A survey conducted among 24,000 schoolkids by the BBC (clearly the frenzied cuts message has not yet got through the thick skulls of those at the corporation who so liberally spend out money) has found that 49% of them rate climate change as the second biggest threat facing humanity. Confirmation for the boys and girls at the BBC, if it were needed, that their daily alarmism is working a treat – Hitler was not alone in targetting youth.
If that’s not enough, there’s another nice scarefest wheeze afoot – the BBC’s very own climate change game. I kid you not. They’ve spent God knows how much of our money devising it, and this is how it is introduced:
Why make a game about climate change?
Currently there is a growing consensus amongst climate researchers that Earth’s climate is changing in response to manmade greenhouse gas emissions. The main debate amongst scientists is focussed on the amount of climate change we can expect, not whether it will happen. With the current level of debate in mind, the BBC decided a game might be a good introductory route into climate change and some of the issues this creates for governments around the world.
The producers’ primary goal was to make a fun, challenging game. At times it was necessary to strike a compromise between strict scientific accuracy and playability. For this reason, Climate Challenge should not be taken as a serious climate change prediction.
It goes on – seriously folks! – using such liberal dollops of cod science, vapid generalisation and crass misinformation. And it also betrays the BBC mindset in all this. They are actually playing a huge propaganda game with us in which they treat us all like morons. The most vulnerable and impressionable in our society – our kids – are the victims of this horrendous, vicious scam. How many of them lie awake in their beds worrying at night because of BBC climate lies?
As part of its ‘Inside BBC Journalism’ series the BBC College of Journalism has made a short film with documentary maker Martin Small to explain the role of a documentary producer. He talks a bit about the technical side of things, about creating a storyline and turning “a journalistic story into a dramatic story” through “all kinds of dramatic devices” (I think we know what he means there – e.g. the playing of scary-sounding music to signpost bad things such as climate sceptics or an Israeli flag.)
The college’s website also provides a transcript [pdf] of its interview with Small, and it’s amusing to note that his final piece of advice didn’t make the film:
It is only television, and somebody once said to me: ‘If a bus driver fails to turn up to work one morning it’s really, really inconvenient, and bad news for the people standing at the bus stop. They may get very wet; they may get very cold; they may turn up to work late; they may get in trouble with their bosses. But if you make a television programme which isn’t perfect, never mind, there’s one on after you.‘
Evidently someone at the BBC College thought that particular insight was better left on the cutting room floor.
I have not until now commented on the BBC’s coverage of Fukushima. The reason is that the safety of nuclear plants is a fearsomely complex subject, as I discovered many years ago when I covered for the BBC parts of the endless inquiry into the Windscale station. Even the experts were bamboozled by the evidence and obfuscation that went on.
But it’s becoming pretty clear now that, short of highly unusual new developments, what is happening at Fukushima falls far short of nuclear catastrophe. Far more important in human terms is the immense suffering that the Japanese are enduring in consequence of the tsunami itself. They have lost their homes during a bitterly cold winter and thousands are being forced to take shelter wherever they can, including in the compounds of nuclear power stations. And ironically, one of the biggest hardships they face is lack of power.
But nothing will stop the BBC in its greenie crusade. For the newsroom, Fukushima continues mostly to be an opportunity for full-scale anti-nuclear propaganda. Never mind the suffering, let’s focus on Armageddon. Yesterday, for example, Chris Hogg excitedly led a scarefest report with the news that radiation levels off the Japanese coast are at 1,250 times safety limits. Shock, horror, hold the front page, let’s evacuate everyone. Mr Hogg then goes on to amplify his alarmism by larding the piece with words like “unpredictable” and news of people being taken to hospital. The tone is undisguised hatred of nuclear power.
The place for such garbage should be the spike. Here, Anthony Watts explains why. First the radiation levels involved are well within safety limits, second, a nuclear plant that is 40 years hold has survived being battered at a level higher than it was ever predicted, and third the real story of Fukushima is the humanitarian distress.
To be fair, some at the BBC are not happy with this flagrant alarmism. The fragrant Fiona Fox of the alarmist Science Media Centre here warns on the BBC College of Journalism site that much of the reporting of Fukushima has been overblown. But as Ms Fox is a partner-in-crime for most of the green frenzy at the BBC, it’s definitely a pot/kettle/black lament.
As David Vance notes below, Nicky Campbell is continuing the BBC pro-riot love-in today. Here (scroll down to find the dedicated comment piece), Peter Hitchens explains how the anti-cuts frenzy party began on Friday night and continued at fever pitch through the Today programme with BBC “presenters” excitedly looking forward to the action ahead. Says Peter:
The atmosphere of much of its coverage was what might have been found in a Left-wing London household as Granny got out her old Aldermaston marching shoes, the head of the household dusted off his anti-Thatcher placards and the children dressed excitedly for their first demo.
Shame the BBC could not find room for a reality check like this, which puts the feeble Cleggeron cuts into their true, left-wing perspective.
Nicky Campbell’s Big Question programme looks to be a rich treat this morning; Up for discussion “Is it time to squeeze the rich?” (Does that include BBC presenters, Nicky?) Lots of clerics on to attack the banks. Then, “Should creationism ever be taught in schools” (There’s a Church of England cleric who thinks it is akin to child abuse to do so and a Muslim who home-schools to be able to teach creationism, nice bit of BBC positioning there) Finally “Should you only tick the box about religion if you go to church” in the Census?
I’m sure everyone here will remember the BBC’s official position during the Egyptian democracy protests, before Mubarak (to his eternal credit, in my view) stepped down, which was that the Muslim Brotherhood is, in fact, “moderate”. Frank Gardener was on air several times saying that the group was “moderate”, and Jeremy Bowen even wrote online that the group was both “conservative” and “moderate”, until he got caught and stealth-edited out the “moderate” bit. (I saw the original myself, and made a comment here at the time, but unfortunately did not take a screen shot.)
A reminder of the BBC’s Narrative on the Muslim Brotherhood:
Through the Ikhwanophobia website, the Brotherhood’s sympathisers aggressively attempt to refute criticisms of the group and to show the world what they consider to be “the true face of moderate Islamists”.
The Muslim Brotherhood is vying to become an official party in post-Mubarak Egypt. The conservative Islamist views of some of the group’s members scare many in Egypt and the West, but, as Tim Whewell has been finding out, many members, particularly young activists, are much more moderate.
With all this in mind, it’s no surprise that the BBC is not mentioning the Muslim Brotherhood or fundamentalist Islam or their influence on the military in things which detract from the Narrative. I didn’t notice the MB complaining about the following incident. I thought they were advocates of freedom and democracy. Or does the BBC consider this kind of thing to be “moderate”, too? Egyptian women protesters forced to take ‘virginity tests’
A leading rights group says the Egyptian army arrested, tortured and forced women to take “virginity tests” during protests earlier this month.
Notice that, while the Egyptian Army has been known during the Mubarak regime to crack down on anti-Government agitators, this is entirely different. The BBC, naturally, is placing blame exclusively on the army, and pointing out problems in the past to spin it away, nothing to do with the new changes in attitude. Granted, the sub-editor is essentially copying and pasting from Amnesty’s own website, but that’s no excuse. It’s not Amnesty’s job to inform people about the larger context, but it is – in theory – the BBC’s.
This happened after Mubarak stepped down, not before. It’s a different type of crackdown entirely. Making sure that protesters are virgins is not the same thing as cracking down on protests. This didn’t happen during the anti-Mubarak protests, but only after Egypt’s top brass asked a member of the Muslim Brotherhood to rewrite the country’s laws on personal freedom. Or does the BBC think this is “moderate” behavior as well?
I know that you are talking about this on the Open Thread but I spent a few minutes suffering the BBC coverage of the Denialists parade through our Capital city. Talks about bias! The BBC is openly doing everything possible to hype this up, whoring themselves to the comrades in the Trade Unions. Perhaps you might like to post your thoughts on the rolling coverage here? The BBC reporters appear ENTHUSED as they facilitate the Tory-bashing assembled leftist masses. Heard Ed Balls been given unfettered time to attack the Conservatives and re-write Labour’s central role in helping bring about the deficit that these assembled fools deny.
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