Marr and Bragg sell themselves cheap as they allow their programmes to be hijacked to peddle the BBC’s political and cultural agendas.
This week Marr told us that his programme would be about national identity and generational conflict [the BBC seemingly keen to promote that] and that next week’s programme would be about the compulsion to build walls….no surprises there as to the main ‘culprits’…Trump, Israel and Brexit….
On Start the Week Kirsty Wark explores what it means to live either side of a wall, and whether barriers are built to repel or protect. Supporters of the US President urge him to ‘build a great wall’ along the Mexican border but the journalist Ed Vulliamy points out that there is already a wall and border guards, supported and funded by US Presidents for decades. And yet still drugs, guns, money and people continue to move north and south. Israel has been building its own separation barrier since the turn of the century, but Dorit Rabinyan is more interested in psychological barriers that drive Palestinians and Israelis apart. The map-maker Garrett Carr travels Ireland’s border to explore the smugglers, kings, peacemakers and terrorists who’ve criss-crossed this frontier, and asks what it will become when the United Kingdom leaves the EU.
Odd the BBC doesn’t mention the ‘peace walls’ in NI rather than the border which has no ‘wall’ at all….and look how it now admits there is a ‘wall’ already in the US…but only to tell us it doesn’t work. So how is Trump ‘racist’ for wanting to improve it?
Bragg’s programme frequently has an underlying message, a lesson or warning from history, as we are told the historical events parallel own today…..last weeks was a rehash of the usual line about the glories of the Muslim golden age of science. What a sell-out.
As a long time listener to “In our time,” I’ve noticed Melvyn’s regular comment on culture and history of ,”It all goes back to the Greeks,” being notably absent in the last year.
In place of the Classics now come obscure studies on little known muslim Scholars who we are told were much better than our own and did not at all make use of the knowledge created by the Greeks who came before them.
Not being content with propagagandising the present they also seek to re write the past.
So fake news or rather fake history from now on it appears.
In the programmes with an historical context Bragg is being much more interventionist in steering the discussions to the conclusions he wants. Some of the experts have to almost contradict themselves to come out with the statements he wants. He’s also very good at breaking the train of thought of anyone going in a direction he doesn’t like – often he then apologises for the intervention and invites the speaker to continue, but by then the point is lost.
His approach is very different if the topic being discussed is a modern scientific discovery – those programmes are presented by the old Bragg who only intervenes to move the discussion on.
What we should be asking these idiots that encourage us to build bridges rather than walls is a very simple question. Do you have a house… Why yes, of course. Do you have a garden… erm, yes. Do you have a fence or wall around your garden… yes but…
There’s no “but” about it. Even if you don’t have a garden then surely you’ll have a door that you lock otherwise your neighbors may encroach just a little, someone may just wander in and take what they want. That’s the bloody point – it’s been the point since the dawn of time. There’s nothing racist in wanting to protect what is yours or what you care about.
The BBC and their idiotic views just makes you sick.
We need walls…
We certainly need pay-walls …so those who believe the constant propaganda the Beeb churns out can pay for it , and those who don’t can make their own choice.
Repel or protect ?! Actually Al Beeb , the for a wall to work the former is to do the latter , otherwise it isn’t really a wall .
To give an example Beeboids , the EU customs wall repels unwanted products from entering this funny empire , and protects citizens and producers within it .
Who was it that said ; you lock your doors at night , not because you hate those outside , but you love those within ?
We should complain in the strongest terms about the BBC4 show last night 9pm on the South Downs. The presenter and the entire crew need, as a matter of urgency, to be sent on a retraining course. There were no ethnic minorities visible. There seemed to be no persons visible or interviewed other than English people. There were frequent references to old England and to English ways and English ancestors. It was that worst of things a genuine celebration of English patriotism The camera work was deplorable in as much as it showed the south country in all it’s splendour and failed to demonstrate the gritty nature of real city life which as we know is the only way to live.
How dare the BBC celebrate that most English of counties that is Sussex. How exclusive is that? And to end with that appalling poem by Belloc so redolent of the real Old England was enough to enrage the most placid of progressives and our dear snowflakes.
I was distraught at such wilful programme making.
Dave S,
As a Scot who was brought up in Surrey, I want to say how much I loved Sussex. The Downs, the villages , the people , the history and , yes, the South Downs !
I saw that Dave and thought the same. Even the bloody cliffs were white! What’s wrong with a bit of black basalt for a change and a bit of balance?