I see that Carol Thatcher has received death threats over her alleged ‘golliwog’ comment about a tennis player.
Miss Thatcher, who has taken refuge in Switzerland following the furore over the incident, is said to be considering suing the BBC over her dismissal from The One Show. Her agent said: ‘It’s been an awful time. We’ve even had death threats.’
If this is true – should she not report the BBC to the police? After all, several BBC “personalities” (aka license fee parasites) have been keen to rush to the media and report on alleged comments made off-air. In doing so, have they endangered Carol Thatcher’s life? And I wonder WHO might be making death threats against her? Have these intrepid seekers of truth not gone after THAT angle?
This entire “golliwog”story is back to front. The word is not illegal, the usage is not proven – this is all BBC driven hysteria. We know nothing of the context of the comments, nor do I quite understand why a private conversation can be so very publicly trailed through the media. Well, that’s not true. It’s to ensure damage to the brand Thatcher, to associate it with racism, and to extol the right-on vanities of hypocrites such as Jo Brand and Adrian Chiles.
gareth
I read that there were 12 BBC production staff in the Green Room – at our expense – as well as the main players.
And presumably this happens every damn night ?
Gareth,
BBC staff and guests mix in the Green Room. I have been in more than few, as a contributor, and am always wary. That said, I am no different off-air than on-air, unlike some of the two-faced political hypocrites who shared the space with me. Innocents have no place in a Green Room, they will be devoured. I have seen it.
If you venture onto the ceefax showbiz pages (500 to 520 )you’ll find that the number of responses to the BBC’s handling of Gollygate has “risen to more than 3,000.”
Fair enoughski, but what’s this ?
“The number of messages backing the BBC’s action (i.e. the sacking) has more than doubled from 60 to around 130”.
So by my rough calculation, that’s a deficit of more than 22 to 1. Odd (hah!) that the Beeb’s highlighling the “1” part of the differential……
Does anyone remember the time when people who told tales were seen as “the bad guy”? I remember many a time a kid getting reprimanded from a teacher for telling tales.
The BBC will never change
“One veteran BBC executive said: ‘There was widespread acknowledgment that we may have gone too far in the direction of political correctness.
‘Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC’s culture, that it is very hard to change it.'”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-411846/We-biased-admit-stars-BBC-News.html
I would say that it is impossible to “change it”.
SO …
“Hurrah! Now we know who to send the poo to”.
I believe that sending toxic materials through the royal mail is an offence – perhaps Jo brand should be arrested of inciting a criminal act ?
Cassandra
You are 100% correct with that little lot.
Our system has been dictating to much of the world for 250 years, and now it is turning on us and the American people.
IMO we can no more protect our freedoms, than the rest of the worlds ordinary people could have protected theirs.
However we the English speaking people have one advantage over the rest of the world, apart from speaking English.
We are the last bit of the world that our own establishments internationalist banking system has left to defeat. We know that when freedom finally takes its last breath here, freedom has taken its last breath anywhere.
I once believed that our establishment wished to ultimately spread liberty, true democracy, property rights and international harmony and FREE trade around the world.
It long since became self apparent to myself that it never had any intention of doing anything of the kind.
It wishes to spread highly controlled international trade simply to increase its own power and control over the lives of ordinary people.
It does not wish to promote the best of left and right. It wishes to inflict by force, against the natural will of the common people, the worst possible aspects of both left and right.
I agree, it’s all a bit silly.
http://thealternativetake.blogspot.com/
H.I.M. Zog (All Hail Zog ! ) | 08.02.09 – 9:08 pm
So by my rough calculation, that’s a deficit of more than 22 to 1. Odd (hah!) that the Beeb’s highlighling the “1” part of the differential……
When I read your post something clicked in my mind and I have just listened to “Any Questions” again.
Whereas you report that Ceefax admits to a ratio of 22 letters of complaint for each letter supporting the beeb, I can confirm that jonathan dimbleby took one of his crowd votes after the golliwog discussion and reported that “a very large majority” of those present thought the bbc acted correctly – somewhat the reverse of the Ceefax ratio.
I very much doubt that he could have got away with lying about the vote, so is one lead to the conclusion that the audience is rigged?
I think we should be told.
While Mrs Thatcher is free to say what she deems fit, so is the Beeb free to employ who it deems worthy.
Yes, perhaps the comment would have slid from attention twelve months ago(especially since “the One show” is a God awful programme). Yet the reason such a fuss was made was not the work of BBC executives but rather those in Fleet Street determined to punish the corporation for a reason beyond me.
gordon-bennett writes: “I very much doubt that he could have got away with lying about the vote, so is one lead to the conclusion that the audience is rigged?”
More likely is that it is self-selecting. Knowing the programme is going to be stuffed with Lefties twittering away, who else but a Leftie would go out on a cold night to watch the ghastly affair?
H.I.M. Zog (All Hail Zog ! ) | 08.02.09 – 9:08 pm |
“The number of messages backing the BBC’s action (i.e. the sacking) has more than doubled from 60 to around 130”.
Looks like the stock reliable supporters are starting to call in twice.
Damaging the Thatcher brand? No point. Mark’s already done a pretty good job of that himself.
I noticed that the golliwog had disappeared from a reissued collection of “Noddy” stories – talk about censorship. Wish I’d bought some when I was in New Zealand last year, The shop owner said they were VERY popular with British tourists.
I like Carol. I was at UCL at the same time and she suffered from “milk snatcher” taunts then (that’s how long ago it was). The BBC should be ashamed of itself for hounding this thoroughly likeable woman.
I just had a look back at The Times article that broke the story last Tuesday and it is plain that the BBC had hung her out to dry as early as Monday night, when it gave The Times details both of of what it was doing and what it was contemplating vis a vis Carol.
It says that they were demanding a formal apology. However, I have read in the Mail in the past couple of days that the Mail has seen the e-mails going back and forth, including one in which apology was made on the Monday.
Link to The Times article of Tuesday:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5645419.ece
David Vance said: BBC staff and guests mix in the Green Room. I have been in more than few, as a contributor, and am always wary. That said, I am no different off-air than on-air, unlike some of the two-faced political hypocrites who shared the space with me. Innocents have no place in a Green Room, they will be devoured. I have seen it.
Perhaps that is their function. You are wary while others are not. To be comfortable there and actively enjoy whatever delights these Green Rooms offer you’ve got to be one of them in mind and mouth.
Just as, say, few MPs bat eyelids at other MPs troughing obscene amounts at our expense – they are mostly cut from the same cloth.
As a lot of BBC programmes are made by independent production companies, I wonder if the cost of entertaining in these Green Rooms is met by individual programme budgets or by the BBC directly.
Isn’t ‘frog’ an ethnic slur? Why didn’t the beeb pick up on that? After all she called him a ‘frog gollywog’!
Probably because ‘frog’ refers to WHITE French people, and at the beeb you can insult white people as much as you want!
This ‘holier than thou’ finger pointing stinks of left-wing opportunism & hypocracy. Carol Thatchers comments were doubtless crass, but they were private, and an issue like this should have been addressed at the time by the people who profess to be insulted not by running to the Dept head. It’s childish!
Why would Carol Thatcher want to work for the BBC? She was just setting herself up for a fall.
I couldn’t help myself 🙂
Could Gael Monfils be the ‘Frog Golliwog’?
Judge for yourselves. #1; #2; #3
Fair comment?.
Considerably more buff than I can remember the stuffed soft toy from my childhood but what can you do with wool? 🙂
The road to dictatorship starts with ‘golliwog’ now lets see what they will ban next given the chance?
Play the white man.
Whtite mans burdon.
Fireman.
Policeman.
white Christmas.
White knight.
Black day.
Blackguard.
Black hearted.
Black as hells kettle.
Pot kettle black.
Black dog.
Then the PC fascists will really go to town with banning insults to polititians including revelations about misconduct, critisism of the government in any way.
Instant guilt, hate crimes, counter revolutionary activity, peoples enemies, workers tribunals, thought crimes, secret trials, informers, spies, agitators, night raids, book burning, re eductaion camps, work camps, death camps.
don’t be silly cassandra,
http://thealternativetake.blogspot.com/
Golly…er,Gosh!
I hope Carol Thatcher does sue, because it would be fun to see Jay Hunt and her fellows in court trying to explain why they fired her.
It looks like the Mail has seen the email exchanges about the apology, although not the apology itself. We also now know that the fascists apparently grasp the concept that “froggy” is meant in a humorous way, but not a “froggy golliwog”. Yet another double standard. If the player in question was Monfils, and not Tsongas, it’s kind of hard to get as freaked out about it. But I still say it’s bad manners, which ought to have been the BBC’s point. Except it wasn’t about the spirit of the law anymore.
So I keep coming back to the BBC’s demands for an apology. I’ve heard Jay Hunt’s own words, and seen her position and what Chiles has said in print. That doesn’t really help their case, since Chiles pretty much seems to portray Carol Thatcher as joking around (cf the Prince Harry remark – she knew what she was saying). We still don’t know what Thatcher’s actual apology was, but it would be amusing to hear it in court.
According to this, the BBC demanded that Thatcher admit that her comment was “completely unacceptable”. Hunt was saying that Thatcher kept trying to claim that she was joking and didn’t mean to be racist. That’s not an approved thought, and until she professed the correct thought, she was out of a job.
In the end, all parties come out looking like fools, as far as I’m concerned. But that’s no excuse for how this played out.
Nick the Greek,
Interesting blog, keep it up!
It cant happen here can it? after all this is a civilised country, a country of democratic values!
How many people have uttered those words or words like it? How many murderous dictatorships have started and flourished while good people looked on and did nothing, the Jews in Germany thought it could never happen, the majority of the SS/SD etc were highly educated people, doctors, philosphers, social workers, sicentists, the very people that organized the death camps were highly cultured and the elite of educated society, these were no street thugs with shaven heads and IQs in the low 60s!
You may see a shiny happy world where everyone is forced to act/think/talk in a pre approved way, you may see a nu world where the human spirit is crushed into a small pre determined box and you may think that is a good thing, many however do not, where you may see a new modern PC world others see a dark and nasty dictatorship called fascism.
See you in the cattle trucks eh?
what is so galling about the BBC`s conduct in the `Golligate` affair is their patronising attitude to black people.
Are black people insufficiently sophisticated to be able to gauge for themselves when they should and when they should not be offended? Clearly the BBC do not think so and must therefore feel black people as a race require protecting. They would never have banned Thatcher had she referred to Australians as `bluey` with corks round their hats clearly because they assume Australians can look after themselves.
I urge every black BBC employee to go into work wearing a golliwog badge simply to show as a race they`ve moved on and couldn`t care less
Aye, see you in the cattle-trucks darlin’
http://thealternativetake.blogspot.com/
Clarkson vs Brand
Why is that the BBC forced Jeremy Clarkson to apologise for a personal comment about Gordon Brown, but Jo Brand and others on QI could go on for ages making personal remarks about Lady Thatcher? AND QI was pre-recorded and could have been edited. Double standards again.
I agree. Very little happened after the Ross Thatcher incident as I recall?
http://thealternativetake.blogspot.com/
BBC News Magazine: “What if you had a racist friend? What do you say when a friend or colleague utters a remark that could be regarded as racist?
……..
Repeat after me “I used a word that is totally unacceptable” WTF do these BBC nazis think they are? Snitch on a friend. Denounce your neighbours, for incorrect thoughts. The good of the party must come first.
Apalling.Utterly unacceptable.This is 2009, not 1984. The BBC is out of control. It thinks it is news, not a reporter of news. Dumbed down entertainment crashes head on into social engineering. Vile people.
jon dee:
Re jon dee @ 3-08
For Childs read Chiles.
He remains sanctimonious and devious.
jon dee | 08.02.09 – 7:00 pm | #
I remember him doing a bbc slot on a museum in the US that had a great collection of gollywog material. The cameraman lingered over the US material in the glass cabinets. Chiles’ remarks on it at the time revealed his deep “hurt”. Are his remarks still on film?
johnj | 09.02.09 – 6:49 pm |
I don’t know about Adrian Chiles’ remarks then, but I do know that nobody should take posturing on ethics or morality seriously from somebody who cheats on his wife with his co-presenter.
I know that sort of dishonesty is tolerated at the BBC, though.
It’s speculation, doubt I doubt Chiles had much involvement other than to think “you f***ing dozy twat” and forget about it, which would be the obvious reaction to such a comment coming from a terminally dim and insulated imbecile like Carol. The blokeyness which made his career strikes me as genuine so I’m sure he’s pretty mortified by all the “horrified, apppalled, suicidal” reactions which have been attributed to him in the aftermath.
gordon-bennett | 08.02.09 – 10:01 pm
Any Questions audiences (unlike QT) are not recruited/assembled or whatever by the BBC, but by the host institution for each programme.
So, if the venue is the Royal Horticulture Society, then RHS members will be in the majority. If the venue is a school – parents and teachers of that school get preference etc.
The BBC does require the hosts, however, to make 15 tickets available to the local branch associations of each of the 3 main political parties (when in England) with appropriate variations in Scotland and NI.
I have seen no evidence of Chiles’ ‘deviousness’.
One man’s sanctimony is another’s concern for things he finds morally reprehensible.
He doesn’t like racism (he is mixed race himself being half Croatian).
He doesn’t like golliwogs, which he sees as being racist and insulting, even if you may disagree.
There is no credible suggestion he ‘informed’ on Carol Thatcher.
He has no record of trashtalking and insulting Margaret Thatcher.
Before his current populist self he was widely respected as knowing more about economic affairs than 99% of the BBC and worked on Working Lunch.
Yet like only the few of the BBC he just about managed to keep his common touch as ‘an ordinary bloke’
You are unjustifiably confusing him with Jo Brand by association, given he worked with Carol Thatcher he is just as legitimately associated with her.
I suggest you put up some evidence or give this line of argument up, it does not work.