Yearly Archives: 2015

Yolande Knell is up to her usual tricks…demonising the Israelis with this story of their apparent wickedness…Susiya: Palestinian West Bank village faces bleak end

What she presents us with is a narrative designed to paint the Israelis in the worst possible light….she gives us the facts for sure…houses are being built without permits, but the whole spirit of the piece is to suggest it is all so unfair and just one more example of the Israelis persecuting Palestinians.

Contrast that with how the BBC reports illegally built homes in Egypt…Egypt’s illegal construction time bomb.  

In this report we hear that the illegal homes are death traps and the authorities are neglecting their duties by not demolishing these homes…despite the huge rate of homelessness in Egypt…..‘Nasser Darwish, a professor at the Structural Engineering Department of Alexandria University.  He estimates that in Alexandria, right now, there are hundreds of buildings with major structural flaws, about 170 of which are in danger of imminent collapse and need to be evacuated immediately and demolished.’

The BBC concentrates on the dangerous aspect of many buildings but many of the homes are not death traps but just built illegally, many, just as the Palestinian ones are, on farm land…

Farmers struggle to uphold property rights in land dispute with government

The morning of 20 November began with a rude awakening for Mahmoud Fathy, a resident of the Houd al-Musullas area, in the rural inland of the Montazah district of Alexandria.

Some neighbours came to the house and told him two bulldozers had begun demolishing a building down the street and that his home would be next.

The bulldozers and security forces were dispatched by the Endowments Authority, to demolish what it said was illegal construction.

“The residents showed security forces their ownership papers, but the police said they are not responsible and ‘you can appeal it in court’”, Fathy said.

A differently nuanced narrative about Egypt comes from Reuteurs which concentrates more on the reason why there are so many illegal buildings in Egypt and their illegality not just the dangerous nature of the buildings..

‘When an explosion in one of Cairo’s calmer residential areas reduced a five-story building to rubble, residents feared it was the work of suicide bombers.

Actually, authorities were dynamiting unlicensed buildings, even though millions of Egyptians are desperate for housing – a sensitive issue that the country’s new president will face….Officials say at least 450,000 of these buildings were constructed without permits in the past three years….

“After the revolution many people started to build on land that is not theirs … The housing crisis has made people desperate to buy property as soon as it is available,” said Ahmad, an agent who helps people find homes in Cairo.

“This is a real problem. People put their life savings in these housing units and then overnight they will find out that these apartments do not belong to them.”

‘

Whilst Knell’s story about Israel gets frontpage billing on the BBC and is also on the world page this story from the Mail is nowhere to be seen…

Amazing pictures show police destroying an entire TOWN including grocery stores and a nightclub that had sprung up to support illegal miners in the Peruvian rainforest

It’s in the Mirror, and the Telegraph as well.

How about in Azerbaijan?

Azerbaijan: Stop Forced Evictions, Illegal Demolitions

Or Spain?…

Retired Britons’ ‘illegal’ homes knocked down in Spain

Or how about Saudi Arabia in 2012?….

Saudi Grand Mufti calls for churches to be destroyed

The Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia has called for all churches in the Arabian peninsula to be destroyed.

The Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia is not some marginal figure, rather he is the chief religious authority of the Saudi Kingdom, and Saudi Arabia is one of the leading countries in the Sunni Muslim world. The Mufti’s words will surely be taken seriously by many. We ought to take them seriously too.

Or how about Saudi Arabia in 2015?….

Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti wants churches destroyed

This is the Grand Mufti talking. It is not some bearded loon, or some fringe extremist, but rather the chief religious authority of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, home to the two holy mosques and so on. So this man speaks with authority. It is as if the Archbishop of Canterbury had spoken.

The Grand Mufti is appointed by the Saudi government. The Saudis are allies of us Brits and the Americans.

Why the BBC fascination with a small, illegal village?  Is it coz it’s the wicked old Israelis beating up on the defenceless Palestinians again as the BBC would like us to believe?

John Redwood asks ‘Why does the BBC ignore England?’ and why does it instead seek to promote the European project of regionalising, and diminishing, the UK?

Actually the web link says ‘Why does the BBC hate England?’, which is probably about right.

Here are his thoughts…

When the Culture Secretary gave his statement on the future of the BBC, I spoke for England. I asked if we could have a BBC England to match BBC Scotland? I pointed out that many of us do not want a BBC seeking to split up our country and trying to foster artificial senses of regional identity. As we move towards more England only decision making at Westminster, we need a BBC England news to cover it.

I will submit further evidence to the review to show the need for BBC England. My area is lumped into BBC South, so we see a lot of news stories about seaside resorts all along the south coast that have nothing to do with inland Wokingham. Meanwhile, we have to switch to BBC London to see things going on 20 miles down the road that are of more relevance to us. My part of the world is variously called Thames Valley, Rest of the south east, the south, London and the south east, the home counties, the three counties (Bucks,Berks and Oxon), and mid Berkshire. No wonder there is no great sense of regional loyalty, when there are so many differing boundaries and descriptions, and when none of these places have sports teams, Councils or representative figures to speak for them. There is no Head of the Thames Valley (apart from the Chief Constable)or First Minister of the south – I am pleased to say – and no Mayor of the three counties or Lord Lieutenant of the Home Counties.

In my area people relate to the UK, to England, and to Wokingham Borough or West Berkshire. There is also a loyalty to the royal county even though it has no Council. The County does have sports teams, ceremonial events and various dignitaries and its own historic sense of identity.

The BBC needs to work with the senses of identity that people feel. England is increasingly aware of itself and of its needs and abilities. The BBC is not even struggling to catch up. The BBC seems determined to cling to old twentieth century ideas of balkanising England and helping the EU split us into regions which mean nothing to us.

‘The BBC Charter and Agreement expressly allows the acceptance of funding from the profits of BBC Worldwide and other BBC commercial services, funding from the Open University for appropriate programming and online services, and co-productions. ‘

 

The BBC’s main defence of its raison d’être is that it is a resource for all the creative industries of the UK without which that industry would wither and die…or at least wilt considerably.

However BBC Worldwide is fully commercial and provides the BBC with a good chunk of its funding, and then there’s the BBC studios and post production facilities, also a fully commercialised subsidiary of the BBC, which works hand in hand with those creative production companies to produce their ‘award winning’ content…

Creating and preserving award-winning content

We work with media companies to create and manage award-winning content across all genres for a wide range of platforms and broadcasters, including ITV, Channel 4 and Sky, as well as the BBC.

From providing best in class HD TV studios and innovative post production workflows to industry leading digital media services, distributing, managing and adding value to content.

We are flexible in our approach and work with projects of all shapes and sizes.

As a fully owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, our teams have a deep understanding of programme making and media handling.

Talented experts are at the heart of our operation and can guide and advise you through the whole process.

Much BBC content is actually produced in partnership with other commercial broadcasters, the film about the Mississippi posted earlier was made in partnership with Discovery Channel which really invalidates the claim that no other broadcaster would produce the range and quality of programmes that the BBC does….other broadcasters are just as interested in, and capable of producing, unique, interesting, high quality programmes.

When it is a ‘fully owned commercial subsidary of the BBC’ that is generating work for the creative industries that pretty much negates the claim that the licence funded BBC is the sole institution that is capable of being the main generator of that creativity….especially when the commercial BBC Worldwide actually provides so much of the BBC’s funding and the Open University also pays into the BBC for its educational services….so again not from the licence fee.

Mike Cunningham, one of my fellow writers on A Tangled Web posted this review of the BBC Today programme this morning and I wanted to share.

“This morning, courtesy of the BBC’s Toady (sorry) Today Programme; we were treated, if that is the appropriate term, to selective segments of propaganda disguised as news items; I term them ‘propaganda’ because only one side of an argument is given or portrayed; with absolutely no chance of a considered discussion, especially from opponents of whatever subject is being discussed. They ranged from an impassioned critique of an EU Commission proposal to harmonise Wildlife protection measures; to the maundering pronunciations of a Lame-duck US President on why the United Kingdom must remain wedded to the European Union.

• A five minute report on the evils of gambling in Australia, and how awful it was, and all that compulsion, ‘n everything: innit?
• We heard how Prez. Barack Hussein Obama is heading back to his (Partly) ancestral homeland of Kenya, and how excited he was to speak of the ‘entrepeneurs’ who were enlivening the Kenyan business culture: and we then heard from two of Kenya’s ‘business elite’ about how successful they were, and it was all due to capitalism; or sleight of hand, or something ( No mention of the billions stolen by the larcenous Kenyan governments; but thats all because ‘boys will be boys’, and that).
• Some RSPB woman commenced  an impassioned critique of an EU Commission proposal to harmonise Wildlife protection measures; and how it was all wrong, and the birds were all doomed, and it was just terrible!
• A Sutton Trust spokeswoman declared that ‘social mobility’ was at risk because Academy schools in England were unable to improve the results of their ‘disadvantaged’ students. No mention was made of two facts which may impinge on those same results: it was possible that the whole idea of ‘Comprehensive education’ was actually ‘shit’ and; the other possibility was that the kids were either uninterested, or just plain thick!
• We were told that Chris Froome, a cyclist, was believed to be loading up with high-performance chemicals and drugs during the ‘Tour de France’, which I discovered was a form of mental torture for millions of fat Frenchmen who just could not get over the fact that yet another Englishman was beating the crap out of their fellow countrymen.
• Glaxo SmithKline informed us all that they had discovered a vaccine for malaria, but it would only be suitable for kids over one year old. It was also implied that, because the African countries where malaria was endemic were very, very, poor; lots of liberal idiots believed that GSK should give this vaccine away, despite this medication costing literally tens of millions to invent and produce, and GSK should not be allowed, under any circumstances, to actually make a profit!
• Obama featured once more, in an interview in the White House (oh how they must hate that name) and stated that Great Britain must stay in the European Union, becozz its such a good place, and becozz of ‘trade’, and becozz of the UK’s former lap-dog approach to America’s military adventures; spoiled only by our blunt refusal to bomb Syria’s Assad.
• We were then told of the dicovery of a planet named ‘Kepler-452b’ and how it was just possible that life may exist outside our Solar System, and how exciting this was, and how squillions more money was needed for more ‘research’, and telescopes, and things like that!
• Some bloke then was interviewed about some snake, or it may have been a lizard, which had lived some hundred million years ago, which had been re-discovered in some museum in Germany; which was ‘dead interesting’ and also exciting; or something.
• The NHS also featured, and we were told how Emergency Care  stuff and things were gonna’ get better, but not, unfortunately; for a long, long time; probably about the same length of time as the snake’s remains had been in the museum!

Here you go, a NEW Open Thread to see us off into the weekend! Hope you are enjoying the new environment, once we all settle in I think it will be great! Detail the bias here please.

Is anyone surprised that Obama – the lame duck inhabitant of the White House – should choose the BBC to give his edict to the British people that we should stay mired in the EU? I was on BBC London this morning and pointed out that it was a disgrace that Obama used a willing BBC to subvert the likely outcome of the EU referendum in 2017 – when he will not even be President. I am sure that Cameron was aware Obama was going to use the power of the BBC to get this pro-EU message out – and this is the sort of instance where the BBC can suit the PM as he angles to keep us locked IN the failing bankrupt inept EU.

We spend most of our time making criticisms of the BBC, that being the nature of this site, but in an indulgent break from that here’s a film from the BBC that is a showcase for the brilliant material that it can produce……Mississippi: Tales of the Last River Rat

‘An intimate and poetic portrayal of wildlife along the Upper Mississippi River – seen through the eyes of Kenny Salwey; a beguiling backwoodsman, storyteller and philosopher of nature, who has lived his life in a log cabin, a stone’s throw from the water’s edge.

This film is a sumptuous evocation of the outstanding natural beauty of one of America’s most iconic rivers – a story that focuses on the plants and animals closest to the narrator’s heart. Country blues combined with wild tracks recorded on location add an authentic atmosphere to the story of Kenny Salwey’s deep, almost spiritual connection to the mighty Mississippi.’

I saw this fim years ago and have never seen it since until I eventually dug it up on YouTube (It’s in 5 parts…50 minutes total)….

The BBC seems to have forgotten all about this magnificent little film with its great music, wildlife photography and narration, and haven’t even produced a DVD for the series as far as I can see.

Maybe they’ll rectify that one day…..judging by the reviews it’s surprisng the films have been forgotten…

Reviews

Nancy Banks-Smith, The Guardian
Kenny himself is one of those flowers who are born to bloom unseen unless they are spotted by a sympathetic producer and poetic photographer. (I had never noticed before how water behaves on a duck’s back. It rolls around like mercury.) As the producer’s name, Andrew Graham-Brown, suggests, this is a British production.

Radio Times
…..it’s probably the most languorously beautiful film you’ve seen for sometime. There’s a poetic quality about Andrew Graham-Brown’s film….

Judy Adamson, The Sydney Morning Herald
If it were possible to give two upward thumbs, this documentary would easily earn the extra kudos…. Before long you’re completely drawn in to his world and you feel a real pull of regret when the program ends and you have to leave.

The Observer
In terms of natural history film making this is an outstanding programme.

The Guardian
….an exquisitely filmed documentary….

Royal Television Society
Stunningly beautiful and poetic photography …. Sensuous and languid, the remarkable footage captured all the moods of the river at all times of day and year. Often complex filming techniques never got in the way of the subject or mood of the piece. This was a near-perfect piece of natural history filming.

And as a bonus here’s a short film that I saw whilst hunting down the one above…

The BBC has different narratives for different religions…..Whilst they insist that Islam is a religion of peace despite wars around the world in the name of that religion the BBC, in order to defend Islam, tries to paint other religions as violent in nature thereby trying to make Islam appear no more strange and dangerous than say Christianity or Buddhism…..

‘Historically, Buddhism has been no more a religion of peace than Christianity.’

The problem is that neither Christianity nor Buddhism are inherently violent, neither of their sacred texts demand their followers kill non-believers whereas the Islamic Koran does demand that Muslims fight and kill non-believers and those who threaten Islam’s dominance.

Anyone who has followed the BBC’s reporting closely about events concerning Muslims knows that the BBC plays down, or completely denies, any connection with violence to the Islamic religion.  The BBC does not want you knowing that there is a problem with Islam because once you know that you might start asking for a solution to that problem.

An example of the BBC’s narrative of violence from other religions with Muslims as innocent victims is their reporting of events in Burma….as linked to above where they tell us that Buddhism is a religion of violence.

Here is another report from Burma that perfectly illustrates the BBC mind at work as the reporter turns Muslims into victims at the hands of Buddhist war mongers…..’Buddhist mobs’ as the reporter suggests.

It’s a very one sided tale…the Buddhist claims of Muslim violence dismissed as rumour and misinformation…

‘Rakhine Buddhists have a different story to tell. They repeat the accounts spread by word of mouth or through internet sites of gruesome Muslim atrocities, and occasionally bring out blurry photographs of mutilated corpses.’

What the reporter fails to emphasise is that the Muslims have been fighting a Jihad against the Burmese for over 70 years in order to annex this part of Burma to create a Muslim state, and indeed proclaimed one in 2012.  He alludes to a massacre in 1942 but fails to be more explicit and explain that the Muslims killed 20,000 Buddhists in one attack and have been on that Jihad ever since….we know that the Muslims have been linking up with the Taliban and that outside Muslims have come to Burma to fight the Buddhists….

‘The long decades of isolation and chronic injustice imposed by Burma’s military rulers have left prejudice and resentment in Rakhine state to ferment into a poisonous climate of mistrust and misinformation.

Some Rakhine hark back to massacres in 1942, amid the chaos of the British withdrawal from the advancing Japanese imperial army. Back then Buddhist men often supported the Japanese-sponsored militia forces, while Rohingyas backed the British. Some go back even further, to the glorified memory of a powerful, independent Buddhist kingdom in Rakhine from the 15th to the 18th Century.’

It is an interesting exercise to compare the BBC’s reporting of the conflict in Burma where we have an ‘interloper’ Muslim minority surrounded by the majority Buddhist native population with that between Israel and the Muslims surrounding them.

In Burma the British colonialists imported Bengali Muslims to work in Burma and many came as illegal immigrants….the Burmese Buddhists have never recognised the immigrants as citizens.  The Muslims are now fighting that ‘Jihad’ to establish their own state by annexing part of Burma.

The BBC’s reporting is very definitely a one sided bit of cheerleading for the Muslim ‘victims’.

Contrast that with Israel where once again the Muslims are considered the victims…once again the British were involved giving the nod to a Jewish homeland, subsequently endorsed and legitimated by the UN.   The Muslims in Burma have no such legitimate claim to a state.

Israel has not been attacking but has been under attack for 70 years by the majority Muslim population surrounding it, not just the Palestinians.

However, whilst Israel’s and the Burmese Muslim positions might seem to bare some comparison the BBC  sides with the Muslims in this conflict with Israel….on that basis the BBC should be supporting the Buddhists as they defend their land against a group of religiously inspired insurgents (Muslim Zionists?) who want to take over part of Burma….will the Muslim jihadists in Burma claim to be the new Jews of Asia as they claim to be the new Jews of Europe whilst ironically they persecute those same Jews?

It seems that whatever the circumstances the BBC’s default position is to promote the Muslim narrative of being the victims whereas in both cases it is the Muslims who are attacking….you may say that Israel has imposed itself upon ‘Palestinian’ land but firstly, as stated, the UN created Israel and the Bengali Mulsims have no historic claim to Burma as the Jews might to some of Palestine; and secondly, the UN at the same time also set up Pakistan as a Muslim state, annexing part of India in a move that resulted in a million deaths and millions of people being expelled from what is now ‘Pakistan’.  If you object to Israel then you must object to Pakistan…a state which is a sponsor of terrorism, a state that has 300 terrorist training camps inside its borders, a state that set up the Taliban and used them to try and annex Afghanistan….never mind Pakistan’s own internal religious persecution of its minorities….and what of Jordan carved out of Palestinian land just as Israel was?  Where are the objections to that State?

Just as the BBC has ignored the Muslim massacre of orthodox Christians in Bosnia just before the massacre at Srebrenica it ignores the jihad being fought by the Muslim ‘immigrants’ in Burma.  Both crucial bits of history that put a different perspective on the narratives being peddled by those with an axe to grind about Muslim ‘victimhood’.

That claimed ‘victimhood’ is a valuable currency…it puts pressure on the media, on politicians and on the public, it gains the Muslim community enormous political influence and money to rectify that ‘victim’ status and the second objective of this tactic is to silence the critics of Islamic practices by claiming that this criticism leads to Islamophobia, hate crimes and racism and yet more of that ‘victimhood’.

That’s why its important to challenge the claims that Muslims are under siege or being demonised and marginalised….all false claims but ones made for political, social and cultural advantage, ones that they know few politicians will ignore because they always have to look like they are doing ‘something’….or ironically face claims of ignoring and marginalising the Muslim community.  They also know that elements of the Media will give them enormous amounts of supportive and favourable commentary which is designed to back up their line.

And that’s where we come in.

Amused to hear Peter Allen saying he was going to devote the last part of his programme to the Labour Party….sure he didn’t mean that.

They were of course talking  about the ‘car crash’ Labour leadership election and one subject came up was the #toriesforcorbyn windup.  A Tory voting caller told Allen that he was going to vote for Corbyn…Allen said that he strongly disapproved and that this was very undemocratic…it would damage democracy.

Hmmm….how about the most influential media organisation in the UK, the BBC, siding with Labour year after year?….or Murdoch siding with Labour for 12 years?  Seemed pretty hunky dory then…at least until the Sun switched to the Tories and Brown declared war on Murdoch.  Isn’t that ‘war’ also undemocratic, usng the forces of government to smash a free press that doesn’t support you now?

I wonder what Allen thinks of the Guardian and Polly Toynbee…does he similarly disapprove or does he reserve his contempt just for the Tories?….here’s the Guardian’s idea of how to manipulate democracy……

How to vote tactically: a no-guarantees guide to gaming the election

Britain’s rotten electoral system means that once again it’s nose-peg time

Under first-past-the-post Labour, Greens and Lib Dems will have to vote-swap to keep the Tories out.

Talking tactics brings politics into disrepute and disgusts young voters with its calculating cynicism. But that’s what our rotten system demands: head not heart. For those in seats where they know following their heart helps Cameron into Downing Street, vote-swapping is an option that lets them register heartfelt politics while using their head to block the brutality of Conservative plans.

The new vote-swap site already has 100,000 voters signed up – with no publicity. This year vote-swappers could make all the difference.

So Polly Toynbee knows tactical voting is disreputable but is prepared to look away if it gets in the Party she wants to win…head not heart.

Which brings us to Lord Prescott being interviewed by Humphrys this morning (08:10) about Blair’s comment that people voting with their heart for Corbyn need a heart transplant.  Apparently this was ‘totally unacceptable abuse’ …can’t see the problem myself.  If Blair thinks Corbyn’s policies are wildly wrong and damaging and people are thinking of voting for him solely on the basis of a warm and cuddly feeling then perhaps they do need a change of heart….utopian policies that do more damage than good are not in any way admirable…just delusional.  Humphrys made no case for Bair’s defence.

Prescott’s not beyond a bit of personal abuse himself…

John Prescott: You’d have to be a plonker to vote for a Del Boy Prime Minister like dodgy David Cameron

A prime plonker not a prime minister.

Isn’t he calling voters who vote for Cameron ‘plonkers’?  Not really any different in substance to saying voters need a heart transplant if they vote for Corbyn.

How about when he declared Cameron a coward...’John Prescott was among the first to spring into the Twittersphere, branding Cameron a “coward” who knew Miliband would “wipe the floor with him”.’

Prescott seems to have a problem with demcocracy and free speech where people voice their opinions…if their opinons differ from his that is…here’s what he thought David Miliband should do…‘He should shut up.’

Yep, very democratic….I guess being a ‘Lord’ has gone to Prescott’s head.

It was amusing to hear Prescott advising Blair, the man who won three elections, on how to win elections…apparently the Iraq war was the cause of Labour losing voters in 2015…hmm…..how about 2005?  Wasn’t it Labour that won that election?  The invasion of Iraq being in 2003.  Margaret Beckett was right about Prescott. Humphrys said nothing but then again he doesn’t have a good record on comments aout Iraq…and the BBC’s standard response to any world problem is that the Iraq war caused it.  Well it certainly finished the career of Greg Dyke at the BBC.

Prescott claims that we should all be talking about policies not being abusive…which is why he spent so much of an interview on the BBC’s prime current affairs programme talking not about policies but about abuse and then spending a good chunk more of it abusing Tony Blair.  Prescott can’t even remember Liz kendall’s name.

Prescott claimed that the polls indicating Corbyn was in the lead were a Murdoch conspiracy…Humphrys didn’t raise an objection…despite the first such poll being reported by the lefty bible, the New Statesman, only a week ago….

Jeremy Corbyn “on course to come top” in the Labour leadership election

For as long as I can remember, the BBC has been to the fore in questioning the Bible, the authenticity of the New Testament etc. But when it comes to the Koran, why it’s a different story as Robert Spencer addresses here.

“The BBC announced enthusiastically Wednesday that “what may be the world’s oldest fragments of the Koran have been found by the University of Birmingham.” This news is not only of interest to scholars and Muslim intellectuals; it appears to buttress the Islamic claim that the Qur’an’s text has remained unchanged for 1,400 years – which is purported to be proof of its divine origin.

There is only one problem with all this: the BBC article raises more questions than it answers, and reveals more about the wishful thinking of the academic and media establishments than it does about the Qur’an.”