basis)
Then there is this snippet from the BBC;
“These three-year-old Tanzanian girls on the mainly Muslim island of Zanzibar in Pale village wear headscarves and are learning to read and write classical Arabic alongside English and the local language.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/07/africa_madrassa_makeover/html/4.stm
Classic Arabic BBC, Children who are forced to go the Mosque. (Yes BBC Madrassa is just another way of saying Mosque) Are taught how to read Arabic in which to be able to read the Koran which just happens to be written in Arabic.
Lastly while the BBC apes on about on how to combat extremism by teaching a more moderate form of Islam what they don’t say is that under Islamic norms young girls don’t have to cover their head or bodies until they are between the ages of 9 and 11.
So what kind of message does that BBC photo shoot present when they show even younger girls wearing the Burka.
The BBC, its portrayal of Islam and half a story.
Yet again, the Muslim world is offended, this time by Rushdie’s knighthood.
Its reactions are so predictable: If it offends, cut it, burn it, blow it up and tear it down. Destruction is a core doctrine.
Extremist Muslims will always be offended by something we do, but primarily by the essential fact that we are not one of them.
hillhunt (ex BBC) – never heard of the red button?
Its digital or it would not have been on 3 and 4.
All live music from the same festival even though different acts is not choice.
Live music is but one very small facet of broadcasting.
If the BBC really wanted to cater for the audience it could have offered the others as live but not simultaneously so viewers could watch more than one, whilst offering the choice of live broadcasting via the red button (like it does for Wimbledon and others).
Those that don’t like popular music (or at least those bands) should still have the choice to watch comedy, films, drama, news, educational programmes, etc.
Would it be OK to have football on simultaneously on 2, 3 and 4 even if different matches? I don’t think that would be accepted.
No its just the BBC riding roughshod over quality yet again.
Hillhunt – living in the stone age and thinking its OK for the BBC to do so as well.
I don’t understand why the Muslim chappies are all so exercised about Rushdie’s knighthood. How can they possibly think it an insult to Islam? Surely it’s bleedin’ obvious that he got his knighthood in the usual way – by donating money to the Labour Party?
More cutting edge journalism from the ‘cash strapped’ BBC:
Babes in the mud
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6237064.stm
They could have made a Panorama out of that…..!
Parsing Pounce: Kenyan Schools
Well for a start, what the BBC don’t inform the public is that Madrassas means religious school.
From the very first paragraph of the report: Some madrassas, or Islamic schools, in East Africa are seeking to redress the image that such schools promote extremism..
It gets sillier…
Children who are forced to go the Mosque. (Yes BBC Madrassa is just another way of saying Mosque) Are taught how to read Arabic in which to be able to read the Koran which just happens to be written in Arabic.
Y-e-e-e-s. An Islamic religious school wants its kids to learn the Koran? The b*stards!
while the BBC apes on about on how to combat extremism by teaching a more moderate form of Islam what they don’t say is that under Islamic norms young girls don’t have to cover their head or bodies until they are between the ages of 9 and 11.
No distinction necessary between piety and extremism? The BBC piece quotes a spokesman about his ambition to keep children away from militant Islam: “Our aim is to give children a chance of a better life. We certainly don’t train them to become suicide bombers.”
pounce clearly thinks the desire to cover female hair – a feature of some sects in the Christian and Jewish cultures, too – equates with the desire to wage Jihad.
So what kind of message does that BBC photo shoot present when they show even younger girls wearing the Burka?
Not much. None of the kids has the full body-covering that we associate with the burqa. Some have their hair covered, but other girls clearly do not.
Pounce: Let’s Twist Again.
More pointless drivel (sorry ‘journalism’) from the bloated BBC
Doing the dirty work at Glastonbury
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6236306.stm
BBC reporter – “Can I go to Glastonbury please – it’ll be so cool!”
Editor “Do you have a story?”
Reporter “Err…yes – an in depth investigation into toilet cleaning”
Editor “Fantastic idea! – go join the other 600 BBC employees there, and don’t froget your expenses card!”
Further to Rory Motion’s hilarious Bin Laden “is a nice bloke” flight of fancy on Radio 4’s Glastonbury coverage. Turns out old Rory is a bit of a Troofer:
watched a free on-line video last night called ‘loose change’…( just google ‘loose change’, find web-site and watch) its about 9/11 and the upshot is that the whole thing was perpetrated by osama bin laden not. It appears to have been done by the american government themselves. If this is true, and it’ll take some refuting , I’d have to say that they have been very very naughty indeed!….4 million americans have apparently watched this film and I’m sure many more are going to. I’ve seen similar stuff about 7/7 and how that was done with full knowledge of the british government…. if this stuff catches on were in for a very interesting time. Mainstream media, when its not ignoring it completely, is always very sniffy about this stuff but the guardian gave the film a full page review….Watch this space, and other ones too…I might be feeling funnier tomorrow
http://www.rorymotion.com/my_life_as_a_artist_blog/post/145.htm
BaggieJ:
All live music from the same festival even though different acts is not choice. Live music is but one very small facet of broadcasting.
Agreed. And we’re talking a small facet here…90 minutes. After 10.30 pm. On a Sunday night. (Out of 400,000-plus hours broadcast by the BBC a year)
The performers could not be more different – an iconic Sixties rock band, a 21st century dance crew and a reggae group.
Would it be OK to have football on simultaneously on 2, 3 and 4 even if different matches? I don’t think that would be accepted.
Why not, if the event is big enough? The World Cup spilled all over the schedules last summer in the early rounds. Big deal. These are mainstream sources of entertainment which mean a lot to a large slice of the licence-paying public. Even among B-BBC’s prickly worldviews, what does that have to do with bias?
Biased BBC: You And Me. Baby We Were Born to Grumble.
BBC sets its sights on winning foreign viewers
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-ft-bbc25jun25,1,6788061.story?coll=la-headlines-business&ctrack=1&cset=true
“I think with George W. Bush’s approval rating at 29%, having a news broadcast with a neutral, British, BBC approach is well-timed,” said Garth Ancier, president of BBC America.”
Eh? Run that by me again, I must have missed it. Was it “You (the US) hate Bush – we (the BBC) hate Bush too! Ergo you will love the BBC!”
Anonanon:
Further to Rory Motion’s hilarious Bin Laden “is a nice bloke” flight of fancy on Radio 4’s Glastonbury coverage. Turns out old Rory is a bit of a Troofer:
Er, no. He’s taking the p*ss….
Biased BBC: What’s Going On?
A view from Edinburgh….
Long-suffering viewers must be freed from biased BBC
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=987322007
“BBC staff live, eat, drink and sleep with like-minded liberals. They know no other views. The corporation is beyond reformation. Nor should reform be attempted.
Instead, the recently renewed Charter should be torn up and the corporation sold off. Then it will not matter if all its newsreaders are women wearing hijabs, with a giant poster of Gordon Brown as backdrop to the news. BBC news reports refer insinuatingly to “Iranian state television”; but we are watching biased reporting on British state television. We are being charged a fee of £135.50 a year to have our news distorted and our values trashed.
Imagine if you wanted to shop at Harvey Nichols, but you had to go to Jenners first and pay them £135 for a permit to enter their competitor’s premises. By what right does the BBC act as gatekeeper to all 196 other television channels? That is an infringement of Article 10 of the European Convention, guaranteeing free access to information across frontiers.
Yet the tyrannical corporation broadcasts Orwellian advertisements warning of raids on the homes of those who have not paid their licence fees. Feckless single mothers sent to jail are effectively political prisoners.
The corporation’s pompous prating of “public service broadcasting” is risible: EastEnders, River City (Glaswegian version of Eastenders) – that says it all. The BBC’s total disconnection from reality is typified by its claim, quoted above, to be “the leading provider of information and entertainment in the United Kingdom”. In the week ending June 10 it had 27.4% of the television audience for its terrestrial operations and a further 2.1% for its other channels. A figure of less than 30% is only “leading” because there are so many other channels splitting audience figures.
The BBC’s own report to the Department of Culture, Media and Sport in 2005 revealed research showing that, if the licence fee were abolished, 58% of viewers (14 million households) would opt out of all BBC television, leaving the corporation with £1.2bn in revenue instead of its current £3bn. It cannot happen soon enough. Auntie has degenerated into a vicious old crone: she is no longer welcome in our homes.”
I’ll give old Rory the benefit of the doubt on the Troofer thing being a piss-take. The leap from hippy eco-warrior with a line in Bin Laden poems to “9/11 was an inside job” may indeed be a little bit bigger than I originally thought. The poem and the rest of the comedy clips are still crap though.
“Biased BBC: Why Don’t You All F-F-F-Fade Away?
hillhunt ”
You wish. Not a chance mate.
Mr Hillhunt – I hope that gorging yourself on Glastonbury didn’t prevent you from seeing Dr Who.
I’m sure it would have squeezed your lemons till the juice ran down your leg, when the right wing UK PM (aka The Master) offered some grits to the the dumb Yank – just before the Master vapourised him.
Hillhunt (ex BBC light programme)
Wimbledon starts today, there are lots of games to choose from on BBC via the red button but it does not occupy three channels simultaneously.
You just don’t understand digital broadcasting do you?
Apparently we will all have to soon thanks to New Labour official policy so if I were you I’d go on a crash course.
You show your ignorance, during the world cup (once every 4 years not every year) three channels did not broadcast simultaneous games. It never will, this would never be accepted.
Why is Glastonbury receiving this wall to wall coverage, it did not receive anything like it on any of its previous years. What made it so important comparing this year to last year?
So why choose to do so now without explanation?
Because it fits in with the BBC agenda.
That’s what its got to do with bias.
Lets say something comes up in the future that is a one off, say a royal wedding, even that will not be broadcast on three BBC channels simultaneously.
What’s suddenly so special about Glastonbury that it warrants it?
Hillhunt (ex BBC light programme) – the secret is to bang the rocks together guys
‘The cult of Story is destroying our culture from within. It’s time to start fighting back’
http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2110659,00.html
Monday June 25, 2007
“Funny old things, internal reports. After months of deliberation and a storm of fact-finding, the BBC last week discovered it had a liberal bias, a comfort zone of liberal thought in which its staff operated. The response from the BBC to its own report has been swift. “Of course we have a liberal bias. Now can we carry on being the nice, comfy, multicultural people that we were before you came along, thank you very much?”……………..
“The performers could not be more different – an iconic Sixties rock band, a 21st century dance crew and a reggae group.”
No they’re not, they all sing the same refrain – it’s fun to take drugs, it’s fun to put acid in your vein, it’s good to be immoral, it’s good to worship the lord of lies and deceit.
If I ran Glastonbury I would ensure that they were at least 3 large army recruitment tents.
If I ran Glastonbury I would ensure that they were at least 3 large army recruitment tents.
Ultraviolets | Homepage | 25.06.07 – 2:25 pm
What, no press-gang?
“What made it so important comparing this year to last year?”
Well the festival wasn’t on last year so I guess wall to wall scheduling of a few cows mooching about in a field would have been tedious.
I’d like to think that the comparative resurgence of British music over the last couple of years has resulted in the wider coverage. Certainly the event has gone more mainstream and is a lot less hippycentric than it used to be. I might even go myself if they ever build a 5 star hotel with a pleasant covered viewing terrace on site.
“If I ran Glastonbury I would ensure that they were at least 3 large army recruitment tents.”
Well most of my army mates were actually there?? Along with the accountants, the lawyers etc who probably contribute enough to the economy as it is… There isn’t really much of a contradiction between being in the forces and appreciating some decent music is there??? I think you might be stuck in the 60s dude.
Glastonbury used to be a charity gig for raising money for CND during the days of the Cold War. In those days it had trouble attracting big name groups. Presumably the big names were not quite as radical left-wing as some would have us believe and chose to steer clear of it (a fact that regularly irked the editors at NME). Once the Cold War ended, Michael Eavis dropped its association with CND and suddenly the event really took off as it was able to attract big names.
Meanwhile CND dropped any pretence of being a mainstream political pressure group and made Kate Hudson (British Communist Party politburo member and Kruschev disciple) its president.
Forget about the direness of the music, the most perceptive comment on Glastonbury is from Stephen Pollard at the Spectator. Among other remarks Pollard makes about Glastonbury is that it is “a gathering which, in its celebration of so much that has destroyed the norms of decent behaviour, has nothing to commend it beyond making for an easy identification of the forces that continue to warp society.” So no surprise that there is wall to wall coverage as well as endless mind-numbing interviews with the performers on the BBC.
The BBC and double standards:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6235754.stm
The kidnappers of BBC correspondent Alan Johnston have released a new video of him in which he is wearing what he says is an explosives vest.
In the tape, Mr Johnston says his captors have said they will detonate the vest if force is used to try to free him.
It is the second video released since Mr Johnston was abducted from a Gaza street on 12 March.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6237458.stm
The Palestinian captors of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have broadcast what they say is his first audio message since his capture a year ago.
The voice on the tape says his health is worsening and he needs medical help.
The recording was put on a website of the military wing of Hamas. Cpl Shalit was captured near the Gaza border in a joint raid by three militant groups.
“captured near the Gaza border” is not quite true. He was captured on Israeli soil, but evidently the BBC, just like Shalit’s “captors” believe that all of Israel is “occupied”:
“Furthermore, hostage-taking is considered a war crime.”
Abu Mujahid brushed off B’Tselem’s accusation, saying the soldier was a prisoner of war who had been captured inside a tank used to fight Palestinians.
“Any occupiers on the land are a legitimate target because they are soldiers,” he said.
Reading comments here over the weekend was a pleasure in the absence of the sick troll who shall not be named.
Now he’s back in his office and disagreeing with everything and everybody please ignore him.
Ryan | 25.06.07 – 2:53 pm
I see the Electronic Engineer with no head for figures is back.
In reply to your pathetic attempt to stand-up your ludicrous visitor projections for this site …here:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/patrickcrozier/3861044074615880734/#361751
I based my assumptions on the Guido Fawkes blog
As a general rule, it’s best for to avoid basing projections for a not very significant niche player on the performance of the market-leader.
Notice the figures gives the number of visits as 1685 in one day – but over 11,000 in one week. That is, there is no evidence that visitors repeat their visits on a daily basis.
……er…..I don’t think you’ve worked out how the sitemeter works….
One can easily see that the average visitor might visit the site once a month, see most of the latest commentary here, then not repeat the visit for a month. That would actually give you 53,000 unique visitors in an average month.
…..no, you definitely don’t know how the sitemeter works.
Sitemeter counts as one visit any user who visits the main page who has not done so for the previous 30 minutes.
So, anyone who checks in three or four times a day will count as three or four (so long as they leave at least a half-hour between visits. If they don’t leave a half-hour gap they count as one visitor, but 2 (or whatever) page views).
Someone like hillhunt could account for a good many more. 10? 15?
The 1685 daily average is for the number of ‘visits’ • as defined above, not unique users. In theory, 337 ‘regulars’ – visiting the site 5 times per day each – could account for the whole traffic.
And each day starts with a clean slate • so Tuesday’s 1685 could be exactly the same people as Monday’s.
I doubt whether the true situation is that extreme • but I wouldn’t be surprised if 10% of the daily average turned out to be repeat visits by regular commenters.
Basically, over a period of about a year, I think it is entirely feasible that 250,000 unique visitors will come to this site.
In your dreams.
It seems, Mr Reith, that you have a few things to learn about blogging and the new media.
We all have much to learn. You certainly do.
http://www.sitemeter.com/?a=supportfaq
Another Glasto article
“http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/3524/”
Says almost the opposite of the Spectator one in some ways.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6237314.stm
Hamas the moderates:
Hamas leaders, who espouse a more moderate brand of Islamist politics, have always shunned al-Qaeda advances.
Glastonbury or no there is no justification for three of the BBC’s 4 channels that actually purport to show a variety of programming to all be covering the same event.
CBeebies, CBBC and News24 don’t count, the first two are children’s channels and were off air, though I would be surprised if Glastonbury did not get several mentions on news24 when the other three channels were all airing it.
Perhaps the BBC would like BBCs 2,3 and 4 to become MTV, Kerrang and VH1.
If this logic is no good then perhaps we can look forward to all of the soaps being shown simultaneously on the BBC channels rather than cluttering up the schedule? No, thought not.
@Reith (BBC)
Sitemeter reports:
“Site Meter defines a “visit” as a series of page views by one person with no more than 30 minutes in between page views.”
So if one of the commenters comes on the site and posts a number of items in a reasonably short time frame they DO NOT appear as separate visits – because there will not be 30 minutes between them. Similarly if some people love the site and keep coming back to see the latest comments (like HillHunt) then they do not register as more than one visit, because there is unlikely to be more than 30 minutes between each visit.
Sure, the commenters will register more visits than casual readers, but I think it is fair to say that the “Visits” counter is closer to providing a recording of individual visitors than it does the number of home-page hits. It is not wonderfully accurate but it is not orders of magnitude out.
The Guido Fawkes blog is indeed a popular blog. It also links to this one. I wouldn’t (and didn’t) claim that it would be as popular as the Guido site with large numbers of unique visitors every day, but the material is not updated frequently enough for that. Bear in mind that Guido Fawkes gets far more visitors to that site than comments posted – and this is common with blogs and forums.
Bear in mind that we have at least three members of the BBC programme making staff posting here (of which you are one) so it seems it isn’t some dark and dusty overlooked corner of the web.
Anyway John, I think we have got off on the wrong foot after you obviously didn’t believe I had a PhD. It got under my skin a bit. I don’t think either of us deserve the snarky comments we have aimed at each other so I’m going to drop it on my side.
Last OT post:
The Antidote to Glastonbury
Fast forward 3 minutes in to get to the interesting bit.
It’s the future of music – hauntology. The ghosts that Joy Division conjured up and were overwhelmed by are getting ready to sweep through the whole world now.
towcestarian | 25.06.07 – 10:23 am
The Sutton Trust is not the hotbed of liberal lefties you claim.
In fact, it was set up by a property developer and its advisory board is made up of…among others… a former Conservative education minister, the chief operating officer of Goldman Sachs, the chairman of Phoenix Equity Partners, a Tetra Pack heiress and the Provost of Eton.
Don’t sound very leftie to me.
Besides, what’s left wing about complaining that social mobility has run into the sand?
The ERC report, which you imply says something very different, comes to the same diagnosis.
And points the finger of blame in the same direction: the education system.
Biodegradababble:
The BBC and double standards:
The kidnappers of BBC correspondent Alan Johnston have released a new video of him in which he is wearing what he says is an explosives vest…..
The Palestinian captors of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have broadcast what they say is his first audio message since his capture a year ago.
Double standards?
No-one would wish Shalit or Johnston any harm, although I seem to recall that you announced publicly that you didn’t give a shit whether Johnston lived or died.
But there is an essential difference between them. Whatever the rights and wrongs of either situation, Shalit is a combatant; Johnston a civilian.
I would be surprised if Glastonbury did not get several mentions on news24
Better than that, they used the BBC ticket allocation to send their own reporter (& crew) there for the weekend. Mud was the major topic of reports.
And something else you would never see at Glastonbury now that it is so achingly mainstream that the Toady Program has a van there:
Acid Mothers Temple and the Melting Pariso U.F.O.
(Sunn O))) were marvellous in Barcelona this year by the way)
They should be playing again at Supersonic along with Wolf Eyes and Black Galaxy.
Ryan | 25.06.07 – 3:58 pm
So if one of the commenters comes on the site and posts a number of items in a reasonably short time frame they DO NOT appear as separate visits – because there will not be 30 minutes between them.
True, but remember the comments are posted on Haloscan, not on biased-bbc.blogspot.com – which is what the meter is counting.
The meter clocks the visits to the main page…..which is how most of us access the haloscan threads.
Anyone coming to the site first thing in the morning, at lunchtime, in the afternoon and in the evening will count as 4 visits.
I’m going to drop it {snarky stuff} on my side.
Me too.
I am genuinely puzzled what you thought were the significant (politically) differences between the various versions of the Sutton Trust story. They look largely cosmetic/practical to me. And why you think theirs is a leftist analysis……the Tories have been saying the same thing for ages.
Thanks for bringing that quote from Garth Ancier to my attention.
Since Ancier is interested in polls, he may be interested in the latest from Gallup, which found that confidence in Congress (now run by the Democrats) is at 14 percent, an all time low.
I don’t know if this will affect his plans for further invasions.
(By the way, many congressional Democrats would be quite comfortable at the BBC. Different accents, but shared values, or, if you prefer, shared superstitions.)
BaggieJonathan:
perhaps we can look forward to all of the soaps being shown simultaneously on the BBC channels rather than cluttering up the schedule? No, thought not.
If the soap episodes were two years apart and attracted actors, writers and directors at the level of Glasto’s line-up, who knows?
Biased BBC: Born Slippy.
“I am genuinely puzzled what you thought were the significant (politically) differences between the various versions of the Sutton Trust story. They look largely cosmetic/practical to me. And why you think theirs is a leftist analysis……the Tories have been saying the same thing for ages.”
I think that you are getting my remarks mixed up with Towcester. I only said the original report was quite bizarre.
The reason being that the report didn’t mention:-
Who Sir Peter Lampl was,
What the Sutton Trust was,
What where the facts the research was supposed to have revealed.
I didn’t actually say it was biased, although the mention of the UK having a lower social mobility of any country (twice) did seem to indicate that the author had someething on their mind….
As you say, the Sutton Trust is actually a Tory dominated think-tank promoting John Major style “meritocracy” thinking. However, I don’t think you would have guessed that from the report. With the primary driver removed from the description of the report the report itself lapsed into incoherence. The emphasis in the second version changed – but the link to it was removed.
Umbongo,
Whilst I have some level of respect for Stephen Pollard’s political views frankly in dismissing Britain’s contribution to one area of art and culture where we increasingly excel (popular music) he has all the credibility of an illiterate chav slagging off Salman Rushdie for using multisyllabic words, cos it makes no sense innit.
Reith 4:06
Thanks for the info on the Sutton Trust; I genuinely appreciate your effort in supplying this. However, the original BBC website article read like the usual leftie-liberal propaganda we are used to seeing on the BBC, hence my complaint. I notice that Version 6 of the article has finally included the ERC report and the dreaded “selection” word.
http://www.newssniffer.co.uk/articles/50516/diff/4/5
It is now rather a good article; shame the BBC couldn’t have got it unbiasaed first time.
@towcester:
My god, it got to version 6! And what a difference from the original version!
Sadly it still isn’t linked to on the main page. So those that only check the BBC website in the morning probably will only have seen the “spun to the hard left” version.
I wonder what the motivating factor for so many revisions was? I wonder if the stream of accusations of bias coupled with calls for privatisation has caused internal warfare in the Beeb?
towcestarian | 25.06.07 – 4:49 pm
Ryan | 25.06.07 – 4:36 pm
I agree that the first version is a lot weaker than the final one.(though not quite as bizarre or bad as Ryan makes out).
Just as a wiki stub is weaker than a full version.
The reason – in this case – seems pretty clear.
The first version is a write off of a Today programme item…
i.e. the duty sub on the website was monitoring Today for any breaking news and suddenly heard David Cameron pop up.
Because Cameron is a party leader making an ‘unscheduled’ appearance ….the sub leaps to action stations to get something on the record.
Later, an education writer who knows what he’s talking about and actually has a copy of the Sutton Trust report (and not just a press release) comes in and the story evolves into something quite decent.
This ‘real time’ stuff is a bit alien to those of us who were brought up as old-fashioned broadcasters (where we got the story sorted before going on air with it)…but it’s supposed to be what the internet is all about.
Not bias – just process.
This is, to all intents and purposes, the same text that was rejected by 55 per cent of French voters and 62 per cent of Dutch voters two years ago – although you would not know this from listening to the BBC’s gullible coverage. The changes are emendations, not amendments; decorative, not structural.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/06/25/dl2501.xml
Second that. Why bother employing Jonny Dymond when Denis Macshane is always available anyway? And as for Mark Mardell – since his exile from Downing Street to Brussels he looks like he hasn’t passed on a single offer of a freebie dinner.
Reith 5:07
Again thanks for the insight on editorial “process” – very enlightening.
Can I suggest that the BBC needs to sharpen up this process to avoid similar cockups in future. Better control of subs pushing out “weak”/biased reports before the day-staff get into the office would seem sensible in the current climate.
I notice also that the ERC report has now got its own (mercifully unbiased) page on BBC online.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6238058.stm
towcestarian + Ryan
Yes….the ERC report and the Sutton report are both on the Education front page.
Also there is is a link on the UK front page to a have your say on social mobility….and following that link also takes you to the Sutton story.
So nothing is ‘buried’.
Good Riddance Chemical Ali
“Mr. Abdul-Qader thanked God for living to see the conviction and death sentence of Chemical Ali. He might, too, have thanked the American soldiers and President Bush for having made it possible. Those Americans and Europeans who target President Bush as the world’s troublemaker too often forget that there are real bad guys out there, people like Chemical Ali. His conviction makes the world more safe, more just, more civilized”.
http://www.nysun.com/article/57216
The BBC its love for the taliban and shoddy reporting
Long haul fight to defeat the Taleban
The battles may be raging in Helmand province, the suicide and roadside bombs are killing people across the country, but the Taleban have been hit hard by Nato’s spring offensive. They admit themselves that the targeted killings of some senior commanders took the thrust out of their own planned spring attacks. And their biggest loss was Mullah Dadullah – a ruthless military commander whose brutality repulsed even his own fellow Taleban leaders. The British Special Boat Service (SBS) killed him in Helmand in May after a raid on a compound where his associates were meeting. There are many stories of betrayal, of his false leg being stolen so he couldn’t get away, of his body being recovered from a river by his followers, but it seems careful intelligence-gathering and a lot of luck culminated in the removal of one of the most wanted Taleban targets.
(A lot of luck BBC? You leave out of that story how 2 Taliban prisoners associated with Mullah Dadullah were released and followed back to their lair by the SBS. That isn’t luck that was plain good tracking skills.)
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In Helmand province, in the south, it’s guerrilla war. There are front line positions which have been held for months.
(No BBC, when there are dug in front line positions that means it is a symmetrical war because both sides have a demarcation line between them. When there is a guerrilla war it means there isn’t such a demarcation line. That is known as Asymmetrical warfare.)
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Taleban fighters snipe at British positions, they return fire with overwhelming force of artillery, rockets and air power to “suppress the enemy”, which does not necessarily kill that many Taleban.
(Which makes me ask the question if NATO have slotted over 1500 Taliban idiots in the past few months How can the BBC claim the Taliban aren’t getting killed)
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“The Taleban is not one, they are not two, they are not hundred, they are not thousand, they are not tens of thousands, the Taleban have millions in this country,” said Mullah Zaeef.
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(BBC pro Taliban propaganda at its worst)
The BBC its love for the taliban and shoddy reporting