former BBC producer Antony Jay remembers those brave anti-establishment days :
“For nine years (1955-1964) I was part of this media liberal consensus. For six of those nine years I was working on Tonight, a nightly BBC current affairs television programme. My stint coincided almost exactly with Macmillan’s premiership, and I do not think my ex-colleagues would quibble if I said we were not exactly diehard supporters. But we were not just anti-Macmillan; we were anti-industry, anti-capitalism, anti-advertising, anti-selling, anti-profit, anti-patriotism, anti-monarchy, anti-Empire, anti-police, anti-armed forces, anti-bomb, anti-authority.”
Thanks to commenter itsalltoomuch.
UPDATE – production company RDF attempt to put the ticking parcel back on Peter Fincham’s lap. Does this imply that BBC staff edited the tape ?
The independent production company at the heart of the row over the royal photoshoot accused the BBC last night of ignoring repeated requests to show it the controversial footage before it was made public. Sources at RDF, which filmed the monarch sitting for Annie Leibovitz as part of A Year with the Queen, say it asked to see the promotional tape “several times” before it was shown to journalists. The apparent failure of the BBC to respond will increase pressure on Peter Fincham, the controller of BBC1 … The BBC described RDF’s requests to see the footage as “low key” and “noninsistent”.
“It [the BBC] still champions the individual against the institution.”
I disagree completely with that. The BBC and the rest of “media liberalism” is instinctively statist. EVERY cause they promote has more state power as the solution.
Indeed. The BBC is not “liberal” at all, in the proper sense of the word. It is statist and collectivist.
However, the BBC generally disapproves of state power when exercised by the hard end of the public sector: the police, the armed forces, or the immigration and prison authorities.
The BBC welcomes state power to extract money for itself, through the television licence fee. And it also endorses a growth in general taxation to support the soft end of the public sector, to which the BBC itself belongs, and for which it is a propagandist.
“The BBC described RDF’s requests to see the footage as “low key” and “noninsistent”.”
It makes me wonder how RDF went about requesting the footage, and how the BBC expected RDF to approach them. Would RDF have had more luck if they had taped their message to the back of a giant wild boar? A giant wild freshly-shaved naked boar?
I wonder if the BBC still has an archive of the emails (I am guessing that, rather than sending out a letter, RDF dashed off a couple of emails). It’s a curious thing that will probably never be answered.
For my money the choice quote from Anthony Jay’s article is this one:
“We saw ourselves as part of the intellectual élite, full of ideas about how the country should be run, and yet with no involvement in the process or power to do anything about it. Being naïve in the way institutions actually work, yet having good arts degrees from reputable universities, we were convinced that Britain’s problems were the result of the stupidity of the people in charge.”
Nowadays many more people have arts degrees, albeit that the universities are less reputable. This “clever people in a stupid world” impulse is a very BBC-ish thing. There is clever, and there is wise.
He felt himself such an elite that, even today, he writes elite as élite rather than elite. Perhaps this is the Daily Telegraph’s house style. I imagine he writes the word “role” with a little hat over the “o”, or wishes that people still did so.
Ashley Pomeroy –
‘I imagine he writes the word “role” with a little hat over the “o”, or wishes that people still did so.’
You got something against circumflexes, pal?
Crossbow
“Indeed. The BBC is not “liberal” at all, in the proper sense of the word. It is statist and collectivist.”
On the money me thinks.
In fact Al Beeb is the living embodiment of ‘IngSoc’.