By clicking Publish you indemnify B-BBC and accept full legal responsibility for your comments
Ultraviolents:
An excellent video about the evil BBCs bias
jones:
come on uv - you are a troll
Ultraviolents:
no im not
moonbat nibbler:
This report is still a whitewash: "its coverage of conventional politics is judged to be fair and impartial"
While the support for Geldof and Bono is sickly, simplified and unquestioning at least it is well meant. Compare this to the African news output. Al-queda in Somalia are admired for bringing "law and order" to the country. Bbc viewers and listeners are not educated about Darfur because it would mean using the "M" word, show China in a bad light and reveal the structural irrelevance of the UN. This Bbc report sees Live 8 and the culture of celebrity as an easy, non-threatening, scapegoat. It is being used to hide the insidious, ugly and evil bias of the BBC.
Dave:
I doubt anything will change at the corporation. The report will be publicised, there'll be the usual speechifying from BBC-types about the importance of high standards and impartiality and then ... it'll be back to business as usual.
I think legislation is the only way to force change on the BBC. It can't happen internally because those in the corporation who might actually be in favour are not in a strong enough position to do anything about it. At the very least more recruits (many, many more) who don't come from the arts pages of The Guardian need to be hired. How can the BBC even begin to contempate that unless it is legally compelled too? The answer is they won't. The liberal groupthink at the BBC will fight like hell to retain power.
DumbJon:
What everyone else said.
The BBC produces these reports about once a year. They acknowledge bias in something that's been and gone, but always claim that there's no wider conclusions that can be drawn, no endemic problem with their culture and all their critics are still mad.
It's nearly 25 years since the BBC spiked 'The Falklands Play', but here we are again:
http://pubphilosopher.blogs.com/
...illedoff_a.html
Anonanon:
Re Bono - a little reminder that the members of U2 aren't the only celebs who abandoned Ireland when it changed its tax laws:
"JOHN SIMPSON, the BBC's foreign editor, spent seven years in Ireland as a tax exile. He returned to the UK recently. While there he wrote three books."
http://news.independent.co.uk/
uk...ticle316369.ece (scroll down)
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Maybe people should actually read the report when it comes out tommorow rather than swallowing whole what the Sunday papers have written about it.
Richard Tait is not a "BBC insider". He's a BBC Trustee - and says:
"The report is unlikely to satisfy those critics who believe the BBC's editorial 'centre of gravity' is wrong."
AndrewSouthLondon:
Where can we find the full text of this review rather than the snippets fed us by The Times?
The report siezed on the Live8 issue, knowing that "its been and gone", and because who is going to articulate the case FOR world povery? I mean who's going to say "let 'em starve, its the only way to stop them breeding. Oh an AIDS is natures way of saying "enough"? Nice safe fault to have, the BBC, wanting to end poverty.
And what does report say of the BBCs news output outside the UK - sucking up to arab opinion in an effort to overtake Al Jazira as the world's favourite news source.
I'll believe change when they stop placing all job ads in the Guardian - the main future source of liberal-bigotry. Perhaps they will start placing them just in the Independent to spite us all.
max:
Maybe people should actually read the report when it comes out tommorow rather than swallowing whole what the Sunday papers have written about it.
Fair enough. Any reason why people sholdn't be allowed to read the Balen report and make up their own minds about its content?
PJF:
"Maybe people should actually read the report when it comes out tommorow rather than swallowing whole what the Sunday papers have written about it."
Quite right, Nick. And perhaps you'd like to take the opportunity to offer "people" similar advice not to swallow whole what the BBC has written about itself.
.
K:
The contents of the report are irrelevant. All that matters is that millions of people will hear BBC and bias in the same sentence.
Although I don't think we're at the tipping point yet, eventually enough people will assume that the institution is so riddled with left-wing bias such that the question will not be over whether such bias exists but what to do about it.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Andrew - hopefully you will find the report on the BBC Trust's website tommorow.
And the BBC regularly places job adverts in places other than the Guardian.
PJF - the BBC is by law obliged to be impartial. Impartial about everything including itself. It's very difficult to be impartial about yourself but we have to try. The Sunday Papers are under no such obligation. So I would of course use my own judgement about what the BBC says about itself. But I tend to find what the BBC says about itself is usually more accurate, let alone more impartial, than what the papers say.
Anonanon:
"The report is unlikely to satisfy those critics who believe the BBC's editorial 'centre of gravity' is wrong."
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 17.06.07 - 6:18 pm
Which suggests the question: "Where does Richard Tait believe the BBC's editorial centre of gravity should be?"
Dong:
In Friday’s R4 Feedback Bowen when discussing Middle East coverage said that since Israel considers herself western-style democracy with free press etc it is judged by higher standards i.e. he did not deny that in relation to Israel his standards are different or - self-admittedly – he employs double standards.
callmedave:
The Sunday Papers are under no such obligation. So I would of course use my own judgement about what the BBC says about itself. But I tend to find what the BBC says about itself is usually more accurate, let alone more impartial, than what the papers say.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 17.06.07
......................................
from the sunday times...
all media organisations are biased and that applies especially to newspapers. But our bias is openly declared. If readers want different views they have no compulsion to pay and can go elsewhere.The BBC is in a different category; everyone has to pay for it and it is in the tricky position of being founded to be free from bias.
K:
Nick Reynolds (BBC)
I think you need a new straw man. The calumny of the press isn't the issue. The issue is the very real and pernicious bias in the BBC's coverage towards America, Israel and and Islamic extremism. I would be happy to pay the licence fee for both your arts and the rest of your factual programming. But we are in a war where our principal allies are America and Israel and our principal enemies are muslim (absent the appearance of buddhist suicide bombers). And the BBC is ruthlessly dishonest about both, so I guess that's kinda impartial. It's plain wrong that I am forced to visit sites like this, Fox, Hot Air or Jerusalem Post just to discover positive developments in Iraq or what's really happening in the West Bank or even the Scooter Libby case.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 17.06.07 - 7:32 pm:
You say:
... the BBC is by law obliged to be impartial. Impartial about everything including itself. It's very difficult to be impartial about yourself but we have to try. The Sunday Papers are under no such obligation.
I agree with you. However, there exists a case study to which so far no-one has provided an explanation, which, on the face of it, constitutes proof that the BBC is not impartial but is in fact institutionally biased and even bigoted.
The case study concerns the BBC's failure to assess the merits, and, having done so, then report the findings of an independent investigation into the political controversy which, according to the BBC, "helped bring down the last Conservative government."
This controversy - the "Neil Hamilton Cash for Questions affair" – had been investigated by two NW freelance journalists - one of whom represented Granada TV for best NW News reporter of the Year. They concluded that the newspaper which authored and drove the story, The Guardian, had perverted the official inquiry into the affair by submitting forged documents and perjurious witness statements.
So, clearly, if these two freelances are to be believed, this is an issue of immense national importance.
So, I have a question for you: Do you accord with the refusal of the BBC's director-general Mark Thompson and his deputy Mark Byford to accede to requests to instigate an assessment of this evidence in order to establish its merits? (An initial appraisal would take half an hour or so).
Casandrina:
After some 7 years the BBC culture is well entrenched, and I suspect the new trustees have neither the courage nor the skills to bring about the needed changes in what is the most opaque public funded institution in the UK.
PJF:
"...the BBC is by law obliged to be impartial."
Nick, is it fears of legal repurcussions that makes the BBC so reluctant to release the Balen report? I ask because you didn't reply to max's question that came right between Andrew's and mine, which you did so kindly answer.
.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
It's the little things that give the BBC's institutional Leftist bias away... From today's Sunday Telegraph Magazine's profile of Newsnight Political Editor Michael Crick:
He was Jeffrey Archer's nemesis and the prime minister-elect tries to avoid him. As Michael Crick settles into his job as political editor of 'Newsnight', will he tone down his terrier-like approach? Nigel Farndale asks the questions:
In many ways, the terrace house Michael Crick shares with his mother is all you would hope it to be … - a 49-year-old student who recently became the political editor of Newsnight. Crick writes his political biographies in here, surrounded by football memorabilia ... and a copy of the Guardian. The only thing that seems out of context is the copy of The Daily Telegraph next to it.
'Actually, the Guardian is my mother's. I'm the one who tends to read the Telegraph.'
But what if his colleagues at the BBC find out? He gives the first of many slightly mad, cackling laughs.
'It's funny, I heard about a BBC executive who went to join colleagues for an away-day in Manchester, and when she checked into the hotel the staff on reception asked if she would like a copy of the Guardian sent to her room in the morning. She asked why the Guardian. That was, of course, what all her colleagues who had already checked in had ordered.'
Like I said, it's the little things ...
Joseoh:
Can anyone really be surprised about the bias at the BBC?, I work in The Netherlands and the anti-Israeli, anti-US, Pro-Muslim and Pro-PC behaviour of the BBC is so different to the reporting of the Dutch and German public broadcasters.
Last month one of the Dutch Newspapers discussed the FOI act in the UK and how the BBC refused to release the 'Balen' report, the upshot of the article was: How is it possible for a public funded body to use public funds to stop the release of a report which was paid for by the public?, the inference was that the BBC is bias and is hiding behind the same FOI act that it seems to use so often to attack other parties.
Ritter:
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
PJF - the BBC is by law obliged to be impartial. Impartial about everything including itself.
------------------------------------
Great - when does the Balen Report get published?
Nick....? Nick.........?!
...tumbleweed.....
Oscar:
Joseoh | 17.06.07 - 8:40 pm | #
Good to hear the Dutch exposing the indefensible behaviour of the BBC over the Balen report. There's hardly a murmer about it in our press.
On BBC News 24's Face to Face Michael Gove got in a few well aimed shots at BBC bias - running rings round Polly the hack Toynbee who obsessively attacked the Murdoch press. He also quoted a Guardian editorial a day after 9/11 - "a bully with a bloody nose is still a bully". On this occasion I think Gove gave the bully Toynbee a bit of a bruising.
hillhunt:
JBH QC:
It's the little things that give the BBC's institutional Leftist bias away..
Surprising, then, that JBH thinks so highly of the former Living Marxism magazine, and specifically of one of its writers, himself a high honcho in the Revolutionary Communist Party:
James Heartfield is a university lecturer and radical journalist of unimpeachable integrity and intellect.
http://www.guardianlies.com/Pegs...20up/
index.html
JBH: We abhor Leftist bias. Except when it agrees with us.
.
Robin:
Nick Reynolds, Hillhunt and John Reith,
After this issue, can we then look at the "comedy" shows the BBC broadcasts on Radio 4?
Robin:
Oh, and Thought for Today, Analysis, Cause For Concern, File on Four ?
hillhunt:
robin:
After this issue, can we then look at the "comedy" shows the BBC broadcasts on Radio 4?
I think you'll find that you need to listen to them. There aren't many pictures on the radio.
Hillhunt: Here to be helpful
Robin:
Hillhunt,
Thats not a very good distraction technique. Look () in your dictionary and you will see () that my terminolagy is correct.
Putting aside your pedantry, can you address the question or not ?
hillhunt:
Robin:
Putting aside your pedantry, can you address the question or not ?
Okeydoke. Your question was:
can we then look at the "comedy" shows the BBC broadcasts on Radio 4?
Answer: Yes we can look at them. I'll also be listening. It improves the effect.
.
PJF:
With all this attention on the BBC's admission of its own bias and its journalists' snivelling hypocrisy, thank the gods hillhunt is here to draw our attention to the important subject of his perception of double standards by another commenter.
(Seriously, hillhunt, many gold stars for your consistent ability to drive the humour challenged commentariat off-piste whilst not getting banned. Top piss-taking/troll marks)
.
K:
HillHunt,
You really are a wonderful ambassador for the BBC. Condescending, smug and never answering the question that was asked. Keep it up.
Robin:
Right, so there`s no defence by the likes of Hillhunt to the blatent bias of a lot of output on Radio 4.
Hillhunt. Really quite ashamed of BBC bias.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
hillhunt | 17.06.07 - 10:20 pm:
JBH: We abhor Leftist bias. Except when it agrees with us.
Er, eh? Like I suspect most who contribute to this blog, I abhor Leftist bias full stop. I also abhor Rightist bias too. However I applaud Leftists, Rightists, Middle-of-the-roadists, and the entire world-and-his-wifeists who disregard their respective particular innate beliefs and special interests in order to champion the cause of truth and justice, especially when it conflicts with their beliefs and interests.
You show that this concept of truth and justice, above all other considerations, is as far as you are concerned, a wholly alien, bizarre, unfathomable one.
Clearly, a potential Oskar Schindler you are most certainly not.
CCTV:
The BBC is failing to report on things in Gaza....it is time they sent Barbara Plett in there to give us proper reports...she might even get to interview the guys who kidnapped Alan Johnston.
hillhunt:
K:
HillHunt, You really are a wonderful ambassador for the BBC.
Excellent point.
Which would be even better if I had any connection at all to the BBC. Which I don't.
With all this attention on the BBC's admission of its own bias and its journalists' snivelling hypocrisy, thank the gods hillhunt is here to draw our attention to the important subject of his perception of double standards by another commenter.
As it happens, I do agree with a real BBC employee, who argues above that it would be useful to read the full report first.
Leaving aside the Sunday Times's time-honoured role as a cheerleader for Murdoch's TV empire, I'm not sure there's that much in the bits published so far to get your pants wet about.
Live8? A patchy, but at times thrilling global music event, well worth the tiny slice of the licence fee it cost, if only because it re-united Pink Floyd briefly. Yes, the Irish guys used the platform to keep pleading for more cash for Africa. Trouble is, that complaining about that is a bit like complaining about the Waltons espousing Mom and apple pie. Who wants more Africans to starve or die of AIDS?
Richard Curtis is one of the UK's most successful film-makers, and he wrote a touching, brilliantly-cast polemic. Not sure I want the BBC to turn down writers like him (and actors like Bill Nighy & Kelly MacDonald) just because they've got a soft spot for starving people. Do you?
The NHS? There's plenty of form from panorama down of reports which do not "celebrate" the NHS, but ask awkward questions of it.
Climate change is a much more interesting subject, although it's a mistake to argue for a simple on-one-hand, on-the-other kind of coverage as if you were covering Tory/Labour debates. Even so, I'm with Paxman on that one...
Nothing at all in the reports published to date about Biased BBC's big hard-on issues, especially Israel/Palestine.
And, sadly, nothing at all about the touchstone issue that keeps every man jack of us awake in the wee small hours - the fate of Neil Hamilton, ex-MP.
Robin:
And nothing about the bias on Radio 4.
Hillhunt. Wishing that the BBC`s bias was the norm.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
hillhunt | 17.06.07 - 11:04 pm:
And, sadly, nothing at all about the touchstone issue that keeps every man jack of us awake in the wee small hours - the fate of Neil Hamilton, ex-MP.
Hmm. Your attempted characterisation of the political controversy that, according to the BBC, "helped bring down the last Conservative government," as a trifling matter concerning a single Tory MP that few care about, wore thin several months ago.
hillhunt:
jbh qc:
However I applaud Leftists, Rightists, Middle-of-the-roadists, and the entire world-and-his-wifeists who disregard their respective particular innate beliefs and special interests in order to champion the cause of truth and justice,
Which is why you were busy recently disinterring ancient and (in one case, seriously erroneous) Reds-under-the-beds smears to bolster your otherwise threadbare personal grudge against the BBC?
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...3267066/
#359497
JBH: Red Is The Colour
hillhunt:
Robin:
And nothing about the bias on Radio 4.
Hang on, I thought we all had to listen - or in your case look - first?
Hillhunt: One Step At A Time
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
hillhunt | 17.06.07 - 11:15 pm:
Which is why you were busy recently disinterring ancient and (in one case, seriously erroneous) Reds-under-the-beds smears to bolster your otherwise threadbare personal grudge against the BBC?
My source of information was The Guardian's David Leigh. And the "smears" were levelled not by me, but by Britain's (surely heroic) security services MI5.
hillhunt:
jbh qc:
My source of information was The Guardian's David Leigh. And the "smears" were levelled not by me, but by Britain's (surely heroic) security services MI5.
Y-e-e-e-s. Except that everyone now acknowledges that they got it wrong in Ms Hilton's case.
An eminent silk such as yourself knows that it's no excuse to claim that a libel has already been uttered by someone else. Especially when it's already been corrected.
dave:
Perhaps the BBC is far more worried by criticism than many of us think.Even this site may disturb it's equanimity a little.The growing world wide criticism of Beeb coverage of the Middle east cannot be ignored for ever.The BBC is closely allied to the dominant liberal axis of power.This axis is about to commit cultural suicide by endorsing a boycott of Israel-academic and other.Soon individuals will have to choose which side they are on.This concept will be new to most of them.Smart put downs and heavy irony will no longer be enough.How on earth will the beeboids handle it?.I watch and listen with interest.
PJF:
"As it happens, I do agree with a real BBC employee, who argues above that it would be useful to read the full report first."
Very wise, hillhunt. How about the Balen report? Would you like to be able to read that?
What do you think of the snivelling hypocrisy of BBC journalists hiding their own (dirty?) linen behind their convenient opt out of the Freedom Of Information act?
.
hillhunt:
pjf:
As a BBC outsider like most Biased-BBCers, I know no more than you about Balen.
But given the amount of BBC openness about its own shortcomings lately (when did the unaccountable Murdoch empire last attempt such a thing?), I suspect that the arguments that it should be kept confidential might have some merit. Clearly the courts thought so, and the courts are not places the media usually find much comfort...
.
PJF:
"BBC is closely allied to the dominant liberal axis of power.This axis is about to commit cultural suicide by endorsing a boycott of Israel-academic and other.Soon individuals will have to choose which side they are on.This concept will be new to most of them."
I can't comment about "most", but I can say "not all":
http://www.engageonline.org.uk/f...ticle.php?
id=28
Good on 'em.
.
PJF:
"...(when did the unaccountable Murdoch empire last attempt such a thing?)..."
The "Murdoch empire" has to account for itself every day. If people think it's shite, they don't pay for it.
I'm quite happy for the BBC to make investigations of itself, and find itself wonderful, so long as it is directly accountable to its consumers in this way.
.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
hillhunt | 17.06.07 - 11:30 pm:
In my post of 11:25 pm I say:
My source of information was The Guardian's David Leigh. And the "smears" were levelled not by me, but by Britain's (surely heroic) security services MI5.
To which you replied
hillhunt | 17.06.07 - 11:30 pm:
An eminent silk such as yourself knows that it's no excuse to claim that a libel has already been uttered by someone else. Especially when it's already been corrected.
Clearly, you demonstrate an unshakable belief that you're on solid ground refuting MI5's allegations against Ms. Isabel Hilton, which I had repeated in good faith. However, your passionate defence of Ms Hilton merely throws into stark contrast your failure to take me to task for my allegations against Guardian editors and journalists:
01) Peter Preston
02) Alan Rusbridger
03) David Hencke
04) David Leigh
05) John Mullin
plus Guardian lawyers:
06) Geraldine Proudler
07) Geoffrey Robertson QC
Plus Mohamed Fayed and his employees:
08.) Doug Marvin
09) Stuart Benson
10) Iris Bond
11) Alison Bozek
12) Philip Bromfield
I take it therefore that you have no answer to the evidence I've collated castigating these twelve individuals of colluding to pervert the Downey inquiry.
PJF:
Further to my "good on 'em" post above, I should point out that the motivation behind the BBC-NUJ journos' petition was about being seen to be not taking sides.
This is entirely correct and appropriate for journalists who believe themselves to be impartial.
.
hillhunt:
PJF:
"...(when did the unaccountable Murdoch empire last attempt such a thing?)..."
The "Murdoch empire" has to account for itself every day. If people think it's shite, they don't pay for it.
Depends whether you assume that the only price we pay (or not) for it is the cost of the newspaper (or Sky Box).
Whether it's the coarsening of tabloid culture by The Sun, the News of the Screws's murky entanglement with sleazeballs like Clive Goodman and Mahzer Mahmood, the suborning and corrupting of professional sport by Sky's financial clout or the dancing-to-attendance on Rupe from Maggie to Blair, Murdoch has a huge and - in real terms - unaccountable grip on public life in Britain and many other places. NI's corporate governance and tax affairs are epics of sleight of hand and deliberate evasion.
Ignoring that is as self-serving as anything you allege about the BBC's own behaviour.
PJF:
Jonathan Boyd Hunt, I'm a bit out of touch 'round here (too much frothing Muslim bashing for me) - but I hope you have acquired the blog owners' permission to post your allegations here.
I suspect you'd be all too happy to be taken to court over this, but I don't know that Biased-BBC Blog would be...
.
hillhunt:
JBH QC:
I take it therefore that you have no answer to the evidence I've collated castigating these twelve individuals of colluding to pervert the Downey inquiry.
Er, yes. Your entire case - read it all on GuardianLies - boils down to your assumption that, because two documents appear in different fonts, this means they've been fiddled with.
Alan Rusbridger, the Guardian editor, long ago explained this: One of the documents was transferred from the newsroom's APAX system to his Mac, which, being a Mac, used a different typeface.
Over to Stephen Glover, a conservative commentator well known for his scepticism about the Guardian and the BBC:
The main allegation, in a nutshell, is that the paper falsified documents in order to show that two of its reporters had questioned Mr Hamilton about brown envelopes at a meeting in July 1993....
Is this credible? I don't believe so. When I wrote this in a previous article for the Daily Telegraph Mr Hunt left a rude message on my answering machine. I expect he will again.
I can't see it would have been worth the paper's while to go to such lengths of deception merely to show that it had known about allegations at an earlier stage than it did. I'm also not convinced by his very convoluted theories.
JBH QC: Horse. Flogging. A. Dead.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Hillhunt:
Seriously disingenuous and bigoted.
B-BBCers: Sorry for feeding the troll.
PJF:
"Ignoring that is as self-serving as anything you allege about the BBC's own behaviour."
Quite true, and I don't ignore it. Due to the powerful influence of the media, I believe in some regulation thereof - mostly limits on market share.
I certainly don't believe that the best counter to private media empires is to have a state enforced media empire that isn't accountable in any way at all to the people who are forced to pay for it (not even via the state that enforces it!).
People are imprisoned every year in the UK for watching television without the permission of the state (and not subsidising John Humphrys). Murdoch may be unpleasant, but that is disgusting and outrageous.
.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
PJF | 18.06.07 - 12:11 am:
Jonathan Boyd Hunt, I'm a bit out of touch 'round here (too much frothing Muslim bashing for me) - but I hope you have acquired the blog owners' permission to post your allegations here.
I suspect you'd be all too happy to be taken to court over this, but I don't know that Biased-BBC Blog would be...
I'm acutely mindful of the blog owners' sensitivity to the prospect of contributors posting libellous allegations. However in my case I hope that they are emboldened by the fact that a commercial publisher published my allegations in far more specific detail and yet was not sued for libel despite the Guardian having issued threats beforehand.
pounce:
BBC bias.What BBC bias?
Who would you like to see on the Queen's honours list?
People across the UK who have made a difference to society have been recognised in this year's Queen's Birthday honours list.
Cricket legend Ian Botham has received a Knighthood. The 51-year-old former all-rounder finished his career as England's leading Test wicket-taker with 383 victims and over 5,000 Test runs.
Footballer Ryan Giggs has been awarded an OBE. Giggs, 33, is Manchester United's most decorated player with 23 winners' medals and 64 caps from International Football.
Iran accused Britain on Sunday of insulting Islam by awarding a knighthood to Salman Rushdie, whose book The Satanic Verses offended Muslims worldwide and led to Iran issuing a fatwa.
Who do you think deserves a mention in the honours list? Who would you like to see given a Knighthood? Is Rushdie's award an insult to Islam?
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/
...=20070618003451
Err BBC who gives a hoot about what gives an insult to your faith of choice.Everything and everything is an insult to Islam be it Miss world, Mecca Bingo,Nike shoes to Burgerking Icecream.I myself am an insult to Muslims (Yup no foreskin but i don't stick my arse in the air 5 times a day)yet do I derserve to die for following my own path?
What a stupid question and i wonder why the clones at the BBC had to ask it.
Yet again the BBC blowing the flute of its Islamic Mullahs
hillhunt:
pjf:
People are imprisoned every year in the UK for watching television without the permission of the state (and not subsidising John Humphrys). Murdoch may be unpleasant, but that is disgusting and outrageous.
This is an important point but...
The sums of money per household are trivial compared to all other licensing costs and taxation (and to the enormous sums fleeced by Sky, much of which goes to keep a few dozen footballers in lives of Babylonian luxury).
Most of us don't get to choose whether we want subsidies for the arts, farming or FCO extravagance. But if we don't pay our taxes, we end up in jail (or bankruptcy). How popular, exactly, is the spending of billions or public money (and the sacrificing of young British lives) in Iraq (apart from in these threads)? And could those of us who disagree with the war claim a discount on our PAYE?
The licence fee keeps this country's major cultural asset at arms length from Government and from the commercial pressures which so disfigure Murdoch's output and which have driven ITV and Channel 4 to squandering so much of their public-service broadcasting.
.
pounce:
Ref the case of the ‘Captured’ BBC reporter. Am I the only one thinking along the lines that Hamas’s preemptive attack on Fatah. (How comes the BBC only reports on the IDF of having a vastly superior armed army and not ‘Hamas’.) Was planned a long-time ago. (Well it wasn’t an ad-hoc get together of armed militants was it? Or was there a wedding in the area?) Now Hamas knowing it would come under the spotlight of every country in the world needs somebody to present their case of ‘genocide’ in a softer light. (You know like ‘Changing rooms’
So how about sorting out the release of a ‘captured’ BBC reporter in which to show the world its nicer side. And who better to promote that nicer side than the friends of the terrorist world THE BBC
Hey it’s only what I’m thinking. But something tells me, the kidnapping of Johnson was nothing more than a publicity stunt .A stunt the BBC is more than happy to promote as NEWS. Something Smells along the corridors of the BBC and it isn’t empty Champagne Bottles celebrating the Hamas win.
pounce:
The troll wrote.;
"The sums of money per household are trivial compared to all other licensing costs and taxation
Yer having a Giraffe.
Jon:
"The sums of money per household are trivial compared to all other licensing costs and taxation (and to the enormous sums fleeced by Sky, much of which goes to keep a few dozen footballers in lives of Babylonian luxury)."
What a stupid argument - the licence fee may be trivial to you but not to other people. Even if the licence fee was 1p a year is it justified to put people in goal for not paying it.
As for Sky - I could not give a monkies how much they get - it paid for the service they provide - if you do not want the service you don't buy it. Simple.
The enormous sums of money fleeced by government is more a moot point. If, like Sky, you only paid for the services you recieved then that would be fair.
PJF:
hillhunt, the point about taxes and obeying the law is a fair one (and I now no longer have a TV, instead of watching one illegally previously); the real issue is whether a media organisation should come under those arrangements.
You believe the BBC is "this country's major cultural asset" (we're finished); I believe it's just an oversized telly station (drivel), and an outlet for left/liberal propaganda (dangerous drivel).
Since you're clearly wrong, I think you should now be taxed every time you go to the pub so that I can get my minority, high quality Belgian beer free at source.
Ta.
.
MidiSource:
Went for dinner a couple of weeks ago where discussion centred on news sources. At the table were sat four PhD holders and one professor. The BBC was generally disparaged and none of us used it as a serious source of news. We're all British but now based overseas (so don't have access to Newsnight and some of the other politics shows).
Nonetheless, I was left wondering about who the BBC provides news for. I personally find it the least informative. Furthermore, I remember reading once that MPs were increasingly reluctant to use the BBC as a source of news (couldn't find the link).
I wonder if there may be a trend where ABC1s in general avoid the BBC.
terry johnson:
In the interests of sanity and readability, will people try and ignore the troll "hillhunt". Don't inflate his ego by bothering to reply to his facile "comments". He drags down every thread where people engage him in "debate". His comments are a waste of time and space , please treat them accordingly.
Scott:
I follow the BBC - and this website - from across the pond. I am not completely up on all of this, but as I recall, the BBC is expanding a tremendous sum of taxpayer money to keep a particular report confidential. Could anyone tell me which report that is and what it covers. Just curious in light of this report, what could possibly be damaging in the one the Beeb is challenging in court? Thanks.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Scott:
The report to which you refer is the Balen Report.Here's an article about the issue.
Bryan:
Scott,
The one the BBC wont let us see is the Balen report into BBC bias.
Bryan:
Jonathan Boyd Hunt,
Snap!
deegee:
Scott:
The Balen Report covers BBC Mid East coverage. That effectively means BBC Israel Palestinian Conflict coverage.
It's difficult to know what could be damaging before reading it. However to many in this blog the effort and money expended to hide it is a red flag.
What 'might' it say?
• The BBC slants its reports to support the Palestinian version of events.
• The BBC is obsessed with this one area and ignores developments in Israel and the rest of the Mid East not related to the conflict.
• The BBC slants its reports to support Islamic viewpoints (i.e. one of the parties) while attacking or ignoring Christian viewpoints (still the major religion in Britain) and marginalizing Judaism (Hinduism, Buddhism, Drusism et al).
• Conversely the BBC hides and obscures Islam as a factor in serious crime, warfare across the globe and terrorism.
• The BBC routinely manipulates language, layout, pictures, positioning, etc. to present an unbalanced viewpoint. For example, Israel routinely 'kills' Palestinians while bombs 'explode' without any apparent human intervention.
• The BBC presents controversial and incorrect information as incontrovertible fact. For example, everyone accepts that 'Israeli occupation is illegal' or 'the barrier being built by Israel surrounds all of the West Bank' or that 'Israel deliberately targets ambulances'.
• It is sometimes difficult to know that anti Israel reports are delivered by interested parties and not BBC employees.
• BBC employees are openly biased to the Palestinian version of events.
• The BBC presents controversial reports on its website and then quietly changes them after the complaint without acknowledging them - stealth editing.
• The BBC manipulates Have Your Say (HYS) features to support the Palestinian version of events. For example, anti Israel comments recommended by few people are highlighted. Comments, which breach BBC guidelines for incitement, pass the moderation process while other comments are held back.
• The BBC did not make it clear in Lebanon when reports were delivered under Hezbollah supervision.
• The BBC routinely slants the composition of discussion panels and audiences to support anti Israel views.
In short the Balen report 'might' say that the BBC is a propagandist for Islam and Palestinian nationalism and is well aware of this.
Of course the Balen report could be a whitewash and the BBC spends taxpayers' money to hide it from the taxpayers because that is what people who don't have to worry about money do.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Bryan:
What's your take on this new BBC-comissioned report, which acknowledges the BBC's institutionalised bias and groupthink, but which, most importantly, does not find that this bias has infected its news and current affairs output.
To me it smacks of the type of argument construction one adopts in order to have the principal contention accepted:
"Members of the jury, Mr. Person has admitted that he is not perfect. He has admitted setting fire to St Mary's hospital; throwing petrol bombs at Mr. Softee ice cream vendors; and dropping TV sets out of high-rise flats; but this is quite different to poisoning the population of Rochdale by introducing deadly toxins in the local reservour, of which he is totally innocent."
What you say?
Richy:
Personally, I'm wondering where and how the BBC will report this.
If overly critical then surely the it'll be placed in the "england" section or the "entertainment" section.
Chuffer:
"The sums of money per household are trivial compared to all other licensing costs and taxation..." points out hillhunt.
Ah, so that's OK then. The BBc can be as rubbish as it likes because is costs us less than some other things. Why didn't we all think of that line of reasoning before?
Hillhunt: wearing out the bottom of his barrel.
Cockney:
I'm a bit concerned about the main strand of the article suggesting the Beeb is wildly overconcerned with TRENDY causes. To my mind trendy causes tend to be causes which are actually important and demanding of attention (AIDS, the environment, even executive pay), but suddenly get blown out of all proportion on the back of a bit of media/celeb interest and end up squeezing out more important issues
This is certainly a fault of the Beeb but the wider uberliberalism is far more of a problem as it frequently loses all touch with reality, provokes the anti-liberal faction into equally extremist areas and thereby generally stifles intelligent and informed debate nationally.
The Sunday Times gave us the usual criticism that the Beeb is staffed with Guardian readers with no balancing 'right wing', but surely a publicly funded impartial broadcaster with a remit to provide quality shouldn't be staffing itself to provide Guardian v Mail or Toynbee v Mel Phillips idiocy, it should be Economist v FT v WSJ otherwise what's the point??
"But something tells me, the kidnapping of Johnson was nothing more than a publicity stunt .A stunt the BBC is more than happy to promote as NEWS."
Well given they're now threatening to knock him off that particularly sad conspiracy theory seems to be approaching its own demise...
C:
The BBC has an entrenched right-wing bias, apparently.
pounce:
Cockney wrote;
"Well given they're now threatening to knock him off that particularly sad conspiracy theory seems to be approaching its own demise..."
Really? And I suppose the fact that Hamas not only know who has him, that they are in control of Gaza and that Gaza is a tiny strip of land approx 25 miles long by 4 miles wide.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wiki.../cd/Gz-
map2.png
Tells me that it is very hard to keep a hostage without the neighbours knowing something is up. Which may explain just how Hamas knew he was alive before his red suited video turned up. A video i should add which looked like it was made by Pallywood.
But then I did say it was my own thoughts and if you wish to lump me in with the conspiracy nuts, then do you in the same breath berate the people who say that 9/11 was an inside job, that the London Tube bombings were MI5 led, that Kelly was murdered and that the attack on the USS liberty (1967) was an attempt by American intelligence in which to blame Egypt for the 6 day war. The funny thing is, all of the latter are given credence by the BBC and the rest of the Ethical Latte Mob. So tell me Rhyming slang boy “Are those cornerstones of Liberal folk law also worthy of rebuttal. Or is it somehow different for those who presume they know best?”
pounce:
BBC Bias, what BBC bias?
Grenade attack on Somalia cinema
A grenade thrown at a cinema in the central Somali town of Baidoa has killed five people and injured nine. Eyewitnesses say the video hall, known to have shown films that have had naked scenes, was packed with people.
…………….
Correspondents say the motive for the attack in Baidoa on Thursday night is not yet known. But residents in the area had complained to the cinema owner because some of the films being screened had scenes of nudity.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ica/
6755669.stm
It appears that the BBCs correspondent in Somalia is so love struck over the goat next door. (Bahhh-locks) that he is unable to recount this little story from 11 months ago;
Somali World Cup viewers killed
Two people are reported dead after Islamist gunmen in central Somalia opened fire in a cinema where people were watching a banned World Cup match.
……………
The introduction of Islamic law, or Sharia, has included in some areas a ban on cinemas and on broadcasts of World Cup games because they have carried advertisements for alcohol.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ica/
5150118.stm
Motive not yet known, what next from the BBC?
hillhunt:
pounce:
do you in the same breath berate the people who say that 9/11 was an inside job, that the London Tube bombings were MI5 led, that Kelly was murdered and that the attack on the USS liberty (1967) was an attempt by American intelligence in which to blame Egypt for the 6 day war. The funny thing is, all of the latter are given credence by the BBC and the rest of the Ethical Latte Mob.
Really? When?
.
pounce:
BBC bias, what BBC bias?
Can the war in Afghanistan be won?
The BBC begins a week of in-depth coverage of Afghanistan by asking its World Affairs editor, John Simpson, to consider if the Afghan government and the West can win the war against the Taleban.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6756125.stm
I see the author of the BBC misguided criminals article (Instead of terrorists) is up to his old tricks of defending his illogical masters. (Allah be praised) so what has the BBC got to say today about the situation in Afghanistan;
“The Taleban have new confidence and new tactics, and their campaign against the government and its Nato backers has been increasingly successful since the beginning of this year.”
Really, And I suppose the thousands of terrorists (Not Misguided criminals BBC, but terrorists) who have died as NATO have taken the fight to the hills hasn’t made an impact of those the BBC staff drool about as they raise their backsides for their Islamic masters. As a consequence of that kicking the Taliban (Sorry misguided criminals) have to resort to high profile attacks on soft targets. So Girls get shot, Teachers get beheaded and markets gets blown up. That doesn’t count as a terrorist major offensive BBC, it is the act of trying to gain as much publicity as possible in which to win the hearts of minds of the electorate in the west.(which at a stroke tells you the Taliban can’t win by arms alone) An act the BBC is more than happy to promote.
“With Nato troops mostly tied up in the southern part of the country, the Afghan police and army are finding it harder to operate elsewhere.
Really, tied up in the south of the country BBC? Here is the NATO map of Afghanistan with troop deployments;
http://www.nato.int/isaf/media/
p...acemat_isaf.pdf
What the BBC fails to remind the reader yet again is that the violence in the country is found mainly on the border with Pakistan. (Something about the Pushto clan springs to mind) The initial deployment of NATO troops secured the north and Western parts and more stable of Afghanistan first. Once that had transpired NATO pushed into the South in which to take on the Taliban in their own backyard. (Which is depicted in the second picture from the NATO site.) Yet the BBC insists all the troops are in the south leaving the rest of the country ripe for attack.
The BBC and how it promotes the Walter Cronkite effect for the worlds terrorists.
dmatr:
The (lack of) impartiality report is now available:
Press Release:
BBC publishes report on safeguarding impartiality in the 21st century
Report:
From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel
Appendices include a transcript of the infamous, allegedly "streamed live on the web" impartiality seminar.
pounce (correction):
BBC bias, what BBC bias?
Can the war in Afghanistan be won?
The BBC begins a week of in-depth coverage of Afghanistan by asking its World Affairs editor, John Simpson, to consider if the Afghan government and the West can win the war against the Taleban.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6756125.stm
I see the author of the BBC misguided criminals article (Instead of terrorists) is up to his old tricks of defending his illogical masters. (Allah be praised) so what has the BBC got to say today about the situation in Afghanistan;
“The Taleban have new confidence and new tactics, and their campaign against the government and its Nato backers has been increasingly successful since the beginning of this year.”
Really, And I suppose the thousands of terrorists (Not Misguided criminals BBC, but terrorists) who have died as NATO have taken the fight to the hills hasn’t made an impact of those the BBC staff drool about as they raise their backsides for their Islamic masters. As a consequence of that kicking the Taliban (Sorry misguided criminals) have to resort to high profile attacks on soft targets. So Girls get shot, Teachers get beheaded and markets gets blown up. That doesn’t count as a terrorist major offensive BBC, it is the act of trying to gain as much publicity as possible in which to win the hearts of minds of the electorate in the west.(which at a stroke tells you the Taliban can’t win by arms alone) An act the BBC is more than happy to promote.
“With Nato troops mostly tied up in the southern part of the country, the Afghan police and army are finding it harder to operate elsewhere.
Really, tied up in the south of the country BBC? Here is the NATO map of Afghanistan with troop deployments;
http://www.nato.int/isaf/media/
p...acemat_isaf.pdf
What the BBC fails to remind the reader yet again is that the violence in the country is found mainly on the border with Pakistan. (Something about the Pushto clan springs to mind) The initial deployment of NATO troops secured the north and Western parts and more stable of Afghanistan first. Once that had transpired NATO pushed into the South in which to take on the Taliban in their own backyard. (Which is depicted in the second picture from the NATO site.) Yet the BBC insists all the troops are in the south leaving the rest of the country ripe for attack.
The BBC and how it promotes the Walter Cronkite effect for the worlds terrorists.
max:
The BBC has a lengthy and comprehensive article which discusses the various aspects of the official bias report here (under 'entertainment', natch):
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/enter...ent/
6763205.stm
callmedave:
John Whittingdale, Tory chairman of the culture, media and sport select committee, added:
"The bias is not necessarily party political - it is the BBC view of the world, and the BBC has.....
...always found it difficult to understand there may be alternative views of the world."
hillhunt and the bbc,great minds think alike (sic)
dmatr:
The BBC has a lengthy and comprehensive article which discusses the various aspects of the official bias report...
Great comment 
callmedave:
The licence fee keeps this country's major cultural asset at arms length from Government and from the commercial pressures which so disfigure Murdoch's output and which have driven ITV and Channel 4 to squandering so much of their public-service broadcasting.
hillhunt | 18.06.07 - 12:55 am
Fanboy is a term used to describe an individual (usually male, though the feminine version fangirl may be used for females) who is utterly devoted to a single fannish subject, or to a single point of view within that subject, often to the point where it is considered an obsession.
they left out fawning sycophant...
Bryan:
Jonathan Boyd Hunt | Homepage | 18.06.07 - 7:34 am,
It's the old pickpocket artists' trick: while one distracts you by jostling you, the other lifts your wallet. This "report" makes a huge deal out of relatively harmless BBC bias while the serious stuff is brushed under the carpet.
And I would trust Mark Byford and Helen Boaden to be impartial (or even know what impartiality is) as far as I could throw them.
Byford was immensely proud of the BBC's fawning over the Taleban and Boaden defended Barbara Plett over her tears for Arafat.
TPO:
BBC web page coverage of the Falklands commemoration
’Other guests at Horse Guards Parade included Prime Minister Tony Blair, Prince Charles, Defence Secretary Des Browne and Baroness Thatcher, who was prime minister at the time of the conflict’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/67.../uk/
6760597.stm
Have they missed anything out? Oh yes this bit:
’But it was Baroness Thatcher who commanded the only ovation during the arrival of the VIPs. She chatted for some time with a smiling Prime Minister, who had been greeted rather less rapturously. It illustrated the capricious nature of power: 'her' war had gone well. 'His' wars, less so.’
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/...8/
nfalks118.xml
Former paratroopers cheered Baroness Thatcher.
The BBC still can’t get over it can they. Still when you have slug friends like this you’ll always be biased. Just like the BBC’s own report says.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
cartoo...2102797,00.html
bijan daneshmand:
pounce
Ref the case of the ‘Captured’ BBC reporter. Am I the only one thinking along the lines that Hamas’s preemptive attack on Fatah. (How comes the BBC only reports on the IDF of having a vastly superior armed army and not ‘Hamas’.) Was planned a long-time ago.
you arent the only one ... i've been trying to make it known that the violence daily served to us by the BBC and others is not random its highly choreographed. Hamas and inceasingly all Jihadi groups are trying to alter the facts on their respective battlefields through TV propaganda .... the prime example was Hezbollah's highly sophisticated propaganda drive in the Lebanon 2006 War
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com...n-of-
media.html
... Hezbollah isnt the only terrorist organisation that Reuters, AP & MSM collaborate with .... Hamas & MSM also work hand in hand.
http://www.snappedshot.com/archi...had-
Bumped.html
Hey it’s only what I’m thinking. But something tells me, the kidnapping of Johnson was nothing more than a publicity stunt .
also its important to consider the "kidnapping" in the context of all the recently reported incidents involving reporters in Gaza, ... just a few recent examples
(1) increased kidnappings ... FOX team
(2) threats to women journalists
(3) Attack on Erez Checkpoint by a Jeep Camoflaged as a Reuters TV Vehicle
there is a pattern to this and the activity is not just down to a Gangster Clan (Dagmooush) as the MSM are trying to portray ...
THeir is an active movement to promote Hamas to us by raising the spectre of a fledgling Islamic Jihadi movements in Gaza, ... two of the organisations promoting this view are
PROSPECTS FOR PEACE
http://
www.prospectsforpeace.com...to_alqaeda.html
FORWARD THINKING
http://www.forwardthinking.org/a...outus-
team.html
These organisations arent your regular left wing political nuts like the SWP ... as I have posted before whats different now is that the advocates of Hamas are a part of the Western Security apparatus ...
In short there is a sinister effort to reach out and work with Islamic extreamists and de-legitimise the moderates throughout the Middle East ... the BBC is at the forefront of this effort ... its therefore very difficult to judge the extent of the collaboration currently underway between the BBC and Hamas ... but be in no doubt they are working hand in hand to mis-represent the reality of Gaza ...
hillhunt:
bijan:
its therefore very difficult to judge the extent of the collaboration currently underway between the BBC and Hamas ... but be in no doubt they are working hand in hand to mis-represent the reality of Gaza ...
No, it's not difficult to judge.
There is none. And only a fruitcake would suggest otherwise.
Bijan: David Icke. Without the charm.
bijan daneshmand:
HOW THE MSM STAGES HAMAS & AL AQSA PRESS CONFERENCES
This "Army of Islam" interview was staged yesterday
http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol...stm?bw=bb&
mp=wm
before you get too taken in by it have a look at the long list of Hamas and Al Aqsa front organisations giving press interviews (although I think you wont be seeing to many Al Aqsa press conferences from Gaza in the near future)
http://www.snappedshot.com/categ...hug-
Conferences
If you look closely at the Army of Islam uniforms and equipment you'll notice a striking similarity with those worn by Hamas ... in fact the only difference being the bandana which reads Army of Islam not Hamas ... now how long does it take to change a bandana????
Cockney:
"But then I did say it was my own thoughts and if you wish to lump me in with the conspiracy nuts, then do you in the same breath berate the people who say that 9/11 was an inside job, that the London Tube bombings were MI5 led, that Kelly was murdered and that the attack on the USS liberty (1967) was an attempt by American intelligence in which to blame Egypt for the 6 day war."
er... yeah. obviously.
pounce:
The BBC and its hatred of the US;
as posted in NYC
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/
1...d7a8d5f28_b.jpg
and as reported on BBC editors.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/
theed..._york_city.html
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Glad to see there is now a link to the actual report, which is very good: open, honest and very interesting.
Bryan, you are wrong about Helen Boaden and Barbara Plett. Helen Boaden actually said that Plett's FOOC on Arafat was an error of judgement.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
That BBC report:
This extract below betrays it is exactly what we all suspected - a cynical dishonest attempt to justify the BBC's biased news reports. I quote from Page 39:
When David Loyn reported for Newsnight in October 2006 from inside the stronghold of the Taliban in Afghanistan, questions were asked in Parliament about the BBC’s ‘unalloyed propaganda’ for Britain’s enemies. Loyn’s straightforward report was justified by the requirement of impartiality to explore the Taliban’s motivation, although (as the Falklands War and Northern Ireland have demonstrated) impartiality becomes particularly controversial when the lives of British servicemen and women are at stake in one side of the fighting.
There is, in fact, no such requirement at all. The BBC's contention that there is, is a deliberate, cynical lie.
In this new report the BBC admits that bias can be effected by omission. Well, the report itself is shown to be guilty of gross omission, and therefore is itself proved to be another manifestation of BBC bias, for Loyn's sympathetic Taliban dispatch wasn't just criticised in the British parliament, it was criticised heavily by the Afghans themselves, which is far more relevant, as the BBC well knows – for BBC monitoring at Caversham Park picked up and reported it.
This is what BBC Monitoring reported the Afghan paper Weesa saying in direct response to Loyn's cheerful Taliban travelogue:
BBC radio [as published] recently interviewed the Taleban spokesman, Mohammad Hanif. Some of the aspects of this interview are noteworthy because of their effects on the nation.
First of all, Mohammad Hanif's words and reasoning obviously show that today, our nation is not confronting the previous simple Taleban. They are facing a new political movement which brings international experience of terror, such as suicide attacks, to Afghanistan. They are very different from the past in terms of tactics. They are now emerging as a mysterious movement whose threat is evident in advance.
Besides this, we do not know why the international media and an international media outlet like the BBC should act as a platform for such a dangerous movement to carry out their propaganda campaign.
The question is, if the Taleban, Al-Qa'idah and their supporters are terrorists, and if their power and strength will be dangerous for Afghanistan and the rest of the world, then why should they be promoted by the media in this way? Does this not foster the growth and development of terrorism?
Afghan Tolo TV also discussed the letters and Id congratulatory messages of Mullah Mohammad Omar, Golboddin Hekmatyar and President Karzai in one of its programmes last night. This has the same negative effects on the Afghan nation as Mohammad Hanif's interview with the BBC.
Isn't this an intentional attempt to recognize and to give prestige to those opponents who are on the one hand pursued by the whole world and are known as leaders of terrorism who turned our country into a cave of death in the process of chasing them while they, on the other hand, rank in the media on the same level as those elected by public vote?
If there are no rules or regulations for freedom of speech, the media and democracy, and if the field is open to all, then this means that freedom of speech and democracy has turned into a strange drama.
We do not say that the media, especially free and independent media outlets, should be the voice of the government. We also do not say that power should be dominant and the media should be its voice, but there have to be some rules and regulations to differentiate legal and illegal movements and deeds. Do not allow dangerous forces to penetrate the nation and become more dangerous. It is not only the right of our war-torn society, but it is the right of all of humanity for the media to avoid broadcasting the messages of terrorism. If this is not observed, the nations of the world will be blown away by the fight between terrorism and antiterror forces. The more the media ranks both sides the same, the more national mentalities will change and finally the limits of which side is legal and which is illegal will be lost, which will be a giant disaster for humanity.
(c) 2006 BBC Monitoring South Asia. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.
Only yesterday the psychopaths whose motivation the BBC "attempted to explain" slaughtered 35 policemen. No doubt their lovers, wives, sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, mothers and fathers will be gratified upon learning that the killers' morale had been bolstered by good old Auntie's perverse interpretation of its legal obligations under Her Majesty's Royal Charter.
Think about this: The BBC World Service is financed by the Foreign Office. So, here we have one arm of the UK government financing the international broadcasting of enemy-morale-boosting-propaganda which another arm of the UK government is spending zillions, and British servicemen laying down their lives, to defeat.
And yet, in its new impartiality report, the pompous, arrogant, we-know-better BBC defends this fucked-up Orwellian doublethink with reference to a legal requirement that doesn’t actually exist, for fuck's sake. The sooner the whole bloody rabble is broken up and sold off the better for the peoples of the U.K., Afghanistan, Iraq, the U.S., Israel, and anyone who doesn't actually aspire to murder and bloody mayhem.
B Wood:
The BBC's own online account of the report is in itself an example of the problem.
The main example it gives is of a new computerised weather map which overemphasises the south-east.
The, apart from quoting Mark Byford on a duty to report alternative viewpoints "no matter how unpleasant they may be" it sidesteps around the issue.
bijan daneshmand:
BWood
The BBC's own online account of the report is in itself an example of the problem.
The main example it gives is of a new computerised weather map which overemphasises the south-east.
The, apart from quoting Mark Byford on a duty to report alternative viewpoints "no matter how unpleasant they may be" it sidesteps around the issue.
Its MisDirection
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mis...ki/
Misdirection
Robin:
Hillhunt,
One step at a time then.
Do you think there is any bias in the Radio 4 "comedies" ?
bijan daneshmand:
More on MisDirection
http://www.leirpoll.com/
misdirec...isdirection.htm
Paul Daniels would have been proud ...
hillhunt:
jbh qc:
The sooner the whole bloody rabble is broken up and sold off the better for the peoples of the U.K., Afghanistan, Iraq, the U.S., Israel, and anyone who doesn't actually aspire to murder and bloody mayhem.
Just remind us. Who, apart from God-deluded Jihadis and their Millenialist equivalents actually aspire to murder and bloody mayhem?
And what do they have to do with the governance of the BBC?
rightofcentre:
Another thing about the BBC weather map, there is frequently nothing at all between Newcastle and Birmingham. Apparently, those of us in Yorkshire and Lancashire don`t count. (But our license fee does!)
hillhunt:
Robin:
One step at a time then.
Do you think there is any bias in the Radio 4 "comedies" ?
Give us a break. There's hours of the stuff to take in. Came across Uncle Mort's North Country and couldn't get past it because it was so damn funny. Wonderfully unflattering sideswipe at Arthur Scargill, too.
Anonymous:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talki...int/
default.stm
Click on "Any questions?
If you could ask anyone a question, what would it be?"
Mmmmmm who is that in the picture al-beeb
Robin:
Hillhunt,
Hours of stuff with a bias.
Richard:
Even the BBC, in typically sloppy style, reports it as 'BBC must be more impartial' How on earth can one be more, or even less impartial?
max:
Re: Nick Reynolds (BBC)
Glad to see there is now a link to the actual report, which is very good: open, honest and very interesting.
Apologies for being repetitive but you didn't answer about this earlier:
Wouldn't it be honest, open and interesting to release the Balen report and let the public make up its mind?
Also, as PJF mentioned earlier (thanks PJF, btw), it's possible that there are restrictions, legal or others, on BBC employees discussing the Balen report. Could you clarify this point? Thanks.
Ritter:
BBC report: Your reaction
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/
...=20070618134957
hillhunt:
pjf:
I now no longer have a TV, instead of watching one illegally previously)
You believe the BBC is "this country's major cultural asset" (we're finished); I believe it's just an oversized telly station (drivel), and an outlet for left/liberal propaganda (dangerous drivel).
Must be hard to reach such definitive conclusions based on not watching any of its output.
Or are you just very gifted as an analyst?
BJ:
it's possible that there are restrictions, legal or others, on BBC employees discussing the Balen report. Could you clarify this point? Thanks.
I'm a BBC employee: and no there aren't. The problem is, I don't know what the Balen report says. Because, of course, if minions like me were to get hold of it, we'd leak it.
However, it was withheld because the court decided that, it was compiled for the purposes of journalism, art or literature -- in line with the Freedom of Information Act 2005. Not because the BBC wanted to "hush anything up"
rightofcentre:
It seems that those over at HYS are fiddling the readers recommended figures again.
A comment I read on Sunday had 9 recommendations, today it has 1.
K:
HillHunt,
You really are worth every extorted penny of my licence fee. Today the BBC published a report stating the bias as fact. And all we get from you is the usual mantra of denial.
If you don't accept that your coverage is biased maybe you could take it up with your stalwart bosses. And maybe mention the Hutton report, the Balen report, the removal of Orla Guerin and teary Babs Plett from ME coverage, the leaked meeting last year of BBC figures to discuss the bias, the stacking of QT audiences (as if stacking the panel wasn't enough), habitual anti-American reports from the ever-unpleasant Matt Frei and of course, Jeremy Bowen our man in Jerusalem (now what country is that the capital of?).
BJ:
the removal of Orla Guerin and teary Babs Plett from ME coverage
Yawn yawn yawn. BBC correspondents are routinely moved to different foreign billets after two or three years.
TPO:
BBC Headline: BBC 'must become more impartial'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6763205.stm
More impartial?
Either you are impartial or you're not. If not impartial, then you're biased.
Goodness me the BBC are biased. It says so in their own report, even though they stuffed the 'impartiality steering group' with Beeb cronies. I suppose even they realised that the game was up and anything less would have been met with derision and contempt.
RIP jr & Ben. As for the one calling himself 'Bullshit Detective', well I suppose most people here will be dancing on his grave, given his propensity for telling lies.
TPO:
Balen Report:
Not because the BBC wanted to "hush anything up"
BJ | 18.06.07 - 2:33 pm |
If the BBC doesn't want it hushed up then lets see it.
I've come across legal and journalistic privilege before through criminal legislation. When challenged on a case by case basis we would invariably uncover a can of worms involving conspiracies.
When there's something to hide, it's normally a conspiracy somewhere.
K:
BJ, if you work for the BBC and are unaware of the controversy surrounding the removal of Guerin and Plett from duties in the Middle East maybe news-gathering isn't the job for you. And were you really so uninterested in all the other counts of bias? i.e.
he Hutton report, the Balen report, the removal of Orla Guerin and teary Babs Plett from ME coverage, the leaked meeting last year of BBC figures to discuss the bias, the stacking of QT audiences (as if stacking the panel wasn't enough), habitual anti-American reports from the ever-unpleasant Matt Frei and of course, Jeremy Bowen our man in Jerusalem (now what country is that the capital of?).
K:
Has anyone else noticed that the HYS forum http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/
...=20070618150400
is meant to be reactively moderated (i.e. you can submit comments directly) but when you do submit a comment it gets sent to a moderation queue instead?
bijan daneshmand:
This is for Nick Reynolds. Lets see if he will get it now ...
ALAN JOHNSON IN HIS OWN WORDS:"When you are with one side, you have got to put to them the very best arguments of the other side"
A revealing Gurniad piece on a talk that Al Johnson gave to BBC College of Jounalism (cringe) ... in which he admits that his perspective and reporting is biased in favour of the Palestinians but is "balanced" by his attempts to seek out what is going on in the minds of Israelis ...
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...2105122,00.html
So much of the job is about trying to find the imagination within yourself to try to see, to really see, the world through the eyes of the people in the story. Not just through the eyes of the Palestinian who has just had his home smashed. But also through the eyes of the three young Israelis in a tank who smashed it. Why did they see that as a reasonable thing to do? What was going through their minds as their tank went through the house?
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...2105122,00.html
WOW ALAN! With impartiality like that its no wonder that the latest report on BBC Bias can be trivialised as an attack on the Vicar of Dibley.
Still at least Johnston admits to his loyalties being on one side which must have made it easier to have participated in making up the news that suited one side
like this
http://www.snappedshot.com/archi...had-
Bumped.html
or this
http://www.snappedshot.com/categ...hug-
Conferences
maybe not as expertly as this
http://www.snappedshot.com/plugi...ag/
staged+scene
still I credit Johnson with this line ..
I normally never tell war stories "... when I was in Jalalabad with the mortars coming down ... blah, blah, blah."
which is a reference to a highly irritating self promoting and self regarding personage at Al Beeb
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6756125.stm
"I have been coming to Jalalabad since 1989, but for the first time in my experience we needed a police escort to drive around there."
moonbat nibbler:
This report provides more entertainment than BBC1. From the "what is imparitiality?" section:
"[Impartiality] is practised day in, day out, by BBC journalists, who have an impartiality gene implanted in their earliest days at the Corporation"
"[impartiality] remains an elusive, almost magical substance, which is often more evident in its absence than in its presence."
lol
The treatment of different news outlets is rather telling:
"The newest news outlet, Al-Jazeera’s English-language channel, offers another alternative vision, with different news judgments and editorial priorities. Avowedly opinionated news as pioneered by Fox News in the United States (now available in the UK) has growing appeal. Shock-jocks on radio have no inhibitions about voicing their personal opinions."
Factual mistake: Al-Jazeera in English is not the newest news outlet, its not the newest TV news outlet either. English language broadcasting of both Russia Today and France 24 started broadcasting after Al-Jazeera English.
The line about "Shock-jocks" is ridiculously close-minded and stereotypical nonsense! Shock-jocks have to exhibit inhibitions, ask Don Imus.
The neutral language used for Al-Jazeera could be used to describe any news or propaganda output. Whereas the BBC does make a value judgement with Fox News saying it originated "avowedly opinionated news".
At least I've learnt something from this report, where the name John Reith comes from!
Cockney:
Biljan, where exactly does Johnston admit to his loyalties being on one side? He's based in Gaza so he sees the destructive consequences of Israeli actions in the war rather than the other way round, but he endeavors to look at Israeli motivations and put these to the Gazans. What's non-impartial about that? I'd expect a decent reporter in Israel to do vice versa??
The fact that he doesn't necessarily follow through on these noble aims is something entirely different...
K:
Biljan, where exactly does Johnston admit to his loyalties being on one side? He's based in Gaza so he sees the destructive consequences of Israeli actions in the war rather than the other way round, but he endeavors to look at Israeli motivations and put these to the Gazans. What's non-impartial about that? I'd expect a decent reporter in Israel to do vice versa??
The problem Cockney is that all we ever get from the BBC is how terrible Israel is whereas in fact it is the Palestinian arabs who openly celebrate the murder of innocents.
K:
Hey Hillhunt,
Thx for the hat-tip!
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/
...=20070618155029
K:
Sorry, wrong link.
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/...012706&
#3012706
hillhunt:
K:
Hillhunt, You really are worth every extorted penny of my licence fee. Today the BBC published a report stating the bias as fact. And all we get from you is the usual mantra of denial.
If you don't accept that your coverage is biased...
Not sure how many times I've now said it, but I have nothing to do with the BBC. It is not, therefore, my coverage.
But just for the record, the BBC report does not state bias as a fact across the corporation's output, and it has published its principles so that these can be weighed against its output.
I'm sure you can hardly wait to get started.
bijan daneshmand:
HE HERE .. HES THERE WE FIND MAHDI EVERYWHERE
have a look at the man supposedly released by Hamas after a year of captivity. he is sitting to the left of Hamas 1:12 into the video
http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol...stm?bw=bb&
mp=wm
he has a striking resemblance to the guy at an Al Aqsa press conference few months back (front row far left)
http://www.snappedshot.com/
uploa...ians_jrl116.jpg
Could it be the ubiquitous Mahdi Abu Ghazaleh!
http://www.google.co.uk/search?h...nG=Search&
meta=
look at the 2nd row left
http://www.snappedshot.com/archi...g-
Omission.html
pounce:
BBC bias, what BBC bias?
Tackling Tajikistan's cluster bombs
High above the mulberry orchards and rolling hills of the Rashd Valley, and just beneath the soaring snow-covered peaks, lies the village of Chor Charokh. Donkeys wander amid the mud huts, and women in traditional colourful headscarves shy away from visitors. A group of small children, happily oblivious to the poverty that surrounds them, scream and laugh as they chase a dog along a stream. None of these children were born when the government and the opposition fought for control of these mountains.
……………….
International efforts to ban cluster bombs gained new force after last year's war between Israel and Hezbollah, when Israel dropped an estimated four million cluster bombs on southern Lebanon.
……………..
In the village of Chor Charokh, like so much of rural Tajikistan, there are hardly any men left. Samir's father, like many others, has left to search for work in Russia.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...fic/
6757535.stm
I wonder why the BBC doesn’t report just who the opposition were during the de-facto civil war in Tajikistan. Could it be a group of people whom the BBC refers to as Plumbers? Maybe the BBC Clones would like to inform the great unwashed just why they left out the ‘Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan’ out of that article. But of course no BBC article would be replete without castigating the Jews Yup according to the BBC the Jews are nasty pieces of work for using cluster Bombs in a war that they didn’t start.Lets not forget the Brits and the Yanks have them as well. Which is strange as China, Russia and Iran produce them. (Which may explain just where the cluster munitions in Tajikistan were produced)
As for blaming the use of Cluster munitions for the exodus of people towards Moscow. What is strange in that synopsis is that people have always flocked West in times of social depravation. Be it Pakistan, Iran, Jordan, Egypt or Turkey You don’t need bombs on the ground in which to get people to vote with their feet over the social depravation caused by running a country on religious dogma. You know BBC like chopping off the heads of little school girls, blowing up Markets and enslaving women because of laws written in a cave 1500 years ago.
And the BBC tries to tell me they are impartial.
will:
HYS BBC report: Your reaction
Added: Monday, 18 June, 2007, 13:55 GMT 14:55 UK
As a proud left-winger who marched against the war in Iraq I can assure you that the BBC is not at all biased. I am shocked that so many on this forum believe that it is. I am even more troubled by the kind of sites one gets when googling 'BBC bias'.
Hillhunt
RECOMMEND
Recommended by 0 people
K:
I was going to respond to Hillhunt's double denial that he doesn't work for the BBC and which even if he did wouldn't accept was at all biased. But thanks Will.
'nuff said.
Ritter:
Interesting contrast....
Rushdie title 'may spark attacks'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6763119.stm
Liberty head Chakrabarti honoured
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/67.../uk/
6758217.stm
I have no doubt that Rushdie would defend Shami's right to free speech. I haven't heard Shami stick her head above on TV or radio to defend Rushdie's freedoms though - have you?. Oh I forgot, Rushdie isn't an alleged muslim terrorist.
pounce:
The saviours of the BBC speak and its message reeks…
Hamas issues Johnston ultimatum
Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas has threatened to use force to release BBC reporter Alan Johnston by the end of Monday if he is not let free.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6764679.stm
Yup nothing like a bit of free publicity for a terrorist organisation which has had no problems using force in the past.
Be it kidnapping soldiers in another country
Murdering people on the streets (and I refer to the murder of a woman holding hands with her future husband here)
Or even launching missile attacks on another country.
Hamas has never had problems resorting to force in which to get its way of enforcing Islamic rule on all.
But the BBC won’t promote the truth about Hamas brutality. No according to them, Hamas are the saviours of the world.
bijan daneshmand:
Cockney
Biljan, where exactly does Johnston admit to his loyalties being on one side?
its here
I was with a journalist, not a BBC bloke, who very much liked being in a war zone, and during the battle for the city, we were in an abandoned block of flats. We went into an apartment where a shell had come through the living-room wall. And I remember hearing this guy immediately start talking about whether it had been a bazooka shell or a rocket-propelled grenade that had done the damage, and where the soldier who fired it must have been standing on the street outside.
But if you looked around the room for a minute, you could see the life that used to go on in it. You could see the books that the family used to read, and the sort of pictures that they liked to hang on the walls, and, from photographs, you could see that they had three kids and that the oldest girl had graduated from university. Of course, their story, what had happened to them - what they were, and what they had lost - was what the war was all about. It did not really matter whether it was a bazooka or a rocket that had turned their world upside down.
note that while the not a BBC bloke was trying to ascertain the facts of what had happened ... Johnston was trying to give us a depiction of the human tragedy in Grozny ... worthy job as long as he did it impartialy and honestly ... but its not the job of a reporter ... in Gaza Alan made the mistake that many other BBC journalists have ... they dont report the story but become part of the story ...
just two examples from that epitomise the BBC style
Barbara Plett crying for Arafat ....
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ent/
3966139.stm
Jacky Rowland testifying at Milosevic's trial ....
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ope/
2220904.stm
bijan daneshmand:
Cockney
and if you want Alan Johnson's specific quote its here
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...2105122,00.html
And when you are with one side from the conflict, you have got to put to them the very best arguments of the other side - the toughest questions. But the aim is absolutely not to smother the story with a search for some sort of formulaic, 50-50-style balance.
Ryan:
"In Friday’s R4 Feedback Bowen when discussing Middle East coverage said that since Israel considers herself western-style democracy with free press etc it is judged by higher standards "
Ah, right. I'd often wondered why the BBC has a bizarre obsession with what goes on in Israel. Personally after listening to the same old same old for thirty years I really couldn't give a monkey's.
Meanwhile the Burmese military continues to systematically wipe out the Karen tribesmen of Burma and we hear not a thing through the Beeb. It turns out this has nothing to do with the Burmese military being Marxist, but is more to do with them being non-western. Presumably the Beeb judges them as little more than savages from which we can expect little better (to take the obvious corollary from Bowen's claim).
So the Israeli's must treat the Palestinians better because they are letting the side down old boy and the Beeb expects more from them.
Perhaps Bowen should stick to reporting the facts and leave the opinions and inferences to the audience.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Since I have been mentioned by name... there's no bias in the Alan Johson piece quoted. Where is it? He says you should look at a story from both points of view. Is it the word "smashed" that you object to? What word would be more accurate?
pounce:
Ritter an interesting snippet about how Muslims are angered by the Salman Rushdie award. Here is what Mohammad Ali Hosseini of the Iranian foreign ministry had to say on the matter yesterday;
“"Honouring and commending an apostate and hated figure will definitely put the British officials [in a position] of confrontation with Islamic societies," Mr Hosseini said.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
pakist...2105748,00.html
So part of the reason Rushdie has to die is because he is an Apostate. On that note would any of the BBC clones CAIR to remind us all about just how peaceful Islam is, when it bestows the death penalty on anybody who has the neck (soon to be removed) to leave the faith.
terry johnson:
Has the pro-islamic Al-BBC noted this story yet or doesn't it fit in with Al-Beeb's view that islam is a "religion of peace" ?
From the Jerusalem Post..
"Christians living in Gaza City on Monday appealed to the international community to protect them against increased attacks by Muslim extremists. Many Christians said they were prepared to leave the Gaza Strip as soon as the border crossings are reopened.
The appeal came following a series of attacks on a Christian school and church in Gaza City over the past few days.
Father Manuel Musalam, leader of the small Latin community in the Gaza Strip, said masked gunmen torched and looted the Rosary Sisters School and the Latin Church.
"The masked gunmen used rocket-propelled grenades to storm the main entrances of the school and church," he said. "Then they destroyed almost everything inside, including the Cross, the Holy Book, computers and other equipment."
Musalam expressed outrage over the burning of copies of the Bible, noting that the gunmen destroyed all the Crosses inside the church and school. "Those who did these awful things have no respect for Christian-Muslim relations," he said."
K:
Have Your Say seems to be a bit selective in the comments they let through.
If you post that the Beeb is biased you are limited to two comments but if you support the Beeb, like a commenter called
Left Liberal and Proud you get to post more. Some animals are more equal than others.
hillhunt:
will:
HYS BBC report: Your reaction
Added: Monday, 18 June, 2007, 13:55 GMT 14:55 UK
As a proud left-winger who marched against the war in Iraq I can assure you that the BBC is not at all biased. I am shocked that so many on this forum believe that it is. I am even more troubled by the kind of sites one gets when googling 'BBC bias'.
Hillhunt
K:
I was going to respond to Hillhunt's double denial that he doesn't work for the BBC and which even if he did wouldn't accept was at all biased. But thanks Will.
'nuff said.
I'm afraid the curse of the impersonator stalks even the HYS columns. Why would I consistently deny working for the BBC here, and post the opposite view on a forum which many B-BBCers would be bound to read?
And while I'm on...what is contradictory about being outside the BBC and taking the view that it does not show bias? Are viewers and listeners only supposed to interpret things one way?
Biased BBC: Sky's the limit.
pounce:
BBC bias, what BBC bias?
Two BBC headlines ref similar stories.
Children die in Afghan air raid
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6762549.stm
and
Children dead' in Afghan bombing
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6755779.stm
In the former the BBC makes it quite clear just who the guilty party are.
(On the South Asian site it is reported as ‘Nato troops kill Afghan civilian’
On the latter well something of a fudge. Just from reading the headlines just who killed those children.
And here is something I read in the Guardian today which sums up my point;
“Although Nato's International Security Assistance Force and the Afghan national army retain the upper hand militarily, Ms Ahmed said the insurgency would only escalate while there were still hearts and minds to win."They're saying: we're here and we're the winning side. I don't think they are, but it's effective propaganda and it's psy-ops," she said.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
afghan...2105412,00.html
Yup the BBC just loves to promote the image that Islam rules, be it in Somalia, Palestine, Iraq or Afghanistan the publicly funded News organisation is the biggest promoter of Islamic Jihad going.
hillhunt:
pounce;
On that note would any of the BBC clones CAIR to remind us all about just how peaceful Islam is, when it bestows the death penalty on anybody who has the neck (soon to be removed) to leave the faith.
If I knew what CAIR meant, I would...
K:
Hi Hillhunt/Nick et al Beeb,
Please respond to the fair question that Terry Johnson posed. Why isn't Hamas' persecution of Christians being covered?
moonbat nibbler:
Most of the recent posts are off-topic and should really be posted in the open thread.
I can't find a single mention in this report of the Beebs support of the "stop the war" march. Hundreds of hours of free advertising, similar to Live 8, yet not a single mention in this myopic self-assessment.
bijan daneshmand:
Nick
Since I have been mentioned by name... there's no bias in the Alan Johson piece quoted. Where is it?
Mentioned you as you are the only one willing to admit working at Al Beeb
Not certain how many times i need to post the quote for Beeboids but here it is again:
And when you are with one side from the conflict, you have got to put to them the very best arguments of the other side - the toughest questions. But the aim is absolutely not to smother the story with a search for some sort of formulaic, 50-50-style balance.
Earlier reference is here
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...4292634/
#360786
pounce:
To the BBC clone who doesn't know what CAIR stands for;
Council on American-Islamic Relations
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Cri...lamic_Relations
But then I'm sure you already knew that. But as dictated to you by your holy book you are taught to lie in which to appear the victim.CAIR to explain that?
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
The BBC has covered this in the past. Do you like this quote Terry?:
"There may never be justice for 19-year-old Yousra: shot dead in Gaza by gunmen from Hamas."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ent/
4522465.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6110498.stm
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Bijan - I have no idea why you think this quote shows bias. To me it shows the precise opposite. Explain to me.
deegee:
And when you are with one side from the conflict, you have got to put to them the very best arguments of the other side - the toughest questions. But the aim is absolutely not to smother the story with a search for some sort of formulaic, 50-50-style balance.
Alan Johnston was definitely with one side of the conflict but when did he ever put Israel's best arguments to the Palestinians? For that matter when did he ever put Israel's best arguments to the BBC public?
It is fairly much accepted that he was a propagandist for the Palestinians but this quote makes him out to be a hypocrite as well.
K:
Sorry Nick Renolds,
Much as I appreciate you finding 2year old news items on Hamas persecuting Christians, I was referring to the specific event that happened, you know, recently.
Jpost news that doesn't quite make it to
the world's number 1 news provider
pounce:
But Nick ref your answer to Terry about Christian persecution in the Holyland. Did you know that the first article by Orla Guerin is about the Honour killing of a Christian woman by her family for falling in love with a Muslims. At a stroke the BBC implies that the situation reference Honour killings is an equal problem for Christians and Muslims. Is that what the BBC implies by quoting;
“News programmes must present all sides of the debate, the report says “
Because if you read the mentioned article more prominence is given towards the Christian angle than the Islamic one. I mean it does end with;
“Back in Ramallah, Faten lies buried in the Christian cemetery, in a rough grave, without even a headstone. Her father was released from jail for two hours to attend her funeral.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ent/
4522465.stm
The fact remains ‘Honour crimes’ is a far bigger problem in the Islamic community than the Christian one. Yet the BBC says otherwise.
But on another note. Thank you for at least having the balls to say just who you are. Not many people (and I include myself in that) have the strength of character in which to admit just who they are on this board. And just for the record. I have no problem funding the BBC for the excellent service it provides. I only have a problem with its (my viewpoint) biased news service.
K:
If anyone is wondering whether BBC is biased on the subject of Israel, ask yourself whether any of the following have shown a constant tendency to report the (anti-semitic, suicide bombing) Palestinians as victims:
Caroline Hawley
Orla Guerin
Babs Plett
Jeremy Bowen
Allan Johnston
Matthew Price
Fergal Keane
John Simpson
Then ask yourself whether you've ever seen a BBC journalist who's ever tended to report Israel as the victim.
BBC: When balance is all one way.
bijan daneshmand:
Nick
the two BBC reports you site as BBC coverag of the eradication of all non Islamic religions from Palestinian teritories by Hamas are in a word Pathetic
the first is an honor killing story were the real reason is never mentioned through the story ... the question of why was she killed is asked but not explicity mentioned ... let me guess was the "morality squad" mentioned Moslems? Could Orla Guerin have described them as an Islamic MOrality squad?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ent/
4522465.stm
Anyone reading this article about teh dsestruction of the Christian community would have thought that it had everything to do with Israel's Wall than the rise of Hamas ....
all that alludes to the real problem is one cryptic comment
"From a statistical perspective and the way things are progressing politically and socially there is a problem," he says.
"The changes are very drastic and very dramatic in a very short space of time."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6110498.stm
Is this the best you can do to justify the
Ritter:
Supplies 'urgently needed' in Gaza
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6764155.stm
"....Israeli officials have also said they will continue supplying water and electricity to the territory."
What amazes me is that Israel's people are so generous that they continue to supply an enemy who is sworn to destroy them.
With friends like the BBC, Hamas will revel in being protrayed as innocent victims, at the hands of the evil jooooos.
Maybe the BBC could ask why radical Islam can't provide for it's own people? Or would that be (in the language of todays report on BBC bias) outwith the "liberal-minded comfort zone"?
meanwhile, in 'entertainment news'.....
Does the BBC have a bias problem?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6764779.stm
Alan:
Al Beeb's bias continues, regardless of its own critical report on itself:
E.G. Radio 4's 'PM' news summary at
5.30 pm today, carried 3 consecutive
and unchallenged, threatening criticism of Salman Rushdie's knighthood. They were from Muslims: representatives of the Pakistan and Iran governments, and from Lord Ahmed.
bijan daneshmand:
Nick
Bijan - I have no idea why you think this quote shows bias. To me it shows the precise opposite. Explain to me.
first have a look at my earllier comment
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...?
a=39991#360785
If you carefully re-read the article you should be able to understand the underlying point made by Alan about the role of a reporter
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...2105122,00.html
Alan is saying dont worry about the specifics of the incident ... about "whether it had been a bazooka shell or a rocket-propelled grenade that had done the damage, and where the soldier who fired it must have been standing on the street outside."
[I can now see how the BBC got the "Qana Massacre" story so badly wrong].
Instead he impells the students to report the story of the victims ... and whats worse to IDENTIFY with the victims ...
"Of course, their story, what had happened to them - what they were, and what they had lost - was what the war was all about. It did not really matter whether it was a bazooka or a rocket that had turned their world upside down.
So much of the job is about trying to find the imagination within yourself to try to see, to really see, the world through the eyes of the people in the story."
When reporters start reporting on these lines, then they stop becoming reporters and instead become commentators who by definition have to push a distinct world view ... and that is compounded 100 fold when teh reporter begins to identify him/her self with the side that he has decided is the victim ... and goes on to fabricate facts to fit with the "victim narrative" thats where the bias creeps into the reporting ...
case in point ... is this report which bends the facts to accentuate the narrative ... yet another house that had a "shell put through it" ...
http://www.snappedshot.com/archi...had-
Bumped.html
Ritter:
Some absolute nuggets in here..... I highly recommend a read.
BBC Trust: From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/
b...rtialitybbc.pdf
"Helen Boaden said that the BBC’s institutional attitudes were sometimes confused with its editorial policy. As an employer, the BBC was ‘passionately committed to diversity beyond what the law requires’, and this led to muddled thinking. ‘I’ve literally had conversations with my journalists, who think we can’t say nasty things about black people even if they’re true, “because we’re committed to diversity, aren’t we?”’
.....
"Justin Webb, the BBC’s Washington correspondent, said the BBC and other broadcasters failed to ask serious questions about why the USA is ‘as successful as it is, why the system it invented works. And, in the tone of what we say about America, we have a tendency to scorn and deride. We don’t give America any kind of moral weight in our broadcasts.’ When Webb was asked about ‘a casual anti-Americanism’, he said he consciously tried to redress it."
and
"Roger Mosey, Director of Sport, thought that ‘the BBC has in the past been too closed to a wide range of views and we’ve had too narrow an agenda. And I have some sympathies with what Janet Daley says generally about a liberal/pinko agenda at times.’
and...
‘It’s a bit like walking into a Sunday meeting of the Flat Earth Society’, said The Daily Telegraph’s Jeff Randall about his time as Business Editor of the BBC. ‘As they discuss great issues of the day, they discuss them from the point of view that the earth is flat. If someone says, “No, no, no, the earth is round!”, they think this person is an extremist. That’s what it’s like for someone with my right-of-centre views working inside the BBC.’
How does the BBC report 'impartially on itself' (for we have been told it's the law for it to be so).
And how does the BBC respond to the allegations of bias?
Q: Does the BBC have a bias problem?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6764779.stm
A: (according to the BBC) No.
Biodegradable:
So much of the job is about trying to find the imagination within yourself to try to see, to really see, the world through the eyes of the people in the story. Not just through the eyes of the Palestinian who has just had his home smashed. But also through the eyes of the three young Israelis in a tank who smashed it. Why did they see that as a reasonable thing to do? What was going through their minds as their tank went through the house?
- Alan Johnston
Nick Reynolds (BBC),
Can you really see no bias in that?
No reason given for the demolition of the house. Was there perhaps an arms smuggling tunnel beneath the house? Was it perhaps the home of a suicide bomber?
We're not told and even if the truth was either of the two cases above Johnston wouldn't care. His mind was already made up. His brief was to report on the "Palestinians'" predicament
How about seeing through the eyes of the passengers on an Israeli bus, or their relatives, and also through the eyes of the young Jihadis and their supporters. Why did they see that as a reasonable thing to do?
How about seeing through the eyes of the Sderot resident looking helplessly at the ruins of his home and the also through the eyes of the terrorists who lauched the Qassam rocket. Why did they see that as a reasonable thing to do? What was going through their minds as their rocket went through the house?
You see Alan Johnston's bias begins at the moment he stops comparing like with like and makes a value judgment, disregarding the BBC's own guidelines.
The BBC has a long history of showing images of grieving "Palestinian" families and giving names to the suicide terrorists, they're even counted among the number of victims, yet there is rarely such sympathy shown towards dead Jews in Israel.
I posted recently about the number of victims of Qassam rockets in Sderot being diminished by the BBC from 3 to 2 then to only one, and no mention at all that the third was a severly handicapped boy of 13.
Similar double standards have been shown in the reporting of the recent atrocities carried out by Hamas in Gaza. Barely a word about dead women and children killed by the Hamas terrorists - had they been killed by the IDF you know as well as I that the treatment would have been very different. Nothing at all about the ransacking of churches and Christian schools, bibles burnt and crucifixes destroyed.
All the while the constant bleating from the BBC and its guests on programmes like World Have Your Say insists that all of this is the fault of the US and Israel and if only "we" hadn't stopped giving aid to Hamas none of this would have happened.
Of course the BBC is biased, and a very large part of the problem is that it can't see it.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
It's a pity this thread has become about the Middle East again rather than the report on impartiality.
Biodegradable - you miss the point of what Johnson's piece where the quotes come from is about. It's not a news report, where the reasons why the house was demolished would be given. It's a piece from Alan describing his philosophical approach to his job i.e. to try and see all sides point of view.
bijan daneshmand:
Biodegrade
I think Nick may have done a runner on us .... if he hasnt I would be interested in a specific response to the Alan Johnson quotes I have posted here ...
whenever Beeboids are confronted with facts they disappear until the air has cleared .... the BBC as an institution adopts the same tactic ... instead of dealing with the problem their problem they use a number of well tested tactics ... MisDirection ... Denial .... Delay ... MisRepresentation .... Obfuscation ... they calculate that as long as there are not to many obvious f*ck *ps ...
like the Andrew Gilligan Affair where Fat Andy was caught with his pants down in a lie to a Parliamentary Comittee ... then they can cary on with their shabby standards ...
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Ritter - have you read the report itself?
bijan daneshmand:
AAAhhhhh Nick
How about being specific about Alan Johnston journalistic philosophy ...
so I take it that you agree that philosphically speaking ...its OK to ignore the facts or at least not determine the exact facts and to instead devote the reporting to ones views and value judgements of a conflict
is that what you are stating?!
bijan daneshmand:
Nick
It's a pity this thread has become about the Middle East again rather than the report on impartiality
to state the obvious the reason teh thread is orientating towards the Middle East is because this conflict is one in which teh BBC reporting bias is most obvious ...
you see there are not too many here concerned about the alleged problems with the standards of impartiality shown in episodes of the Vicar of Dibly ...
the Gorillas in teh room are the BBC reporting on ISLAM, ARAB ISRAELI DISPUTE, LEFT WING DICTATORSHIPS, .... do I need to go on?
Lets have a sensible fact based discussion ... not MisDirection ..
David Preiser:
Nick Reynolds,
Alan Johnston is most definitely not trying to see both sides of the real story. Interviewing someone who has just had his home destroyed and then asking what the soldier was thinking when he destroyed the home is not in reality both sides of the story. I think it is disingenuous to claim otherwise.
Johnston wonders what is going through the soldiers mind, does he? Does Johnston report that the owner of the destroyed home was connected to a suicide bomber? Does Johnston report that the home was a cover for a smuggling tunnel below? Does Johnston try to report that the home was hiding a massive weaons cache, or that mortars had been launched into Israeli territory - at non-military targets - from the home? That would be the true "other side" of the story. Not an emotional reaction from the soldier carrying out his job.
This is never what happens in these reports, though, is it? What Johnston and his brethren actually do is show a "victim" without honestly reporting on why the "victim" might have been a target of the action being reported.
Of course, if they ever did report it that way, the reader might be tempted to think that the action of the Israeli soldier was somewhat justified. This wouldn't be acceptable, as the reader then might be tempted to think that the BBC report is biased in favor of Israel. Since that is also unacceptable, the Pally homeowner is portrayed as an innocent victim, out of context.
But there have been several discussions about context with other BBC employees, or BBC supporters, so I don't expect this to be any different.
Biodegradable:
Biodegradable - you miss the point of what Johnson's piece where the quotes come from is about. It's not a news report, where the reasons why the house was demolished would be given. It's a piece from Alan describing his philosophical approach to his job i.e. to try and see all sides point of view.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 18.06.07 - 6:31 pm
I understand that Nick, but the fact that he automatically sees one side as the agressor and the other as the innocent victim is a giveaway - it perfectly illustrates that he, and the BBC's reporting of the ME in general, starts from that premise. It's far from "see all sides' point of view". In fact, in real life, it's very common for the BBC to report Israeli actions without explaining why that action was taken, or sneeringly report with the qualifier that "Israel says..." or "Israel claims..." The prime example being when reporting on those "crude, homemade rockets that rarely cause casualties".
As I said, a fairer and more balanced way to achieve that declared aim would be to compare a "Palestinian" who's home has been demolished with the victims of a suicide attack on a bus or cafe in Israel, or compare the views of IDF soldiers with those of the terrorists - but Johnson shows plainly that he only sees one side, only sympathises with one side, and feels that only one side carries any blame. That much is clear from his reporting - his explanation only confirms it.
Alan:
Al Beeb now claims that it will present a 'wider' range of views to counter any of its own built-in bias. OK. Start with this article supporting Salman Rushdie's knighthood, against the mullahs threats.
"An honour we should all agree with:
knighting Salman Rushdie means Whitehall is willing to offend the mullahs" (by A.S.H.Smyth)
http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk
(go to 'Opinion').
Such an article would begin to redress Al Beeb's built-in Islamic bias of its report in this evening's Radio Four 'PM' 5.30 news summary, which I referred to here at 5.50pm.
Chuffer:
If I knew what CAIR meant, I would...
hillhunt | 18.06.07 - 4:54 pm |
Hillhunt: never knowing when to stop digging.
bijan daneshmand:
The report commissioned by the BBC into itself concluded with something equally blindingly obvious. It said that the organisation is institutionally biased and especially gullible to the blandishments of politically driven celebrities, such as Bono and Bob Geldof. Almost anyone in Britain could have told the BBC that for free, but maybe it’s better to have it in an official report.
Maybe its not if all this report amounts to is a classic case of misdirection ... what the BBC has done here is taken the most innocuous examples of its bias ... where the bias has the least resistance in the public at large ... and "owned up to it" in the Entertainment Section ... and presumabley we wont have any other pro-Make Poverty History incidents in the Vicar of Dibley ... and that is teh bias problem dealt with ...
How stupid do the BBC think that the ordinary license payers are?! I think the answer is very very stupid indeed ...
K:
Did the 6 o'clock news cover the report into BBC bias?
Or was the story omitted in true BBC style?
paul:
Alan 18:54
I read the B-BBC online piece and was not really surprised to see that they mentioned Kohmeni's fatwa against Rushdie, but did not mention that the fatwa in question was a call to have him murdered. Obviously, the concept of Islamic religious leaders calling for someone's murder isn't the sort of thing al-Beeb wants to highlight.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6763119.stm
It's all too much:
The "PM" item about Rushdie's knighthood this afternoon was almost beyond belief. I listened with increasing horror as the monologue went on until the final coup de grace,
Lord Ahmed
"This man,you can see, not only provoked violence around the World because of his writings, but there were many people who were killed around the world.....
...And its' not tine to forgive and forget you don't think....
Forgiving and forgetting is one thing but honouring this man who has blood on his hands, sort of, because of what he did - honouring him, I think is going a bit too far.
....Lord Ahmed, thank you."
Rushdie is the VICTIM not the perpetrator. He hasn't kill anyone. He just wrote a book, and in liberal democracies we are allowed to do that!
This is an utterly unacceptable example of the double standards and bias of the BBC.
Geezer:
"moonbat nibbler:
This report is still a whitewash: "its coverage of conventional politics is judged to be fair and impartial"
While the support for Geldof and Bono is sickly, simplified and unquestioning at least it is well meant. Compare this to the African news output. Al-queda in Somalia are admired for bringing "law and order" to the country. Bbc viewers and listeners are not educated about Darfur because it would mean using the "M" word, show China in a bad light and reveal the structural irrelevance of the UN. This Bbc report sees Live 8 and the culture of celebrity as an easy, non-threatening, scapegoat. It is being used to hide the insidious, ugly and evil bias of the BBC.
Well-said Mr Nibbler,
But I believe that there is a more subtle misdirection going on here.
There is a wide perception that the "Make Poverty History" campaign is an unquestioned good thing, amongst less informed people anyway.
By admitting an uncritical acceptance and promotion of the idea, what the BBC are basically saying, is
"OK, we were spreading propoganda, but hey, perhaps we are only guilty of caring too much!"
After-all, supporting an end to third world poverty can only be considered a noble cause!
Taking the attention off the very serious bias that its News department shows day after day, and that they are refusing to discuss.
jg:
Nick, JR and other BBC lurkers.
Just read the most recommended section of the HYS on the bias report
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/...4951&
#paginator
This is how the British public see you. These are not the views of us here at BBBC, but the views of the general public. Are you not ashamed that you have fallen to such a point where a once great institution is derided by those it purports to serve?
Dave:
Yesterday I wrote: 'I doubt anything will change at the corporation. The report will be publicised, there'll be the usual speechifying from BBC-types about the importance of high standards and impartiality and then ... it'll be back to business as usual.'
From the BBC website today:
'According to Richard Tait, the BBC Trust member who chaired the team overseeing the report: 'Tait believes that, in the end, the broadcasts stayed within the impartiality guidelines.'
Hey, whaddya mean you're not reassured?!
holiday in hamastan:
if you want to see the BBCs bias in all its glory, have a look at Newsround's "Guides" page. This, may i add, is targetted at children.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/h...des/
default.stm
All the usual left-liberal trendy causes get their boxes ticked. So, "India: Riots 2002" is mentioned, but no mention of say "Battle of Britain".
"Islam" is mentioned , but no "Christianity".
its also packed full of , well, downright lies for want of a better word.
for example, D-Day
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/h...000/
3754731.stm
"The allied forces landed on the beaches of Normandy and started to break through the German army's defences. They began an attack that lasted for eleven months and took them all the way to the German capital Berlin, to the bunker that was Adolf Hitler's headquarters."
Errr.. it was the Soviet Red Army that captured Berlin.
Or howlers , such as this one:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/h...600/
1612612.stm
"On 11 September 2001 armed people took control of four planes that were flying above the US"
No mention of Al Qaeda, Islam, or terrorism.
pounce:
On this day when the BBC informs the world it has to be just a little more impartial, they report on a story from Afghanistan where a suicide bomber murders 3 people as well as himself. So on that note what do you think the headline for said article should be?
Suicide bomber kills 3.
3 people killed in suicide bomb attack
Suicide bomber strikes Kabul.
Well that is how any impartial news agency would report such a story . So just how do the BBC report on the above in light of its quest to report impartially?
Nato troops kill Afghan civilian
Nato troops have killed a civilian at the scene of a suicide bomb attack in Kabul, Afghan and Nato officials say. Several others were injured when the US soldiers opened fire. The US military said the shooting had been accidental. At least three people died in the suicide bombing,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6759309.stm
So any of you BBC clones wish to tell me how the BBC justifies 1 death over that of 3. A death I should which would not transpired if the BBC defended terrorists hadn’t decided to kill because their faith tells them to do so. The last I looked 3 deaths outweigh 1 death. Unless of course the victim has been killed by Non Muslims.
The BBC, the fifth columnist in our midst.
moonbat nibbler:
This report shows just how divorced from its blatant bias the BBC is:
"The new College of Journalism has recently launched an online training module on impartiality, presented by Evan Davies. An earlier module, on the pitfalls of loaded language in the Middle East, was presented by Jeremy Bowen."
Jeremy Bowen constantly and consistently talks about Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. Calling the territories "occupied" shows partiality towards Palestinian claims and the use of the plural is loaded language.
Gaza has not been 'occupied' for two years and so there is only one "occupied territory", the West Bank. The inference Bowen constantly makes is that Israel along with Gaza and the West Bank is rightfully Palestinian.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Biogradable - he does not "automatically sees one side as the agressor and the other as the innocent victim". He is simply using this example from his experience to make a point. The point being that news reporting is not just about "who did what to whom" but the human consequences of actions.
pounce:
The BBC, and how it panders to Brown skinned people as only victims;
(PS. Ss a brown skinned person I find that article a bloody joke, but then so do many of the people who replied)
Bridget Jones? She's got it easy
Since when did skin shade, religion and the prospect of living with your in-laws become a concern for educated, career women looking for Mr Right? For British Asian females, who are facing a shrinking pool of eligible men, Bridget Jones had it easy.
I can personally vouch that for every miserable, white Bridget Jones singleton out there, there is a brown Bridget having a worse time.
Many young British Asian women, be they Muslim, Sikh or Hindu, are struggling to find a life partner. Alongside their white peers they have delayed marriage, putting education and careers first.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magaz...ine/
6763443.stm
PPS
Hindu and Sikhs have no problem allowing their females to marry out of the faith. Only one faith out of the three listed doesn't. I wonder which one that could be?
bijan daneshmand:
Now Now Nick
You arent being straight with us ...
[Alan Johnstons] point being that news reporting is not just about "who did what to whom" but the human consequences of actions.
thats NOT what Alan was saying ... what is the problem that people at the BBC have for dealing in facts ... dont obfuscate just read what the man said!
Alan's point was ... the essential element in a conflict zone is not the facts but establishing the victims and identifying with them and conveying their message/struggle etc to the world at large ... unintentionally Johnston has let the cat out of the bag ... Alan's approach is exactly what is wrong with BBC reporting ....
the correct approach to journalism is that reporters report, informed editors editorialize, and readers/viewers are left to make the value judgements.
the BBC in its patronising way has reporters making value judgements and then constantly shovelling their values down the viewers throats ...
have a look at HYS most recoemended comments ... and you will see that this approach is FAILING ...
David Preiser:
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 18.06.07 - 8:20 pm
"The point being that news reporting is not just about "who did what to whom" but the human consequences of actions."
If that were truly the point, then why not report about the action that caused the home to be destroyed? And please don't tell me that the Israeli soldier driving the tank is the cause. The actual cause would be whatever reason the particular home was targeted for destruction.
Johnston ignores this, as do most BBC reporters. And I don't mean why don't they report elsewhere that Palestinians have attacked and/or killed Israeli civilians. I mean this should be covered in the same report as the house being destroyed by an Israeli tank. Otherwise, Johnston's reporting of one particular "human consequence" is out of context, and thus....you get the idea.
But we cannot view any action by an Israeli against a Palestinian as being anything other than horrible, disproportional - if not entirely unprovoked - aggression, can we?
Anonymous:
BJ,
Appreciate the information and thank you for responding, albeit your claim that the BBC "has nothing to hush" is totally unconvincing as my fellow commenters pointed out.
max:
the above was me.
pounce:
The BBC, its hatred of the US and half a story
Azeri radar eyed for US shield
Standing beneath the dramatic Caucasus mountain range in northern Azerbaijan, the Qabala radar station is a stark concrete block which dominates the rural landscape.
This former Soviet installation is now at the centre of discussions between Moscow and Washington. Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested it could be used for a joint missile defence project as an alternative to the United States' plan to build a missile shield in Europe to guard against attacks from what it describes as "rogue states". The US sees Iran - bordering on Azerbaijan - as a potential threat.
………..
There was also scepticism about any possible US involvement in the radar station, which once tracked American military activity. "I do not think the Americans will bring anything good here," said Mustafa, a local teacher. "They haven't ever done anything for Azerbaijan and they only act in their own interests."
…………
"The question is whether the US will agree to use Qabala to show it has a close partnership with Russia. It's about political strategy, not military strategy."
Concerns have also been raised that the proposed missile defence project could damage Azerbaijan's relations with neighbouring Iran. The US believes Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ope/
6764079.stm
Yet again the BBC paints a negative picture of the US in order to please its Islamic masters. Err BBC I think you will find the US has rejected Putins offer for a number of reasons. 99% of them militarily reasons and 1% political. That 1% been Iran is next door and they wouldn’t let it rest with the Yanks to the right of them, to the left of them, to the South of them and to the North of them.
But hey nothing new from the impartial BBC.
bijan daneshmand:
moonbat
Gaza has not been 'occupied' for two years and so there is only one "occupied territory", the West Bank. The inference Bowen constantly makes is that Israel along with Gaza and the West Bank is rightfully Palestinian.
you are correct about this .... its also the reason behind the BBC constantly repeats the Hamas mantra that Isreal is a country that "has no borders" .... this way Bowen can justify Hamas' otherwise illegimate denial of the right for a Jewish state to exist.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
David - because its not a news report its a piece about his philosphical approach to his job.
If it was a news report then of course why the house was destroyed should be reported.
bijan daneshmand:
BBC: [deleted]
[deleted]. the BBC proves you wrong ...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6764779.stm
"In fact, the report is a remarkably frank dissection of the BBC's attempts - and difficulties - in maintaining impartiality in the 21st Century, across its wide range of outlets and programmes.
Richard Tait, the BBC Trust member who chaired the team overseeing the report, is a former editor of ITN.
He said: "It doesn't say the BBC has a liberal bias - it says the BBC will have to work even harder to maintain the trust of the audience in future.
Tait breathes in and then [deleted=]
"Newspapers are becoming viewspapers, people are using the web to get a whole range of different sources of information, and the technology means people can choose their own news."
By the way the BBC would strongly advise you to get rid of your dog ... its a najess animal that is haramand may offend you muslim neighbours as much as any refernce to that son of a bitch Sir Salman ...
Edited By Siteowner
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
BJ - while there are not specific restrictions around the Balen Report it is a confidential document.
And in your contract of employment with the BBC you are restricted from revealing confidential information.
The High Court agreed with the BBC about the Balen Report, so end of story. And to quote:
"The BBC has always maintained that the Balen report is held for purposes of journalism and, therefore, outside the scope of the Freedom of Information Act. The Information Commissioner agreed. We believe that programme makers must have the space to be able to freely discuss and reflect on editorial issues in support of independent journalism.
The BBC also welcomes the High Court's clarification that, in cases where the Information Commissioner agrees with a public service broadcaster that the information sought is outside the scope of the FOI Act, there is no appeal to the Information Tribunal.
The Balen report was commissioned by the former BBC Director of News, Richard Sambrook, from an experienced journalist. It was always intended as an internal review of programme content, to inform future output. It was never intended for publication.
The BBC's action in this case had nothing to do with the fact that the Balen report was about the Middle East – the same approach would have been taken whatever area of news output was covered."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice.../27/
balen.shtml
Could we PLEASE talk about the impartiality report?
K:
Nick Reynolds (BBC)
I think you have a fair point that all the context does not need to be provided for an opinion piece as opposed to a news story.
However, wouldn't you acknowledge that the BBC has form on this, i.e. middle east news stories denuded of anti-Palestinian/pro-Israeli facts? Thus, the natural distrust of Allen's narrative. Why haven't you reported this story?
Sometimes, whole stories are ignored because they either favour Israel or indict Palestinians. An example would be the story Terry Johnson referred to earlier.
Jon:
Picture this:
I am a BBC reporter during the second world war based in Dresden. I have lived in that city for years reporting the "news" from the German point of view. Because of all my years in Dresden I have made many friends One day I am with a family of an SS officer who is fighting on the Russian front. Then one night bombs become raining down from the RAF - I see my friends house get flattened by a British bomb. My friends are panicking and obviousley in fear of their lives. They keep saying "How can the British do this" I immediatley report that the British are carrying out "war crimes" - I do not see this from the British point of view - how can I - I have known this family for years, and here I am witnessing the death of my friends.
My reporting cannot be unbiased, no ones would. This is the problem the BBC reporters like Alan Johnstone and Jerramy Bowen have an empathy with their friends. Maybe the BBC think they are actually reporting things from both sides - but they are deluded - An unbiased view would be from the outside, from afar. It is impossible to be unbised in cases where the "reporter" is actually living with one side in a conflict.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
K - I don't think its true that "whole stories are ignored" because of some ideological bias.
We can't report every single story. I think our reporting of Israel/Palestine has got progressively better over the past few years and we make strenous efforts to show all sides.
But I doubt if anyone on this thread can ever be persuaded of that.
So could we PLEASE talk about the impartiality report?
bijan daneshmand:
So could we PLEASE talk about the impartiality report?
OK Nick .... So what do you think about the Impartiality Report?
Was it Excellent, or just Very Very Good, and impartial ....
K:
Nick Reynolds(BBC),
The main concern of people at this site is the partiality of the BBC as opposed to this report which seemingly misses the point. The most common grievances of people on this this blog (in addition to many journalists like Melanie Philips, Charles Moore, Mark Steyn, Tim Hames, William Shawcross, etc.) is the constant tilt against America and Israel and towards muslims. This has been recognised in special meeting of your own people last year. This is the bias you need to address. If you were told to come here to fire-fight the report's publication I fear you are wasting your time.
What's the point in saving the kennel when the house is burning down?
This will continue to grow as a problem until the licence fee is scrapped or the problem is fixed.
If you want to fix it:
1) Start advertising jobs in both right and left wing newspapers (without filtering responses)
2) Staff your Middle East offices with people sympathetic to the existence of Israel.
3) Have an editorial policy that actually checks that salient context wasn't omitted. If all else fails, you could always email Melanie Philips if your article missed anything.
But all of this presumes a will on the behalf of the BBC.
Jon:
"The report quotes Curtis as arguing that Make Poverty History was a movement, rather than a campaign, so the BBC should not have been so concerned about impartiality.
He said all the main political parties were in support, which he believed made it uncontroversial."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6764779.stm
Membership of the EU is supported by all political parties, the theory of MMGW is supported by all political parties - does this mean that because it is a "movement" and not a "campaign" the BBC can be as biased as they want? I thought the BBC were supposed to report other views. There are a great many "sceptics" on MMGW and the EU. But the BBC door is almost closed on different viewpoints.
K:
Nick Reynolds (BBC)
Are you seriously suggesting that the BBC would have neglected a report where Israelis had entered a mosque and threatened muslims?
I think you are being disingenuous about not covering this story because you can't cover every story.
bijan daneshmand:
Good Analogy Jon
Because of all my years in Dresden I have made many friends One day I am with a family of an SS officer who is fighting on the Russian front.
But what would if one day the SS officer came around and took you to Gestapo Headquarters and held you there ... and asked you to broadcast a tape blaming teh British, Americans and of course the Jews for reigning death and destruction on the 3rd Reich and demanding that certain Nazi Officials held in Britian ...lets say Rudolph Hess ... shoudl be released as they have not been tried yet ... would you betray your country and do it?
moonbat nibbler:
Another five minutes to read, another gem:
"The whole point of message boards is that opinion should, in general, flow freely, as it does on Have Your Say on bbc.co.uk, with only such balance as the contributors themselves happen to supply."
Dear Random House,
Could you please publish the BBC report "From Seesaw To Wagon Wheel" under your BBC Books comedy imprint?
Regards,
Mr Nibbler.
Alan:
Given the BBC's claim to want to represent a 'wider' range of views in future, and given its gullibility to BONO's blandishments hitherto, perhaps the BBC will present a critical programme based on this:
"Welcome to the People's Republic of Bono" (13 June) (by Brendan O'Neill)
http://www.spiked-online.com
David Preiser:
Nick Reynolds,
You're right that:
"because its not a news report its a piece about his philosphical approach to his job."
However, that's how he does his news reports. If his philosophical approach to his job is to ignore all the things I mentioned previously, then his contributions - and those of other BBC reporters with a similar philosophical approach - should not be represented as news reports. They should be presented as One Side's Perspective.
This goes right back to the impartiality report, no? There are many, many examples of this sort of philosophical report on topics that do not involve the Middle East. Otherwise, the report wouldn't have even been done in the first place, nor would the Balen report, etc., etc.
I can deal with presentations of One Side's Perspective, but only if they are represented as such. Which is most certainly not the case.
One small example that has nothing to do with the Middle East would be The Vicar of Dibley.
The original premise was to educate the masses to accept a female CofE vicar. So the recent political activist stunt on the show should be no surprise. But that's Light Entertainment, not news. Although it is unfortunate that viewers are forced by law to pay for this "education".
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
K - regarding your solutions.
1. We already advertsise jobs in all newspapers.
2. We couldn't do this anymore than we could recruit staff who were sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. The BBC has to be impartial.
3. We already have policies on accuracy. Of course we should report all the relevant facts and I hope we do. Melanie Phillips regularly appears on the BBC.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Jon - people who are sceptical about climate change and the EU regularly appear in the BBC's output.
Geezer:
I didn't think it was possible, but this report manages to be both Hogwash and Whitewash. Congratulations Beeb, another first!!
The BBC are under growing pressure from the public about their biases on so many things, from Europe, immigration,Israel, being anti-British and toadying up to every left-wing cause or "movement". That's why the have produced this meaningless bit of twaddle, to try and convince the ever sceptical, Licence fee paying masses that they will change. Yet, conveniently absolve the News dept rom any wrongdoing, despite most anger being directed at the wankers who call themsleves correspondents and news editors.
What a joke! Keep at it Beeb, you are merely nailing the coffin lid down on your license fee.
Geezer:
Nick Reynolds:
More nonsense. Having the odd person on to voice differing opinions doesn't nearly make up for the overwhelming Bias of he editorials, especially as these people are always described as being right-wing or Pro-this or anti-that and are only included in the less watched elements of the news schedule, being tucked aware on obscure parts of the radio or News 24. Rarely do these people make appearences on the 6 or 10 o'clock BBC 1 News programmes. The strict editoraial line is maintained for the two most influential programmes to the mass of the population
Who has more influence on the tone of middel-east output: Jeremy Bowen or Melanie Philips and allies? Pretty obvious conclusion really.
Allan@Oslo:
I had to copy this from an earlier linked article in The Guardian:
Vin Ray uncovers a previously unpublished piece by captive BBC Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston that underlines his mastery of the art of storytelling
STORYTELLING - Jackanory meets the 10 o´clock news. This sums the left's use of news for lies.
BTW, I noticed from a link to the BBC that Bernard Manning died today and comments (not tributes - bias in BBC 'comedy'??) were invited. Fortunately, the comments were all tributes. Bernard Manning was a genuinely great comedian because he told jokes. The likes of Mark Steele are not funny, and they epitomise the descent of the BBC into a cesspit of leftist, humourless bias.
callmedave:
Who has more influence on the tone of middel-east output: Jeremy Bowen or Melanie Philips and allies? Pretty obvious conclusion really.
good comment.
must say thankyou to nick reynolds though for debating the issues,makes
a change from hillhunts sneering
sarcastic gibberish.
max:
Speaking of Melanie Phillips.
http://www.melaniephillips.com/d...m/diary/?
p=1555
dave t:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6764779.stm
Meanwhile I can't find the original link to the report on the front page of the website - by Gum that were quick lads!
At the very bottom is a link to the 'article' above which attempts to decry the Sunday press reaction..no bias there then... if BBC were impartial they should merely put the Sunday papers' reactions in the article and NOT attempt to decry them etc. The BBC should report and WE should decide - THAT is where they went wrong so many years ago.
And on such a slow news day yet the report gets buried already...if people didn't know about it and went looking they would never find it - especially under entertainment! I wonder if our American cousins will be able to find it without going via Fox News or suchlike since they are 8 hrs behind in some cases.
I do like the comment they show though - that only the BBC are surprised by this report! How did that one slip through?
John Boy:
The BBCs cultural bias is evident throughout its website.
Check out the On this Day section and look for missing events of real import.
For instance much is made of the loony loyalist grenade attack on an IRA funeral on March 16th.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/...000/
2523953.stm
It is the top story above the Halabja gas attack and Aldo Moro's kidnapping.
Yet no mention of the savage killings by and IRA mob of two British Corporals (AKA the Corporals Killings) on the 19th of March the same year. It seems to have been outranked by the proposed building of Milton Keynes. This is suprising to me since it was one of the most shocking things I ever witnessed on film.
You have to go to wiki for this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Cor...porals_killings
Both events were equally memorable and in fact part of a chain of events since the IRA mob at first assumed the Corporals to be loyalists attacking the funeral.
OTD is an archive now. It may prove to be a lasting monument to the BBCs cultural bias. Unless it is stealth edited of course.
dave t:
John Boy - and no mention of the fact that both R SIGNALS Corporals deliberately fired into the air to try and drive off the mob when they could have (under the rules of engagement/ Yellow Card) fired AT their attackers and killed some of them. But then such sacrifice and sense of duty are unknown or not understood at the likes of the BBC are they? Why DO so many in the BBC support the cowards and thugs and murderers? Is it something to do with a moral vacuum in their liberal world makeup?
Ultraviolents:
Look, Nick Reynolds, what about calling the president of Iran a "trenchant critic" of Israel?
Why no explanation?
I feel something worse than anger towards you.
dave t:
Perhaps 'trenchant critic' is doubleplus truthspeak for 'fruitloop' and we've been wrong all along?
No I didn't think so either.... 8-)
John Boy:
The BBC is not even what it was in the Eighties. But even then as can be witnessed by dramas like Edge of Darkness there was an anti-American CND undercurrent. Drama is drama of course and I quite enjoyed that at the time, but I get the feeling that mindset has completely taken over the news organization now as well.
It seems to be the BBC is staffed by people who secretly wish the USSR had won the cold war, the IRA had driven the British from NI and feverishly await the next terror attack so it can be blamed on the disaster in Iraq. I think its sad really.
Anyway, those Corporals were brave and clearly decent men who did the8ir best to avoid the trouble they stumbled into, and deserve better from what is supposed to be an unslanted view of history.
I just spotted another classic in OTD - check out http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/...000/
2891661.stm
Does any other event in the history of the last half of the twentieth century get two articles? Hmmm.
Anonymous:
Yes, Dave t it is the tiny little world they inhabit. I've spent time with the supposed anarchists of the world, even staying in their dirty little squats.They support any tinpot wanker that spreads their pathetic ideology. They got excited about being radical in their youth & sadly still believe it even into middle age. Well past their sel by date to my mind!
PJF:
.
"Could we PLEASE talk about the impartiality report?"
No problem, Nick - look, commenters are.
Could we PLEASE see the Balen report?
You seem to think your parroting of the BBC press release will somehow bring closure. Forget that.
"And in your contract of employment with the BBC you are restricted from revealing confidential information."
Well thank God that for the sake of freedom (and journalism) there are whistleblowers all over willing to put their conscience above their contracts, and hell, above even the Official Secrets Act, to reveal information in the public interest. All over except in the journalistic ranks of the BBC, it seems. They'll happily use the information for which others may go to prison to release, but sod even a leak when it comes to their own pensions.
"The BBC has always maintained that the Balen report is held for purposes of journalism..."
The BBC and its journalists clearly have no idea just how contemptible that line makes the BBC and its journalists look.
.
Roland Deschain:
People who are sceptical about climate change and the EU regularly appear in the BBC's output.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 18.06.07 - 9:57 pm | #
It is refreshing that someone at the BBC is prepared to discuss the issues with us openly and I would thank you for that Nick. It does us all good to hear opinions different to our own.
However I am struggling to think of any climate change sceptic who regularly appears in the BBC output. Can you honestly say that coverage of this issue by the BBC reflects the views of the public?
(I know. Now I'm going to get a list of climate change sceptics who've appeared on the BBC talking about something else entirely!)
hillhunt:
Biased BBC:
Whinge Speed: Hurricane Force.
My favourite... John Boy:
It seems to be the BBC is staffed by people who secretly wish the USSR had won the cold war, the IRA had driven the British from NI and feverishly await the next terror attack so it can be blamed on the disaster in Iraq. I think its sad really
Y-e-e-e-s. It is sad to post obvious tripe like that.
But you went and did it anyway.
Bryan:
Bryan, you are wrong about Helen Boaden and Barbara Plett. Helen Boaden actually said that Plett's FOOC on Arafat was an error of judgement.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 18.06.07 - 12:52 pm
"Judgement" didn't come into it. It was Plett's spontaneous expression of her bias, snug in her BBC cocoon. And Boaden bent over backwards to cover for Plett and excuse her and represent the bias as something else.
Here's what she added about Plett:
She unintentionally gave the impression of over-identifying with Arafat.
That statement is worthy of close examination because it is a gem of an example of the deeply-ingrained attitudes that give rise to BBC bias and, at the same time, it's such a poor attempt to represent the bias as something very different, almost innocent. We analysed it on this very blog at the time.
Perhaps you should take a careful look at it.
Sarah:
The BBC seems to want to change the history of the world.
It may well changes its future. Certainly I would never support any use of force or loss of my American compatriots' lives to defend a country the licence payers of which support such an organisation. I would object, wholeheartedly.
hillhunt:
Sarah:
The BBC seems to want to change the history of the world. It may well changes its future. Certainly I would never support any use of force or loss of my American compatriots' lives to defend a country the licence payers of which support such an organisation.
Y-e-e-e-s. On that basis, you'all for pulling out of Iraq, given the welcome your (and our) troops are getting day after day?
Biodegradable:
Biogradable - he does not "automatically sees one side as the agressor and the other as the innocent victim". He is simply using this example from his experience to make a point.
Thanks for your response Nick. Others have responded while I've been away, I agree with them and don't want to repeat myself. I do appreciate you taking the time to respond and debate here, and I understand how you would want to defend your colleague, but I simply don't go along with the idea that Alan Johnston has ever been other than biased in his reporting from Gaza.
While there has been a huge outpouring of sympathy and support for him since his "capture" most supporters, and indeed his own bosses at the BBC have praised him as a friend to the "palestinian cause". To the best of my knowledge I haven't heard any Israelis praising his impartiality and integrity. That, I thik, says it all.
The point being that news reporting is not just about "who did what to whom" but the human consequences of actions.
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 18.06.07 - 8:20 pm
I've already pointed out that the "human consequences" of "Palestinian" terrorism on Israelis is rarely covered. Of course Johnston's job was to cover Gaza, but surely somebody over there could cover the Israeli "predicament" too.
I previously asked "John Reith" to comment on the lack of any mention of terrorism as an obstacle in the recent "Obstacles to peace" series. He admitted that its omission was "iffy".
Do you not see that as another clear example of "bias by omission" and unbalanced narrative?
callmedave:
Y-e-e-e-s. It is sad to post obvious tripe like that.
hillhunt | 18.06.07
hey dimwit,
we have to sift thru your shitty tripe everyday.
hillhunt:
callmedave:
I see. The BBC is staffed by unreconstructed Stalinists who wanted an IRA victory and are desperately longing for another terror attack on the country they and their families live in?
And you expect the world to take this blog seriously?
Jon:
Nick Reynolds (BBC) - Yes people do appear on the BBc who have a different opinion on MMGW (not often) - but watch this from the Politics Show with Al Gore and later Peter Hitchins and comapare and contrast how they are treated.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q...related&
search=
The opening line from the BBC presenter.
"...How he thinks he can convince people in Britain that are sceptical of climate change that it is a big problem"
Al Gore mentions that 6,000 scientists agree with him - the presenter does not question that figure (which is wrong according to the IPCC) - every other question put to Al Gore is on the presunption that MMGW is a fact. Contrast that with the questioning of Peter Hitchins - is this bias?
Pete:
I couldn't care less whether the BBC thinks it is biased or not. All I want is the right not to subscribe to it and to watch other channels without being fined and getting a criminal record.
MisterMinit:
Can anyone show me any facts that show the BBC's hiring policy to be anymore Guardian-centric than any other media organisation.
Or at least a breakdown of where it places its adverts.
And I would imagine that the bulk of their job applicants come via their website.
callmedave:
hillhunt | 19.06.07 - 12:14 am
y.e.e.e.s shitty tripe is shitty tripe.
Biodegradable:
And I would imagine that the bulk of their job applicants come via their website.
MisterMinit | 19.06.07 - 12:18 am
Do you have a link for the page that advertises their job vacancies?
Biodegradable:
Don't bother MisterMinit, it's here, for what it's worth:
https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/fe/tpl_bbc01.asp
Not much there.
hillhunt:
Jon:
Contrast that with the questioning of Peter Hitchins - is this bias?
Hitchens is treated respectfully and his opinions given full weight. He does get into a (mild) verbal tussle at the end, but that's with another guest, whom he puts down as a Guardian writer who only mixes with other lefties....
You could describe it as biased.
But you'd be wrong.
Jon:
"Can anyone show me any facts that show the BBC's hiring policy to be anymore Guardian-centric than any other media organisation."
"In the fiscal year from from April 2004 until March 2005, the BBC spent a total of £568,343 on recruitment advertising in a total of 49 newspapers. The recipient of the largest amount of revenue from such BBC advertising was, by far, The Guardian. Nearly 41% of the BBC's expenditures, or £231,944, went into The Guardian's coffers. To put this into some perspective, this is over two and a half times more than the amount received by the next largest recipient, The Western Mail (a Welsh paper) which received £92,388, or just over 16% of the total expenditures. The Times/Sunday Times received a combined total of just £53,326, or a shade over 9% of the total. The amount received by The Guardian alone is approximately equal to the next seven largest recipients combined. And one of those seven, The Manchester Evening News, which received £11,100, is in fact itself a member of The Guardian Media Group."
http://
theamericanexpatinuk.blog...artnership.html
hillhunt:
Biodegradababble:
Don't bother MisterMinit, it's here, for what it's worth:
https://jobs.bbc.co.uk/fe/tpl_bbc01.asp
Not much there.
Nothing of your stature for sure, although there are 10 junior-ish jobs on offer at the BBC website.
How many advertised, by contrast, in today's Media Guardian?
Oh...none.
MisterMinit:
I'm on my mobile phone and you can't seem to access the careers stuff from the BBC mobile home page.
But this Guardian argument slightly annoys me as I often hear this criticism yet I have never seen any statistics on the matter at all. And don't forget, bias is an inherently statistical concept.
Jon:
MisterMinit | 19.06.07 - 12:42 am |
"But this Guardian argument slightly annoys me as I often hear this criticism yet I have never seen any statistics on the matter at all. And don't forget, bias is an inherently statistical concept."
Read the post above
MisterMinit:
Jon, that's interesting.
How does this compare with other media organisations?
will:
And I would imagine that the bulk of their job applicants come via their website.
MisterMinit | 19.06.07 - 12:18 am
Well that would make the pushing of tens (hundreds?) of thousands of pounds to theguardian the more outrageous.
Jon:
As BSkyB and ITV are commercial companies, the FOI Act does not apply so it would be difficult to find out. But as BSkyB is owned by a media man - I would guess that he would use his own media outlets to recruit staff.
I'm not sure about Channel 4 as they are partly funded by the government so I believe.
.
will:
Politics Show with Al Gore
The BBC interviewer was desperate to get Gore to criticise the UK's efforts to meet its obligations on climate change.
She had obviously only been exposed to the BBC's coverage, from which one would never know that, as Gore said, the UK is a world leader. The UK is set to make emission reductions of almost twice its Kyoto target - thus bailing out all the EU backsliders.
(Good job Hitchens is a gent. That scornful laughter from theguardianperson could have tempted some to give her the traditional cure for hysterics.)
deegee:
Nick Reynolds or anybody:
But also through the eyes of the three young Israelis in a tank who smashed it. Why did they see that as a reasonable thing to do? What was going through their minds as their tank went through the house?
- Alan Johnston
Please publish the link to the Alan Johnston interview with the three Israelis. I seem to have missed this story.
Gordon:
Wrt the two coporals murdered by the IRA, not only was their honorable behaviour rarely alluded to, but the more robust idea that they should have fired on the crowd in the hope of making their escape or if not at least taking a few dozen of their attackers with them, was totally absent from public debate.
Mike S:
Why does the BBC call lebanese politicians who want less syrian goverment influence in their country, anti-syrian and not Pro-independence. Anti-syrian suggests a sort unrational hate of everything syrian.
Alan:
Mike S
Perhaps Al Beeb isn't aware of:
"ASSAD'S GAMBIT"
http://www.coxandforkum.com/
(14 June; scroll down).
Alan:
Two useful piece on BBC Report in the 'Telegraph' today:
1.) "BBC viewers angered by its innate liberal bias";
2.) "The BBC can't kick its addition to bias" (Damian Thompson)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk
The BBC Report on itself tries to reassure us of what it thinks is its 'impartiality' by approvingly quoting the following unimpeachable example of impartiality, i.e. bias:
"An earlier module, on the pitfalls of loaded language in the Middle East, was presented bt Jeremy Bowen"
(Page 11 of Report).
Biodegradable:
Please publish the link to the Alan Johnston interview with the three Israelis. I seem to have missed this story.
deegee | 19.06.07 - 6:45 am
Apparently it wasn't a story but a hypothetical example that Johnston used in a lecture.
Nick Reynolds claims that because it wasn't an actual story it proves nothing. I maintain that it shows very clearly the psycology behind BBC reporting.
Biodegradable:
deegee,
It was from "a previously unpublished piece by captive BBC Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston that underlines his mastery of the art of storytelling"
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...2105122,00.html
There is no myanishen district:
There is no myanishen district in Afghanistan.
Hillhunt are you going to retract this false reporting on behalf of your BBC?
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
The BBC's response to the reporting of its new Impartiality Report:
Does the BBC have a bias problem?
If you've read the newspapers, you may have got the impression that a BBC report on impartiality has concluded that the BBC is "institutionally biased". ...
In fact, the report doesn't reach that conclusion - though it does quote people who hold those beliefs
Ah. I see. So that's okay then. These people are mistaken or deluded. Carry on as usual then.
Silly me. Er, now then, where did I put the Victory Gin....?
hillhunt:
There is no myanishen district:
There is no myanishen district in Afghanistan. Hillhunt are you going to retract this false reporting on behalf of your BBC?
Of course.
Just as soon as I become an employee of theirs. Which I'm not. And never have been...
On the other hand, I bow to B-BBCers' extensive knowledge of Afghan place names and only mention is passing that the name Myanishen is being quoted by the respected Reuters and AFP news agencies.
http://www.canada.com/vancouvers...ef-
3413f1173f78
http://www.france24.com/france24...0fox&
cat=europe
In fact, you'll find a comment in the French report from an ISAF spokesman named John Thomas, confirming the Taleban success.
Just remind me: What is it I'm supposed to apologise for?
There is no myanishen district:
Hillhunt
I accept your apology and retraction such as it is though it is not clear that it is on behalf of your corporation as you do not yet work for them.
I trust you will to see to it that your other colleagues at the BBC supporters club understand that they have been duped regarding its existence.
I am pleased to see that you at the BBC do not use other's errors, however highly regarded those organisations are, to condone mistakes by your corporation, but instead follow the path that you should be up with the best and not trailing along with shoddy reporting behind the very worst.
I will approach people at Reuters and AFP to similarly retract as obviously the BBC and its supporters are not in a position to retract for them.
holiday in hamastan:
hmmm... googling on "myanishen" doesnt return a wikipedia entry (googling for geographical names usually does)
http://www.google.co.uk/search?h...le+Search&
meta=
a direct search on wikipedia , again no results:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Spe...earch=myanishen
hmmm.. interesting!
BJ:
1) Start advertising jobs in both right and left wing newspapers (without filtering responses)
I haven't seen a BBC job advertised in the Guardian for months now. Most are advertised on the BBC website. If they are advertised in the Guardian, it's because the Guardian has the most popular media section of all daily newspapers.
2) Staff your Middle East offices with people sympathetic to the existence of Israel.
Can I refer you to this?
3) Have an editorial policy that actually checks that salient context wasn't omitted. If all else fails, you could always email Melanie Philips if your article missed anything.
Because she's sooooooooo balanced, isn't she?
holiday in hamastan:
ah. found it. its a mis spelling. the district is actually
Miyannasheen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Miy...asheen_District
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Biodegradeable: what it shows is Alan Johnson's approach to his job i.e. report both sides fairly.
Regarding climate change this is what the report says:
"The BBC has held a high-level seminar with some of the best scientific experts, and has come to the view that the weight of evidence no longer justifies equal space being given to the opponents of the consensus.
But these dissenters (or even sceptics) will still be heard, as they should, because it is not the BBC’s role to close down this debate.
They cannot be simply dismissed as ‘flat-earthers’ or ‘deniers’, who ‘should not be given a platform’ by the BBC. Impartiality always requires a breadth of view: for as long as minority opinions are coherently and honestly expressed, the BBC must give them appropriate space."
Biodegradable:
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Biodegradeable: what it shows is Alan Johnson's approach to his job i.e. report both sides fairly.
Thanks again for your response Nick, but once again I must disagree with you.
Johnston's choice of example demonstrates his mindset; "Palestinians" as impotent, innocent bystanders watching their homes being destroyed by ruthless Israelis in tanks.
That is Johnston's interpretation of the two sides; on one side the "Palestinian" victim, on the other side the Israeli aggressor. A little simplistic don't you think for somebody who has so much to say about the "art of story telling" and the "crafting" of news reports?
His mind is made up and is about as fair as a propaganda piece from the ISM or Hamas itself.
holiday in hamastan:
i wonder has Alan Johnson ever reported on the Hamas Charter?
***********************************
the Islamic Resistance Movement aspires to the realisation of Allah's promise, no matter how long that should take.
The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said:
"The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharqad tree (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews."
F0ul:
I did like the report as I read it. If the BBC were to implement it to the letter, I would be happy.
The killer line was that impartial didn't mean politically correct.
As it happens, I doubt it will take a blind piece of notice of what people have been saying for years - its not in its style!
Anonymous:
The BBC report is good in parts. They do give lots of examples - soem are new to me, eg bussing in ethnics to give some colour to a hideously white QT in Lincoln.
But they dismiss all these problems as either in the past, or one-off mistakes. They do not admit any fault, but at the same time promise to do better somehow. Just by trying harder - no real changes needed.
They also pick some prize examples. Its like being asked your own faults in a job interview. You invent something like "being a perfectionist".
So they dish up the "make poverty history" campaign as an example - knowing that there is not a pro-poverty lobby - just lots of people who have passed their teens and realise that the campaign was a load of tosh.
The other weird example is in coverage of british teams and competitors in sporting events. This is probably one area where most of us would be very happy to see partisan coverage - so long as its not ridiculous.
Its called "cheering for your own team" and we could probably do with some of this when they report the british armed forces. Or at least some kind of presumption that they are "our" forces and should not undermined at every opportunity.
The report is correct when it identifies "group-think" at work.
Jack Hughes:
Above was me.
They also describe political correctness as "a sign of a civilised and respectful society". This is a classic defence - usually deployed when pretending PC does not exist has failed.
It suggests that the only alternative to stultifying PC is an organised campaign of rudeness to the handicapped - where we all sing the horst-wessel song before we run over some gays in our 4x4s.
Biodegradable:
The piece Nick Reynolds (BBC) and I have been discussing is now on the BBC website.
Alan Johnston on the art of journalism
"When you are with one side from the conflict, you have got to put to them the very best arguments of the other side - the toughest questions."
Fine words, but I can't recall him ever asking any tough questions to any side.
No tough questions here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progr...ent/
6459521.stm
Gordon:
NR
Your comments are always thoughtful even when you feel that you have to defend the indefensible. I also appreciate your use of the term "unbalanced" rather than "biased"
Implicit in the ideas of balance or imbalance is the word "fulcrum". In other words what points of view are to be judged so inimicable to our sense of right and wrong that they should be regarded as inexpressible?
Would the BBC interview the Klu Klux Klan and leave the immpression that its vile stance wrt blacks is just another point of view and part of life's rich tapestry?
I assume not.
Now why not the same approach to the Taliban who practise the slaughter of both female students and their teachers.
Where would you set the limits of the fulcrum Mr Reynolds?
Best wishes
Gordon
terry johnson:
Excellent post, Gordon. I think you may have a long wait before (if ever) Mr. Reynolds gets back to you ..
Nick Reynolds(BBC):
Not too long.
Yes I can see occasions when the BBC would interview the Klu Klux Klan.
We probably have done in the past.
I would expect any interview with them (or the Taliban) to be appropriately testing and tough.
Guy R:
Nick Reynolds
"I would expect any interview with them (or the Taliban) to be appropriately testing and tough."
In which case David Loyn's fawning obsequies to the Taliban on Newsnight last year must have fallen somewhat short of your expectations...
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
It's a very good interview and very good journalism.
There's nothing "fawning" about it. Indeed he describes the Taliban as "religious zealots" and shows that they are burning down schools.
Did you actually see it Guy R?
Jon:
Nick - Did you actually check the link I gave to the Politics Show and Al Gore - did you think Al Gore and Peter Hitchins were treated the same by the interviewer?
As far as I could see Al Gore was treated like the Pope. Maybe you were right about having "sceptics" on the BBc but they are always treated with contempt.
No doubt Copernicus or Kepler if they were alive today would get the same treatment as eminent scientists who disagree with the MMGW movement get today.
Can anyone say that the science on MMGW has been proven beyond all doubt.
Can the 3% of man made CO2 really alter the earth so catastrophically. Whereas the sun has no effect on the earths climate at all.
The problem is now that the myth has been spread by the BBC and others - they will not relent. The only way to silence critics is to ridicule them - or shout louder so that no one can be heard. And this is the tactics of people who know that to debate MMGW reasonably would put an end to the myth.
Jon:
Just a thought - but did Al Gore only agree to the "interview" if it was done by someone who would not argue the "other side".
As everyone knows Al Gore is not a scientist but a politician - would the BBC treat George Bush with the same reverence?
terry johnson:
"I would expect any interview with them (or the Taliban) to be appropriately testing and tough."
RUBBISH !! Al-BBC treat the Taliban with kid gloves because a) They're not white so they score high on Al-Beeb's PC-ometer. b) they're muslim which also scores high on Al-BBC's PC-ometer.
If the KKK did one tenth of the things the Taleban did Al-BBC would be down on them like a ton of bricks.
Anonymous:
I see. The BBC is staffed by unreconstructed Stalinists who wanted an IRA victory and are desperately longing for another terror attack on the country they and their families live in?
And you expect the world to take this blog seriously?
hillhunt | 19.06.07 - 12:14 am | #
Well [deleted], the BBC solicits the details of troop movements in Iraq, embeds reporters with the Taliban and employs staff who weep over the medical evacuation of a terrorist, so the above scenarios are not at all unlikely.
Edited By Siteowner
David Gregory (BBC):
Jon
If I can just explain how I tackle reporting climate change as a BBC Science Correspondent?
I work in the Midlands so my job is less likely to be reporting on the latest big climate change report. Instead I'll do stories like; Bulmers planting apple trees that have rootstock capable of surviving drought. Or showing how new estates are being built so they can handle more heavy downpours and deal with the run off effectively.
Now as Science Correspondent (with about 1.30 to tell my story) I see my job as reporting the Scientific consensus. One of the cries on here is that people don't want opinion from BBC journalists, just facts.
With that in mind I don't often put in a whole clip from a climate change sceptic scientist (Indeed I'm not sure I ever have) but over time I will mention that point of view.
Of course the scientific consensus may change over time and I will report that.
This same approach means when I do stories about people who baco-foil their bedrooms to block out the mobile phone signals because of health worries then I'll often put in a script line or more saying so far there is no credible scientific evidence of any health problems.
"Can anyone say that the science on MMGW has been proven beyond all doubt." Well no. But science doesn't work like that and it's important to know that.
Anyway, as I've said before I don't know much about the Middle East but I thought you might interested to know how a BBC Journalist tries to achieve balance when it comes to reporting science. Which in theory is a bit more black and white than some of the other topics debated here.
Alan:
Another reason why the BBC is biased in favour of the European Union:
"The European Investment Bank, the European Union's long-term lending institution, is providing BBC Worldwide with a EUR 40 million (£25 million) loan facility." (From EIB press release of 2002).
http://www.eib.europa.eu/news/pr...ss.asp?
press=37
Cockney:
"Johnston's choice of example demonstrates his mindset; "Palestinians" as impotent, innocent bystanders watching their homes being destroyed by ruthless Israelis in tanks."
Given that he's famously based in Gaza, self evidently he's going to have experience the results of Israeli aggression rather than vice versa??
hillhunt:
Anonymous:
Well [deleted], the BBC solicits the details of troop movements in Iraq, embeds reporters with the Taliban and employs staff who weep over the medical evacuation of a terrorist, so the above scenarios are not at all unlikely.
Y-e-e-e-s.
Who was embedded with the Taleban? When?
Ms Plett's teary moment has been criticised publicly by the BBC. Everyone makes mistakes.
And troop movements? £500 says some junior sub-editor applied the standard dumb-ass citizen-journalist paragraph to the wrong story.
It says so much about this blog that it harbours people who actually believe that BBC staff want their own families put at risk from terrorism.
Biased BBC: The worst is not bad enough.
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies:
@ David Gregory (BBC):
David,
The issue with al-BBC's coverage of global warming is the routine conflation of several quite separate themes into one.
There are two broad positions about GW itself, but many subtleties.
The major positions seem to me to be either that
1/ The earth is not getting warmer at all; or that
2/ It is getting warmer, but...
...and 2 is then followed by any of the following illustrative qualifiers:-
a/ ...it's not man-made, but cyclical, often seen previously and extra-terrestrially, and the science does not in any case support the cause-effect assumption so often used;
b/ ...it's beyond our ability to control it - we can't control the temperature inside an office building to within 2 degrees, so it is laughable hubris to attempt the same with the entire atmosphere in 100 years' time;
c/ it's a statistical artefact brought about by factors such as warmer winters (if the temperature in Alaska varies between -20 and plus 20 instead of -24 and plus 20, has the average temperature really warmed up by 2 degrees or has nothing of any practical significance occurred?);
d/ ...it's so uneven (eg the southern hemisphere is acknowledged to be cooling) that global measures make no sense and undermine the scientific assumptions;
e/ ...acting to prevent it now makes no sense because the economics suggest we should deal with it in the future at relatively much less cost to future generations;
f/ ..the greatest factor bearing on the likely success of CO2 reduction is the global population, which nobody is talking about at all;
g/ ...just because one buys into the existence of GW does not mean I have to accept also the statist top-down "solution" to it that authoritarian lefties favour so much; how about a free-market one instead?
h/ ...the advocates of MMGW resemble the adherents of a religion and are probably lying to me about it to secure more wealth and influence for themselves;
i/ ...we've been here before with The Next Ice Age, Nuclear Winter, etc., and nothing ever comes of it;
j/ ...on balance, GW will be a good thing and will reduce hunger, so let it rip;
k/ ...there is an obvious correlation between GDP and CO2 emissions. Those who castigate the USA over Kyoto are lying by omission in never mentioning this reason for the state of US CO2 emissions, so nothing else they say can be trusted either;
l/ ...in the future it will be India and China that are the worst offenders, and they're getting a free ride now while we are penalised with economic costs that will do nothing to solve the problem;
m/ ...why should Indian and Chinese poverty be perpetuated to appease western liberals? Aren't they entitled to industrialise?
n/ ...I completely 100% accept the factual truth of everything the IPCC and "mainstream" opinion tells me about this.
In my experience, 1/ above is a minority opinion. The issue is that there are many who hold one or more of opinions 2a through 2m, and al-BBC routinely conflates all such people together with those who hold opinion 1/. There's either opinion 2n, and everyone else is a "sceptic" or - most offensively - a "denier".
This is either lazy or intellectually dishonest, but above all it is not a reasoned response to critique so much as a political one. If your opponent's argument is hard to refute, lump him in with some extremists and accuse him of being the same.
Thus, if a conservative suggests that prison sentences are too lenient and criminals should be taken off the streets for a lot longer - an opinion most people agree with - the liberal will retort by accusing the conservative of wanting to bring back hanging.
This is the debate that we do not often hear on al-BBC. Or does it happen and I've just missed it?
Ryan:
Gordon-Broon-Eats-Hez-Bawgies:
I think you have hit the nail on the head there. The BBC is OK to report the scientific concensus that man-made global warming is happening. What there is no justification in doing is the propagandising for a statist solution for that MMGW. Especially when you consider the following facts:
1] Britain has far lower CO2 output than Germany or the US or many other industrialised countries.
2] The Chinese really don't give a damn. They will burn all the oil and coal that we don't burn.
3] Natural climate change happens anyway and is something we need to learn to adapt to. The Horizon programme on the Moche civilisation of Peru should have been a lesson to those that are under the mistaken impression that solving CO2 emissions solves climate change.
BBC News: not biased, just stupid.
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"Now as Science Correspondent (with about 1.30 to tell my story) I see my job as reporting the Scientific consensus. One of the cries on here is that people don't want opinion from BBC journalists, just facts.
With that in mind I don't often put in a whole clip from a climate change sceptic scientist (Indeed I'm not sure I ever have) but over time I will mention that point of view."
Thank you for responding on the GW issue - it's very helpful.
Can you see that if every BBC journalist reporting on GW delivers his reports the same way, then the overall impression becomes misleading? And that doesn't take into account the causal babbling of disc jockeys and entertainers, whose scientific credibility doesn't stand a lot of examination.
Meanwhile, the 'consensus' on which your case rests isn't awfully convincing. A lot of the serious criticism of the anthropocentric theory comes from hard-nosed specialists, while much of the 'consensus' comes from scientists whose expertise lies in very different fields.
No less a figure than Saint Jeremy de Paxman has opined on the BBC's coverage of the GW issue, so it's not as if unease were restricted to 'the usual suspects'. We have to take the BBC's coverage of the subject as a whole. However well your individual 1.30s may stand up, can you say the same if you step back and take an overview?
Bryan:
Sorry if this has been mentioned, but there was an extremely fiery debate last night on World Have You Say:
Alan Dershowitz lays into the BBC presenter for describing him as "pro-Israel" but nobody else on the debate as "anti-Israel". He calls the BBC "biased." Good man.
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/...go.x=30&
go.y=13
Click on Audio - Top right.
Link wont last past tonight. Dunno how to get a permanent link to the debate.
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Thanks Cockney and Hillhunt for good comments.
David Gregory - welcome to biased bbc.
Re climate change - I don't think we "propergandize" for a particular solution. See this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/climate/evi.../
sceptics.shtml
A quick search of the phrase "climate change denier" on the BBC website.
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/...e=all&x=32&
y=14
This reveals that while contributors to programmes and message boards might use the phrase (as is their right) it is not being widely used by the BBC itself.
Nice to see some comments from people who have actually read the report.
Biodegradable:
Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Thanks Cockney and Hillhunt for good comments.
Hahahaha! 
Biodegradable:
Alan Dershowitz lays into the BBC presenter for describing him as "pro-Israel" but nobody else on the debate as "anti-Israel". He calls the BBC "biased." Good man.
...
Link wont last past tonight. Dunno how to get a permanent link to the debate.
Bryan | 20.06.07 - 11:31 am |
I commented here, maybe the "Tuesday" link will last longer:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...0211852/
#361145
In response to Dershowitz's complaint Peter Doobie then asked the other guests if they were anti-Israel. Of course they all said "no", rather like hillhunt denying he's an antisemite.
David Gregory (BBC):
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies: Well there is a larger debate on all the topics you mention. So that might run from a longer debate about the politics of carbon trading on Newsnight to an email conversation between me and a viewer on some more speicific aspect of climate change science. So I do believe the debate is there.
GCooper: Actually I emailed JP about that comment and got a rather enigmatic reply. I don't think the overall impression is misleading. Man made cliamte change is the scientific consensus. Mobile phones do not damage our health is the scientific consensus. I believe it is good to try and treat viewers and listeners as intelligent enough to understand this debate. My job is to bring them the latest evidence and news about what is happening right now.
As for the usual suspects. Well Melanie Phillips is a climate change sceptic. But she gets the science wrong. I emailed her about one of her recent posts and she showed little understanding of how science works and she cut me off. Personally I wouldn't use her. But if a strong scientist gets a good paper published in a recognised journal, well that that would be different, I'd be very interested in talking to them. But you have to be careful with "maveric" (for want of a better term) science.
To finish off with a practical example I'm just off out to stand next to puddles and took about climate change. Was last night's downpour due to global warming? No. Last night was just weather. But do the models predict such heavy sudden downpours if climate change was real? Yes.
But all journalists should remember the plural of "anecdote" isn't "data"
GCooper:
Nick Reynolds writes:
"This reveals that while contributors to programmes and message boards might use the phrase (as is their right) it is not being widely used by the BBC itself."
That's somewhat questionable. After all, who chooses the contributors?
Beyond a point this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. The BBC's talking heads babble about it with utter conviction, not because they have seen and weighed the conflicting evidence, but because they have heard nothing but one side of the argument.
This, they then repeat ad nauseum .
That's not consensus: it's group-think.
Ryan:
"Nick Reynolds (BBC):
Thanks Cockney and Hillhunt for good comments.
Hahahaha! "
Like I keep telling you, they aren't biased so much as unbelievably stupid. They just believe whatever the last clever chap told them. They haven't got the wit to challenge what is said. Consequently they can be easily manipulated by people that are smarter than they are.
BBC News: not biased, just UNBELIEVABLY STUPID!
Biodegradable:
Given that he's famously based in Gaza, self evidently he's going to have experience the results of Israeli aggression rather than vice versa??
Cockney | 20.06.07 - 10:04 am
Exactly, so where's the "reporting both sides fairly" that he and Nick Reynolds claim he does?
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"I believe it is good to try and treat viewers and listeners as intelligent enough to understand this debate."
So do I. And that implies giving them both sides of the story.
"My job is to bring them the latest evidence and news about what is happening right now."
Excellent news. But it pays a journalist to question the credibility of his sources, as I'm sure you would agree. 'Evidence' from, say, a body funded to 'combat climate change' and staffed with MMGW believers, is no more innately credible than that funded by Exxon.
Challenge the non-scientist Melanie Phillips, by all means: but why give Al Gore such an easy ride, as the BBC does?
As for your willingness to consider dissenting opinions (we can argue about the reality and usefulness of consensus some other time), in case you are unaware of it, may I recommend Dr John Rae's 'Greenie Watch' website? It's a good place to get a sense of the conflicting evidence - something I don't get from the BBC, I'm afraid.
http://antigreen.blogspot.com/
David Gregory (BBC):
GCooper: Quick word before I dash out to my puddle. It's too simplistic to ask for "both sides of the story". As far as the scientific majority is concerned climate change is real, we're responsible and it's happening. That's what the science is telling us right now. The reporting of those who disagree with the consensus is a difficult task. Many journalists love a maverick, science reporters tend by nature to be more cautious. But I stay accross the debate and will reflect any changes in what the science tells us.
The problem with this debate is framing it in terms like "both sides of the story" because that simply isn't how science works. And stuff like "it's the coldest weekend ever in NY how's that for climate change!" doesn't do anyone any favours. (Happy to check out your website you suggest)
Ryan: "BBC News: not biased, just stupid." Well at the risk of indulging in intellectual willy waggling, I've got a PhD in Physics. So at least on paper I'm not stupid.
Heron:
David Gregory - thanks for the input on MMGW. I would take issue with your views on a scientific consensus; there are numerous high profile scientists who are at best agnostics on the issue, though as this has become a political issue they have been silenced rather effectively, and funding cut off. There have been several reports criticising both the methodology and conclusions of the IPCC, such as this one (linked below) by Vincent Gray:
http://
www.climatescience.org.nz...rayCritique.pdf
Other notable examples are Nigel Calder (whose theories were well covered by the BBC), and Richard Lindzen, both of whom have impeccable scientific backgrounds, as opposed to, well.... let's pick a name at random... Al Gore, for example. So I think there is a good basis to challenge your views on a consensus. A majority, quite possibly, but certainly not a consensus.
While any response on this would be desirable and, I'm sure, enlightening, my question to you is rather different.
I just wondered whether you were around at the time when the BBC was faithfully covering the "Global Cooling" or "we're entering a new Ice Age" stories in the 1970s and 1980s? If so, how did you view those issues - now proven as complete poppycock - at the time? Did the BBC cover dissenting views then, or did it pretty much go along with the "conensus" like it mostly does today? What were your personal views at the time, and are there any lessons to be learned from the coverage of these issues that can relate to the BBC's coverage of MMGW today?
I look forward to your response, either now or on your return from the puddle.
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"The problem with this debate is framing it in terms like "both sides of the story" because that simply isn't how science works."
But science doesn't work by consensus, either - indeed, consensus is frequently inimical to the scientific method.
What do you think Galileo might have said about about consensus?
Simply reporting the majority view as if it were established fact isn't very helpful - particularly when that message is reinforced by a constant stream of uninformed certainty from other broadcasters, who really aren't qualified to hold an opinion about anything.
Well, maybe hairstyles. And footballers. They probably know about footballers.
Enjoy your puddle story. I too have work. And do check out Greenie Watch. It's a useful digest of the Damned.
Oh.. and please let us not get into an academic arms race.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
GCooper | 20.06.07 - 1:37 pm:
What do you think Galileo might have said about about consensus?
Simply reporting the majority view as if it were established fact isn't very helpful - particularly when that message is reinforced by a constant stream of uninformed certainty from other broadcasters, who really aren't qualified to hold an opinion about anything.
Are we talking about MMGW here or "the political controversy that helped bring down the last Conservative government"?
Alan:
Al Beeb's mix of entertainment and politics continues today; it's Royal Ascot coverage, not only includes horse racing and fashion, but has Ms. Balding asking Ms. Adie in the paddock (at about 2.30pm local) about how Alan Johnston must be feeling. No comment about Islamists though. Perhaps we'll have Bono on soon, condemning western politicians, and giving tips for the last race.
TPO:
Ms. Adie in the paddock
Alan | 20.06.07 - 2:44 pm |
Has she been saddled up?
deegee:
Exactly, so where's the "reporting both sides fairly" that he and Nick Reynolds claim he does?
Perhaps part of the problem is the concept that there are 'two' sides i.e Israeli/Arab. After all the time AJ spent in Gaza what picture do we have of Gazans?
Did A.J. ever interview:
• Gazan Christians about what it is like to be Christian in a Muslim society?
• Gazan Gypsies (Dom) about what it is like to be Gypsy in a Muslim society?
• homosexuals about what it is like to be gay in a Muslim society?
• daughters in a family after an honour killing?
• Beduins about how it was to live in a culture dominated by town Arabs?
• teacher who were earning more as illegal workers on Israeli building sites than they could ever earn in Gaza?
• a woman who has undergone female circumcision and now is forced to do the same to her new daughter?
• Palestinians about what part of the Hamas platform they were voting for?
• Gazan workers expelled from the West Bank by Palestinians?
• families what what they thought about their husbands and sons storing explosives in their home?
• a Palestinian girl whose only hope of escape was to get arrested by the Israelis?
• Palestinian authorities about why so much of this supposedly densely populated area is undeveloped?
• an Arab patient whose life was changed by surgery in Israel?
• Palestinians about how it was under Egyptian control?
• young couples when the father of the bride couldn't come up with a dowry?
• leaders and followers of criminal clans like the Dagamoush?
• Palestinians how they felt about constantly receiving aid and never standing on their own feet?
• Palestinians how they felt when they saw the freedoms enjoyed by Israeli Arabs and compared that to their own lives?
For that matter has any BBC person ever reported on these issues? Tunnel vision and half a story.
Ryan:
"Well at the risk of indulging in intellectual willy waggling, I've got a PhD in Physics. So at least on paper I'm not stupid."
Well Dr Gregory, it doesn't show. What are you doing wasting it at the BBC?
I've got a PhD too, but I'm using mine....
...and you haven't answered my point about the presumption the BBC makes about how the problem can be tackled (if it actually is real). The BBC website's "Ethical Man" series being pertinent.
David Gregory (BBC):
All fine at the puddle. Off out to talk to farmers now.
Heron: Well at the time I was pretty concerned about Dr Who since I was about 10. Actually that hasn't changed much in the past few years thinking about it.
The big freeze was a very popular idea with tv programme makes and the general public, I'm not sure how seriously it was taken by climate scientists. Though obviously that's not a contemporaneous view and scientsists I talk to about it certainly have the benefit of hindsight.
Can I also assure you that while an interesting film, my primary scientific source is not Al Gore or his movie.
GCooper: I totally agree that science builds to a point and then often some amazing maverick comes along and changes everything. As a physicist I have no illusions about my contribution. Useful, but part of an established set of ideas, I wasn't going to turn anything on it's head. But the temptation is to see mavericks at every turn, especially for journalists as I said before.
B-BBC often stresses the need for facts. Surely as Science Correspondent that's what I should provide? So the fact is I present the current state of scientific knowledge as it is.
When you say "Simply reporting the majority view as if it were established fact isn't very helpful" Erm, what would you like me to report instead? These are the facts. I report them.
Roland Deschain:
The problem I have with the BBC coverage of global warming is that it relentlessly gives the impression that there is no scientific argument about mankind's responsibility for it. But it isn't difficult to find well-written pieces which purport to show otherwise, and that the IPCC reports are not as scientifically sound as we are led to believe.
For example see http://devilskitchen.me.uk/2007/...ate-
change.html
I freely confess I don't have the time to read through the various links and probably wouldn't understand them, so at the end of the day I have to rely on gut feeling. But contrary opinions seem to be ignored by the BBC (and media and political parties) or simply insulted which gives me the gut feeling that the whole thing is a hoax.
Alan:
Presumably, Al Beeb will now give as much open, public support to Salman Rushdie, who is under Islamic death threats again, as it is giving to Alan Johnston.
Like this, for example:
"Death to Rushdie, Again"
by Robert Spencer, 20 June).
http://www.frontpagemagazine.com
Biodegradable:
deegee | 20.06.07 - 2:54 pm |
Bravo! 
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"B-BBC often stresses the need for facts. Surely as Science Correspondent that's what I should provide? So the fact is I present the current state of scientific knowledge as it is."
And then:
"When you say "Simply reporting the majority view as if it were established fact isn't very helpful" Erm, what would you like me to report instead? These are the facts. I report them."
Surely the question is not whether you should report facts, but whose facts do you ('you' in the sense of the BBC as a whole) choose to report?
For example, this recent story http://timesonline.co.uk/tol/
new...icle1896266.ece
didn't seem to make much of a splash on the BBC, where the casual (and implausible) connection between GW and hurricane activity is regularly made.
How many times was Katrina blamed by BBC pundits on 'manmade Global Warming'? Often enough, I would suggest, for it to have become 'common knowledge'.
And here, really, is the nub of the problem. You and your scientically trained colleagues may well be entirely blameless in either what you report, or how you report it. But you are a needle in the BBC's giant haystack.
Most of the BBC's listeners and viewers get their opinions from the ragbag hegemony that produces 90 per cent of the Corporation's output. The people who conduct fawning interviews with the idiotic Al Gore, or make casual observations in the middle of whatever house makeover or fashion programme they happen to be presenting that week.
That's the BBC's output perceived by most people: the very Left-liberal arts bias that we are complaining about here.
Thom Boston:
Deegee - "For that matter has any BBC person ever reported on these issues? Tunnel vision and half a story."
This is the thing about B-BBC. I believe Martin Belam made this very point - people make all sorts of claims without checking them, presumably on the assumption that, this being a blog on which most people agree with them, everyone will nod and tut and accept it as fact. But it isn't. And perhaps this is ramming the point home, but what the hell:
Gazan Christians - a cursory look on the BBC website reveals a whole sidebar on Middle East Christians. Specifically Gaza? Fine - how about this pastor - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
4514822.stm -
"We have lived side by side with our neighbours for a long time, and we thank God it is peaceful, but at the same time you cannot really fully live your Christian life here and have full freedom to share your faith."
Homosexuals - How about this feature, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
4514822.stm, which was obviously run on both the World Service's Outlook programme and the news website, about gay Gazans who feel their only chance is to live in Israel? "Many Palestinian gays say they would still rather live under
house arrest in Israel, where homosexuality is not considered a crime, than at home."
Daughters and honour killings - there's a very moving interview right
here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...rts/
1779602.stm - "I have had to pay a high price. My friends have become my new family. I
do not regret leaving my family, but I feel sad that I was forced to do so. My family lost both its honour and a daughter. For my family the
purpose of my life was that I would marry a Kurdish man. Suddenly I was transformed from a good Kurdish girl into a wasteful whore."
Cont...
Thom Boston:
Bedouin - as far as I can see, there isn't anything on any struggle with Gaza's townies. Although this article - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ght/
6400501.stm - explains many of them in Israel are not having it great either: "I could come home and not find my house," says one. Then again, the Israeli housing minister does make clear that the land "does not belong to them, so they have no licence to build on it."
Teachers - Jeremy Bowen mentions in this piece - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6300317.stm - that after Hamas won the elections, they did not get paid and that everything became "much worse". Or how about this piece, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6194517.stm, in which a Fatah-supporting teacher explains "Fatah recognises Israel, we realise that we must live side by side with it. Israel is a fact and it won't go away. Hamas's rigid policy is costing us a lot of support round the world".
Female circumcision - Deary me, one recent story - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ica/
6734261.stm - reveals that a chap in Cameroon actually won a BBC award for his campaign against female circumcision. In fact,"mutilation campaigner wins BBC award" is even the damn headline. Or, there's an interview with a Somali
woman who underwent it here - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/healt...lth/
3711459.stm - "She cut me up and removed my clitoris, put it in a bag and threw it away. I cried, I was screaming but I couldn't escape." If you can find evidence of female circumcision being carried out in Gaza I would be very interested to know; it is, according to the US State Department, overwhelmingly a practice carried out in
sub-Saharan Africa - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fem...lation#_note-
20
Hamas platform - the piece I referred to earlier about the Fatah teacher also has a man from the Hamas side, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6194517.stm, who says "We are living under occupation, but we need to be reasonable with Israel. But the problem is that Fatah want to give too much anyway, and
we can't give away our rights." Oh, or how about James Reynolds' piece, "on
the campaign trail with Hamas", http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
4640334.stm, which details the following exchange: "One voter approaches a Hamas candidate. "You should negotiate with
Israel," the man says. "Why?" the Hamas candidate replies. "We need to win our rights by force."
Palestinian women getting arrested - as this article
makes clear - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6123380.stm - there are many Palestinian women and children living in
fear of domestic violence and so presumably would be keen to escape - especially because "the legal and justice systems in the West Bank and
Gaza result in light sentences for men who, claiming an affront to family honour, kill female relatives suspected of adultery." However it also makes clear that "although the number of shelters for Palestinian women is growing, Israeli restrictions on movement in the West Bank and Gaza make them difficult or impossible to reach." Admittedly, there is no mention of whether this forces them to get themselves arrested.
Explosives stored in homes - There's a debate between Israel's ambassador to London and an Amnesty spokesperson here - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
3725173.stm - in which the Israeli outlines that "a family of a mother - a pregnant woman - and her four daughters were killed at point-blank range by terrorists from a house that the Supreme Court in Israel had prevented from being
bulldozed and knocked down earlier."
Who is to blame for undeveloped Gaza - how about this, er, Alan Johnston piece, "Gaza economic woes hit firms hard"? - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6077414.stm "The political situation has destroyed all our ambitions," says one businessman.
Gazan workers expelled/Gazan patients in Israel - there's a story from today, for pity's sake: "Israel to let in stranded Gazans". http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
6220904.stm - or, how about this - an
interview with - yes! - a Gazan teacher http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
4439826.stm on the benefits of border controls being lifted in 2005 - "many Palestinian
patients who were ill and needed to go for treatment in hospitals were not able to go... If the borders were to open it would encourage the
economy,especially for the tens of thousands of Palestinian labourers
who are dependent on work in Israel to survive. It would give them the chance to make money to feed their kids, improve their economic
situation and make life come back to Gaza."
Life under Egyptian control - another piece by, um, Alan Johnston, entitled "hero-worship in the ruins of Rafah," talks about life
in a refugee camp under - yes - Egyptian control. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/progr...ent/
3757569.stm
Cont...
Thom Boston:
Dowries - there is nothing I can find on this, but this may be because, as the Washington Post has reported, http://www.washingtonpost.com/
wp...0700387_pf.html, economic problems have caused marriage to become "a tradition many could no longer afford" and forced a cap "on
the cost of weddings and bridal dowries that had swelled enormously."
Receiving aid (a total of $1bn last year) - this story, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/busin...ess/
6638241.stm, explains that the Wolfowitz-controlled (at the time) World Bank believes "economic progress in the Palestinian territories will continue to be stunted as
long as restrictions on movement there remain." The Palestinian authority welcomed the report and said "It helps convince the relevant
governments and public opinion of the actual reality that the
Palestinians have been trying to explain without much success."
Israeli-Arab comparative freedoms - This Middle East
penfriends exchange, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
3529467.stm from 2004 (the whole thing lasted 7 episodes) has
an Egyptian teacher (yes, another teacher) discussing the relative views of Arab freedoms and Israeli freedoms, as well as a raft of other
topics. It is very interesting and informative, and for those that pick up on this sort of thing and claim it to be of relevance, the Israeli is
always first and usually writes a longer piece (ie, has more of a say).
I'm not making these points to be smug. But I think sometimes it's important to have the evidence to back up your claims.
will:
or make casual observations in the middle of whatever house makeover or fashion programme they happen to be presenting that week.
Recent examples -
Oddy rooting for Gore for President on Springwatch.
Breakfast TV woman presenter, in quick unscripted aside, reminding man presenter, apropos not much, that mortgage rates used to be 15% back in the 1990s.
deegee:
Thom Boston:
I don't know how many of those examples prove your point.
None that I can see came from Alan Johnston.
The Middle East Christians: Gaza pastor article was about how wonderful it is to be Christian in Gaza. Things are difficult but for everyone and Israel is to blame. It sounded exactly like the false reports that came from Soviet Russia during the famine.
The honour killing report came from Sweden not Gaza. The girl was Kurdish not Palestinian.
The Bedouin report wasn't unreasonable but said nothing about Bedouin under Palestinian control only Israel.
The mutilation reports came from Cameroon not Gaza. Cameroon, it should be noted is a) in West Africa not North Africa and b) Black African not Arab.
The Hamas report was a typical whitewash. All the elements of the Hamas Charter calling for the killing of Jews were ignored. All the elements in the Charter stating that nothing could be negotiated were ignored.
The economic article typically blames Israel for everything. The Karni project was designed to allow easier shipment of goods and materials and only stopped after continuous attacks by the Palestinians made it too dangerous for the Israelis.
Similarly the question of population density in the Strip (repeatedly and falsely described as the world's highest and a cause for the violence) while most of the land area is idle is not touched. Israel is not stopping Palestinians building houses or for that matter shacks on vacant land.So who is?
That Israel allows some sick and injured to cross its borders in the present crisis does not replace an interview with someone who has been treated in Israeli hospitals or explain the female suicide bomber caught while on her way to bomb the doctors at the Beer Sheva hospital where she had received treatment.
The discussion between the two women really said nothing. Had this been a discussion between a Gazan Palestinian and an Israeli Arab instead of an Egyptian and a Jew it would have answered my point.
Are you really saying that all Muslims and Muslim countries are the same so an isolated report from one covers all the others? The examples you have provided seem to suggest that.
Jon:
David Gregory - thanks for taking the time to respond. I realaise that it would be hardley unlikely for a maveric BBC physicist to question the BBcs wholesale endorsemant of the "facts" as you put it.
I would however question the word "fact", MMGW is a hypothesis - and a hypothesis is not a fact.
I agree that a maverick scientist may be just that a maverick but any scientist who can put forward an "alternative" hypothesis should be heard - then let the scientists shoot holes in his hypothesis if possible. Is this not the scientific way not "consensus". Talking of consensus is that word not an anathema to a "real " scientist. Actually I don't believe that the "consensus" among scientists is as large as you think.
Can I suggest you read this research on the IPCC report undertaken by an independant research organisation.
Here is one point they make from the evidence.
"A more compelling problem is that the Summary for Policymakers, attached to the
IPCC Report, is produced, not by the scientific writers and reviewers, but by a process of
negotiation among unnamed bureaucratic delegates from sponsoring governments. Their
selection of material need not and may not reflect the priorities and intentions of the
scientific community itself. Consequently it is useful to have independent experts read the
underlying report and produce a summary of the most pertinent elements of the report.
Finally, while the IPCC enlists many expert reviewers, no indication is given as to
whether they disagreed with some or all of the material they reviewed. In previous IPCC
reports many expert reviewers have lodged serious objections only to find that, while their
objections are ignored, they are acknowledged in the final document, giving the impression
that they endorsed the views expressed therein."
Here is the full report.
http://www.fraserinstitute.ca/ad...%
20Summary5.pdf
Oh by the way no one has answered my question on the non-scientist Al Gores "interview" on the politics show.
Thom Boston:
Deegee: "none that I can see came from Alan Johnson".
I think that sentence utterly proves my point. Rant first, think (or even look properly) later.
Thom Boston:
Actually, to engage properly rather than being snarky (you have paid me the respect of answering me in full; you deserve the same, I apologise, I was point-scoring there and it was cheap) I'm not saying all Muslims and Muslim countries are the same at all. But as I point out, the genital mutilation, for example, is mainly concentrated in Sub-Saharan Africa. Where have you got it from that it is widespread in Gaza? (And by that I mean a reliable source - eg the US State Department (my source) not an anti-Muslim propaganda site).
I think that you're coming from this from too narrow a perspective. You initially said "has any BBC person ever reorted on these issues"? I have shown you that yes, they have, and often. Now you're changing the parameters, swapping "issues" for specific stories you have in mind, and, additionally, a specific spin (ie anti-Palestinian) you think they should be reported with.
It's all too much:
Private individual buys A380 superjumbo. BBC choice of comment - "Planestupid" - apparently a German eco group.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/busin...ess/
6768237.stm
Well, it seems that "balance" requires that the purchaser be branded a 'climate criminal' but I don't see any comment to the effect that this is a good thing for European industry.
David Gregory (BBC):
Jon
Interesting report from an interesting perspective. It's doesn't seem to dismiss climate change though.
As for Al Gore. Well I'm sorry to say I didn't see the interview and as I'm sure you realise I have no control over how it was conducted. I think it might be fair to point out that I can't really slag-off other BBC staff or programmes on the web. Happy to discuss the processes and things I do see. But in the case of Mr Gore I'm not sure I can be much more help.
Guy R:
Nick Reynolds (BBC) | 19.06.07 - 11:30 pm
Sorry about the 24 hour delay in responding, but that's work for you. I did indeed see Loyn's Taliban interview/ feature on Newsnight last October and I recall being surprised at the time that the tone of the piece appeared to be difficult to distinguish from a straightforward panegyric to the subject of the interview (a summary (?) of which is still available on the BBC News south asia/Newsnight site). I ought to have been more specific in my criticism, for it was the Keane-esque pseudo-lyricism of the piece (which I think still comes across from the web version) rather than any failure on DL's part to ask the right questions that continues to cause me concern.
Jon:
David Gregory (BBC): I understand your reluctance to criticize a colleague and I accept your reasons for not doing so. But I think that if a topic on climate change is being discussed the interviewer should do a bit of homework first. Statements like "6,000 scientists agree on MMGW" is allowed to pass without comment. Every figure quoted by Al Gore should be divided by 10 and then it would still be an exaggeration.
If you are tempted to see the clip you can see it here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q...?v=q...related&
search=
I know that you will be able to answer Peter Hitchins question to name a greenhouse gas.
Yes the report does not dismiss climate change. It does however show that other explanations are possible and that the climate models which are held up as evidence of CO2 being the culprit is on shaky ground to say the least. I have not read one paper that says climate change does not happen, it is the cause of climate change that is in dispute.
Jon:
Sorry the link should be
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q...h?
v=qyd4WE70ADs
Jon:
"But in the case of Mr Gore I'm not sure I can be much more help."
Actually I don't think anyone can help Al Gore his symptoms are just too far gone for any remedial treatment.
GCooper:
Jon writes:
"I have not read one paper that says climate change does not happen, it is the cause of climate change that is in dispute."
Precisely. Climate changes. That is (more or less) what 'climate' implies - a mutable state.
I'm genuinely pleased that Dr Gregory has joined our debate, but troubled that he is unwilling to tackle the issue of how a fraud like Al Gore is allowed to spout "science", unchallenged by the BBC, when, by any useful definition, Gore's testimony on 'climate change' is about as useful as that of Matthew Hopkins on the subject of witchcraft.
Dr G cannot defend the BBC by ducking the issue. His 1.30s may be impeccable. But what about the endless hours of arrant nonsense?
Pete:
There is not bias at the BBC just because the BBC now says there is bias at the BBC. There may or may not be bias at the BBC. Nobody knows or can tell for sure, as bias is entirely in the eye of the beholder.
It is disgraceful that we are compelled to pay for the BBC's version of the truth. We need to free the BBC from the licence fee so that its version of the news is as independent as all other news sources.
Anonymous:
Who was embedded with the Taleban? When?
David Loyn. October 2006.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...sia/
6081594.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talki...int/
6091532.stm
It was mentioned here on this blog at the time, but you weren't trolling here then - probably revising for your mock GCSEs.
Ms Plett's teary moment has been criticised publicly by the BBC. Everyone makes mistakes.
Oh yeah - funny how all these "mistakes" are in the same direction. Any Beebie weeping over Ariel Sharon being incapacitated? As if! If a Fox News reporter admitted weeping over Ronald Reagan's passing you'd be all over that like flies on shit.
It says so much about this blog that it harbours people who actually believe that BBC staff want their own families put at risk from terrorism.
No, not their own families. You've just invented that. Their record however long demonstrates their lack of support for British troops in the field. As long as George Bush gets a bloody nose they don't give shit about death tolls in Iraq or anywhere else.
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies:
David Gregory wrote:-
...when I do stories about people who baco-foil their bedrooms to block out the mobile phone signals because of health worries...
*Sigh* There we go again.
You've already made up your mind that those who dispute the need for a socialist solution to climate change are roughly intellectually equivalent to "those who baco-foil their bedrooms".
hillhunt:
Anon:
Who was embedded with the Taleban? When?
Loyn? Y-e-e-e-s. To gain temporary access is not the same as being embedded. That it?
Ms Plett? One sniff does not bias make.
It says so much about this blog that it harbours people who actually believe that BBC staff want their own families put at risk from terrorism.
No, not their own families. You've just invented that.
Really? Here's John Boy | 18.06.07 - 10:58 pm:
the BBC is staffed by people who secretly wish the USSR had won the cold war, the IRA had driven the British from NI and feverishly await the next terror attack so it can be blamed on the disaster in Iraq.
And as for this...
As long as George Bush gets a bloody nose they don't give shit about death tolls in Iraq or anywhere else.
No-one at the BBC has family or friends among the British Forces?
Biased BBC: Britain's Got Talent. But None Of It Posts Here.
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies:
Al-BBC's stance on Iraq is very similar to the Whig stance during the Peninsular War. There was nothing that would have suited the Whigs better than for Tory Wellington and his army of patriots to get routed by the "progressive" French. How they howled with rage when the buggers kept winning instead.
David Gregory (BBC):
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies
"*Sigh* There we go again.
You've already made up your mind that those who dispute the need for a socialist solution to climate change are roughly intellectually equivalent to "those who baco-foil their bedrooms"."
Woah! Hang on there!
Have I ever said I believe or report that the only solution to climate change is a socialist one? I've just explained the general process I go through as a Science Correspondent when reporting issues like this. As I said earlier, most scientists who study climate believe global warming is a reality and it is man made. But beyond that when it comes to what we do about this, well everything else is politics and up for debate.
I'm sorry if you feel the mobile phone comparison is wrong, but you know I still get emails from people saying I'm wrong when I talk about evolution and that God created everything. In my job I'm not going to put the views of creationists on air. People hold these views but my job is to report the scientific facts.
GCooper: I'm not sure what you want me to say about Al Gore. Two things inhibit my comments here, I'm employed by the BBC and so can't really slag them off in public and secondly if I was very frank about something on here I do worry it might end up in the BBC "Sidebar of shame" on the frontpage
So with that in mind I think I have to be honest about what I am prepared to say here. I can discuss my stories, how I work and more general science/environment reporting issues but beyond that I do have to be a bit cautious.
A deep debate about climate change might be of more interest somewhere like badscience.net
But that question from Peter Hitchens is a very good one!
will:
David Gregory (BBC)"people saying I'm wrong when I talk about evolution and that God created everything. In my job I'm not going to put the views of creationists on air. People hold these views but my job is to report the scientific facts."
So if creationists (& it seems, intelligent designists) are wrong, who or what did create everything, Mr Gregory?
Heron:
David
Thanks for your contributions. Refreshingly free from the half-truths and evasions practised by our other Beeboids.
BaggieJonathan:
David Gregory,
Your acceptance of the theory of evolution as an unquestioned fact for a bbc science correspondent grieves me.
No, I'm not a creation scientist, but that does not mean they are not making some valid points (perhaps more the ID movement more than the 'purer' creation scientists).
Your dismissal of them without even considering them puts you up there with radical BBC agenda.
There are some problems with evolutionary theory, if push comes to shove even the Dawkins of this world would admit that things have had to be 'amended' to smaller or greater degrees over the years with the theory in order to fit the facts.
Over the years various hegemonies have dominated science in an almost fundamentalist religious way but many of these have either been amended, superceded or discredited.
Newton was totally in the ascendant before Einstein.
The four elements were accepted for centuries before our modern understanding of elements arose.
The BBC Science went hook, line and sinker for the asteroid killed all the dinosaurs line till quite recently and published it as fact, including for children.
Now it acknowledges that it is at least challenged and probably not the sole factor involved.
There was no getting round the what happened to the frogs argument.
Sometimes it is necessary for science correspondents to recognise that what is now scientific heresy may in future accepted as scientific fact behind the new hegemony and therefore consider and report alternatives on their merit.
Sometimes this in necessary even for BBC science.
David Gregory (BBC):
*sigh* Oh dear. I really didn't mean to upset anyone here who believes in creationism. And as a scientist and a journalist I do indeed realise that what is "heresy" now could become tomorrow's fact.
What I'm trying to do here is explain the processes of my job and how I decide to fill up my one minute and thirty seconds.
As Science Correspondent if I do a story on evolution would you like me to include a creationism viewpoint for "balance"? If I did that then I really think to be fair I should at least mention "pastafarianism" too(http://www.venganza.org/). To really play devils advocate I guess I should also include something about Islamic creation stories as well.
With all that in mind I personally think my job as science correspondent is to stick to science.
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies:
Have I ever said I believe or report that the only solution to climate change is a socialist one?
The point is that you reached for an analogy of how you arrive at a decision to exclude certain viewpoints from discussion of climate change.
In doing so, you rather gave the game away, by reflexively and instinctively comparing people who don't buy the IPCC line with loonies. And that Freudian slip is exactly the issue. There are undoubtedly some climate change heretics who are loonies, but the overwhelmingly majority are not and simply hold one or more of views 2a to 2m above in my previous post. There are also pro-Kyoto types who are loonies too - pretty much all of them, in my opinion - but you'd never dream of characterising them as such. It's only those who don't fall into line behind the big state solution who get that treatment. If you were trying to characterise the pro-Kyoto movement, would you characterise them as, say, the Roman church in about 1540? A great big gormless mass of ignorant opinion, none of whom has ever looked down a telescope, but every one of whom is adamant there's nothing to see?
You might well argue that this is politics, and thus beyond the remit of a science correspondent. And you'd be right if this were science, but it's not - it is politics.
Lots of science is political, but it is standard practice by those pushing a political agenda to dress the politics up as science to make it more palatable. For example, it is pretty much beyond argument now that there are three distinct human sub-types. Pharmaceutical companies put smaller doses of paracetamol in headache pills sold in Japan, most sufferers from sickle cell anaemia are black, and most sufferers from skin cancer are white. If the BNP started advocating the segregation into ghettoes of blacks to protect whites from sickle cell anaemia and blacks from skin cancer you'd see right through the fraudulent science in an instant because of who was saying it. Why no such similar scepticism to all science? It's all paid for by somebody, and if it's been paid for then somebody's been bought.
Pennance:
"most scientists who study climate believe global warming is a reality and it is man made—David Gregory
Climate change (including both warming and cooling) is not "man made", it is inevitable. Although some scientists believe that Christians are responsible for global warming (see http://pennance.us/?p=38 ) there is no evidence for the presence of Christians on, say, Pluto where climate is also changing. Since most scientists lack sufficient training in one or more of the areas (e.g., non equilibrium thermodynamics, statistics, atmospheric chemistry, partial differential equations, etc.) needed to arrive at rigorous conclusions concerning a system as complex as the climate, many so called "scientific" opinions should be treated as little more than anecdotal.
David Gregory (BBC):
Gordon_Broon_Eats_Hez_Bawgies: First of all what makes you think I treat the people who think put baco-foil around their bedrooms as loonies? You may think that, but I don't. Often these are people who have very real symptoms, who really are suffering and who believe their problems are caused by mobile phone technology.
My job is to explain the science as it stands. So I have no prolem with covering the "baco-foiled bedroom" story as long as we point out that so far no useful scientific study has found any evidence of an effect.
The two confirmed ways mobiles can make you ill are crashing your car because you are using one and worrying yourself sick about a mast (So it's quite possible all these scare stories, while having no scientific basis, could make people ill. Oh the irony)
I reached for that analogy because its another issue alongside climate change with strong views. But my job is to report the science as it stands. And that's what I try to do. I think very carefully about all this, which is why I don't call the "baco foil brigade" loonies. And I apply just as much care and attention to issues like climate change.
BaggieJonathan:
I don't ask for a so called balance.
'Balance' is not unbias.
What's the point in 'balancing' right and wrong.
What I do expect is that scientific theories are at least examined whoever is suggesting them, not merely dismissed just because of who is making the theory or suggestion.
For example is an Islamic creationist states a fact that evolution does not predict or explain and suggests a mechanism that causes the occurrence and is in earnest in doing so I believe it should be looked at.
The fact of who it came from is in this case irrelevant even if I do not approve of the source for many reasons.
This is true of other branches and not just science, but it seems particularly true where scince meets another discipline, for example history.
Many have cast the lie that the Chrisitan church taught the world was flat in the middle ages and that everyone believed it.
It was also held that those that taught otherwise were persecuted for it.
Not only is this not true about the teaching it is also almost exclusively not true about the persecution.
They claimed that the church taught about the four corners of the earth.
Not so, go to Hereford Cathedral and look at the mappi mundi, from long before Columbus - the world depicted is round it has no corners.
If the BBC is so much better than the other broadcasters round the world as you claim perhaps it could start making an example of all the lazy ploughman's lunches across the disciplines.
Mick McDonald:
David Gregory - 2 quotes from you-
"But my job is to report the science as it stands."
"What I'm trying to do here is explain the processes of my job and how I decide to fill up my one minute and thirty seconds."
How can you possibly achieve the former, given the constraints of the latter?
Alan:
This is listed under the BBC's 'Entertainment' section:-
"BBC to fund C4 digital switchover"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/enter...ent/
6224572.stm
Shouldn't that read:
"BBC licence-payers to fund Channel 4" ?
The glories of democracy, accountability, and spending other people's money.
Jon:
I do have a great deal of sympathy with David Gregory. He is right that 1 min 30 seconds of air time is not enough to put forward complex scientific theories. I have to say that if you check out most of the coverage of MMGW it is not a debate between scientists or even scientific correspondents who do the interviews. It tends to be "environmental" correspondents - such as Sarah Mukajee or Richard Black(?) - but by far the most coverage of any matters on MMGW usually comes from a left wing politician and a benevolent interviewer.
Alan:
No doubt, Al Beeb will be reporting this tomorrow:
"New group for those who renounce Islam"
http://www.telegraph.co.uk (go to 'News').
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"I'm not sure what you want me to say about Al Gore."
Oh, nothing, really. Even if you weren't (very understandably) constrained by concerns about your employment, anything one says about Gore is dwarfed by the sheer arrogant stupidity of the man. What's to say?
Indeed, I take Jon's point and agree with him. My complaint isn't with you, or your kind of journalist, and I don't recall seeing many specific complaints here about hard science reporting.
Most complaints are (I believe quite rightly) addressed to the broader issue of the ill-informed commentary provided day in, day out, by the BBC's talking heads. And I accept there's not much you can do about that.
Incidentally, my apologies to Dr John Ray, whose name I spelled incorrectly, in an earlier comment.
Biodegradable:
Alan | 21.06.07 - 6:13 pm
Please do some research first and try not to give ammo to the beeboid trolls:
Ignore Islam, 'ex-Muslims' urge
NDK:
David Gregory (BBC):
Two points I want to make.
The first one is that even if we accept there is a consensus, there are two groups of people who diverge from the consensus - those who are unconvinced by MMGW (or the solutions offered thereto) and those who routinely exagerate the effects or the likelihood. It seems to me that plenty of time is spent dismissing the former group in "tin foil hat" terms. However the latter group seems to be generally tolerated as "wrong but their heart" is in the right place. To take an example, the IPCC estimates of sea level rise has shown reductions over several reports. Yet I am routinely handed leaflets by the likes of the Green party which show rises way above even the high IPCC estimates. Surely some even handed ridiculing of the extremists is in order.
Take for example the ideas contained in the film "The Day After Tomorrow". Clearly, there is a possibility that the gulf stream might change direction, but who seriously argues that it will happen overnight? Yet there are people (I've met them) who believe this stuff. One is a science teacher at my son's school.
The second point I want to raise concerns the reporting of consensus. Many times in the past a consensus has been shown to be wrong. Usually this has resulted in no serious consequences. Examples might include the slow acceptance of tectonic plate movement or the big bang theory. The scientist faced a hard time but people didn't die.
In contrast, we have several historical consensii (?) where the lack of challenge ultimately resulted in much death and suffering. An example being the virtually universal acceptance of eugenics prior to 1939. To evade Godwin's law, let's ignore Germany and go instead to Sweden for evidence which conducted a little known compulsory sterilisation program that ended only in the mid 1970s or the similar programs in Democratic US states. Consensus was against the transmission of disease by germs or John Snow's discovery about Cholera. Consensus (albeit under more extreme circumstances) underlay the disaster caused by Lysenkoism.
Debates about global warming rarely challenge the putative solutions put forward by the green movement. Indeed several people who support the consensus view but offer an alternative solution (eg Bjorn Lomberg) are dismissed as global warming deniers. We hear a lot about saving the planet from warming but little about the potential dangers of preventing development that would be an inevitable byproduct.
In other words consensus in this case is not risk neutral. Challenging BOTH the advocates and the sceptics is essential because year zero solutions will cause deaths just as much as perhaps doing nothing.
Biodegradable:
Even the left wing Israeli press has no problem calling an Israeli a "terrorist" - why can't the BBC call Hamas a terrorist organisation?
Suspected killers of Jewish terrorist unlikely to be indicted
Acre Magistrates Court Judge Moshe Alter reduced all restrictions placed on the suspected killers of Jewish terrorist Eden Natan-Zada, who was lynched by a mob after murdering four Israeli Arabs on a bus in the northern town of Shfaram in August 200
Jeremy Bowen's Dazzling Verbal Gymnastics
"There is no dialogue with those murderous terrorists," Mr Abbas said, referring to Hamas militants.
Thanks for the explanation Jeremy.
Alan:
Biodegradable.
If ex-Muslims are publicly launching a meeting tomorrow, presumably they want publicity.
David Gregory (BBC):
Mick McDonald:
David Gregory - 2 quotes from you-
"But my job is to report the science as it stands."
"What I'm trying to do here is explain the processes of my job and how I decide to fill up my one minute and thirty seconds."
How can you possibly achieve the former, given the constraints of the latter?
Bloody good question. It can be hard. But sometimes I get up to 2 minutes...
DennisTheMenace:
.
David Gregory (BBC) | 21.06.07 - 7:45 pm | #
--------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
No one disputes that your task is a difficult one and that in a 1 - 2 min slot it is almost impossible to provide a fully rounded expose on matters such as the MMGW hypothesis.
However from time to time it should be possible to devote a slot to examining some of the contrary positions and cases.
Such as -
"Read the sunspots
The mud at the bottom of B.C. fjords reveals that solar output drives climate change - and that we should prepare now for dangerous global cooling"
http://www.canada.com/nationalpo...84068db11f4&
p=4
and
"Will the sun cool us?"
http://www.canada.com/nationalpo...e9eeb015777&
k=0
and for a laugh -
"The Sound You Hear Is the Polar Bears Weeping Over a Photograph of a Stranded Human on a Dwindling Palm Springs Golf Course"
http://www.ninme.com/archives/
20...ound_you_h.html
The people concerned are not idiots and highly eminent in their particular field (apart from the last one).
Their carefully researched counter propositions at least deserve some airtime.
You at least owe it to yourself given your scientific education and background.
Balance is not absolutely necessary, just some dispassionate, scientific objectivity for a change instead of all the hyperbole and rhetoric.
.
DennisTheMenace:
.
David G. - the following might also help explain the difficulties some of us MMGW agnostics are having.
"Pathological science, as defined by Langmuir, is a psychological process in which a scientist, originally conforming to the scientific method, unconsciously veers from that method, and begins a pathological process of wishful data interpretation (see the Observer-expectancy effect cognitive bias). Some characteristics of pathological science are:[3]
1. - The maximum effect that is observed is produced by a causative agent of barely detectable intensity, and the magnitude of the effect is substantially independent of the intensity of the cause.
2. - The effect is of a magnitude that remains close to the limit of detectability, or many measurements are necessary because of the very low statistical significance of the results.
3. - There are claims of great accuracy.
4. - Fantastic theories contrary to experience are suggested.
5. - Criticisms are met by ad hoc excuses.
6. - The ratio of supporters to critics rises and then falls gradually to oblivion."
Points 5 & 6 are particularily relevant from my (agnostic) point of view given they emphasise the supremacy of 'consensus' and 'heresy' over healthy scepticism.
.
Jon:
"A complete list of things caused by global warming"
"and all on 0.006 deg C per year! "
http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/war...uk/
warmlist.htm
Is it any wonder that people question the science. Even if there is a grain of truth that may lie behind the CO2 hypothesis - it is being drowned out by "alarmists".
Jon:
Here is a pertinant comment from Vaclav Klaus.
"Vaclav Klaus: You ask how much environmental damage I need to see before I am willing to do anything? My problem is that I do not “see” sufficient and persuasive evidence for environmental damage you have – probably – in mind, and I wonder whether you see it yourself, or whether you just read about it."
http://hecubus.wordpress.com/200...rming-catch-up/
Doesn't this hit the nail on the head. I worked in the Steel Industry in the 1970s - everything was grimy - houses that were within a couple of miles around the steelworks seemed to be constently covered in "soot". Small becks and rivers were dirty and full of rubbish. You don't see that today. We are told that this and that are happening because of MMGW but we don't see it for ourselves.
Our "information" is coming to us via environmentalists or politicians. It would be very interesting to see a program on the BBC that tells us for example that Al Gores "carbon offset" payments are paid to to his own company.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/
new...RTICLE_ID=54528
Jon:
Hope springs eternal - Even a 15 year old can see through the MMGW hysteria.
"15-Year-Old Outsmarts U.N. Climate Panel, Predicts End of Australia's Drought"
http://newsbusters.org/node/12968
the pinko champagne is on us:
I'd rather listen to white noise than a BBC clone screaming MMGW.
So trendy, so lefty, nu-Cuba, al-Beeb.
Anonymous:
Loyn? Y-e-e-e-s. To gain temporary access is not the same as being embedded.
Well, if you're behind enemy lines ”travelling with armed Taleban fighters...” then that surely counts as being as embedded as Gavin Hewitt riding in an armoured vehicle with coalition troops.
Ms Plett? One sniff does not bias make.
The BBC's governors' programme complaints committee thought otherwise - they said Ms Plett had "breached the requirements of due impartiality" - i.e. she was biased.
http://media.guardian.co.uk/
site...1651260,00.html
Anyone with an IQ greater than an amoeba would realise she was biased from the rest of her output anyway.
No-one at the BBC has family or friends among the British Forces?
Now that's worth considering - how many of the BBC's 2,000+ journos actually have family or friends among the British Forces? I'm betting that it is less than any other sample of 2,000+ UK citizens.
the BBC is staffed by people who secretly wish the USSR had won the cold war, the IRA had driven the British from NI and feverishly await the next terror attack so it can be blamed on the disaster in Iraq.
Undoubtedly there are people amongst the Beeb who think exactly along those lines. Former (indeed current) Communists, pro-Republicans and those who will of course blame any future UK terror attack on the Iraq war work there.
Biased BBC: Britain's Got Talent. But None Of It Posts Here.
In your case that is certainly true.
Bryan:
Given that he's famously based in Gaza, self evidently he's going to have experience the results of Israeli aggression rather than vice versa??
Cockney | 20.06.07 - 10:04 am
Goodness gracious, Cockney. Don't you have any resistance at all against the tired old cliches of the Palestinian "narrative"? Self-defence against Palestinian terror is not "aggression."
Obviously Johnston would have experienced the results of Israeli self-defence. But he would also have experienced Palestinians -
*Teaching their young hatred of israel and the West from the cradle on up
*Killing "collaborators"
*Celebrating in the streets after every suicide murder of Israeli civilians.
Problem is, it would never have crossed Johnston's mind to report honestly, if at all, on these events.
And he would never have spoken of "Palestinian aggression." It's not in the BBC script.
hillhunt:
Anonymous:
Loyn: Case not proven. Embedded implies a substantial period with troops; not a quick in-and-out.
Ms Plett: Her not-impartial sniff alone does not prove routine BBC bias.
BBC's bomb-wishers: A touch disingenuous. You accused me earlier of lying - of wrongly suggesting that Biased BBC posters believed that BBC folk wanted their own country bombed. Now you're adding to the lunacy by suggesting that Shepherds Bush really does harbour people who'd prefer their nearest and dearest to meet a horrible end (never mind the daft notion that Stalinists & IRA members staff the place).
Biased BBC: More wriggle than a snake.
David Gregory (BBC):
For what it's worth at Midlands Today a group of us have just had a weekend away with the army as a team building exercise and to build links. We do it every year. And at least one member of our team is in the TA.
will:
The BBC "bias" report gets futher coverage in today's Times.
snippets
In the past two years it has been hit with two critical reports, which endorse the conclusion that the Corporation failed to report Eurosceptic views fairly, and its coverage of business has been heavily criticised. There was also a complex report about the BBC’s Middle East coverage, whose text, although not its summary, indicated an antiPalestinian bias.
Would the ME report be the Cardiff study that measured only airtime given to the opposing sides, rather than take into account the tone of the BBC's questioning?
Mr Byford argues that the BBC gives vent to a broad range of views “every week on Question Time”
http://
business.timesonline.co.u...icle1968952.ece
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
This most certainly proves that the BBC is institutionally biased.
And so does this.
And so does this.
Debate over. B-BBC won. You lost.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Hillhunt:
My post above should have been addressed to you.
Anonymous:
Loyn: Case not proven. Embedded implies a substantial period with troops; not a quick in-and-out.
Was Loyn with the Taleban for more or less time then Gavin Hewitt was with coalition forces in 2003? In any case I didn't know there was a "substantial period" test for being embedded. If your behind enemy lines travelling with the enemy you're embedded.
Ms Plett: Her not-impartial sniff alone does not prove routine BBC bias.
Yes it does. Her recording presumably went through various BBC offices in Jerusalem(?) and London before making it on the air. Nobody thought "hang on - this is a bit off". Even the complaints were rebuffed at first and the complainers had to go to a higher authority.
Plus the lack of tears for Ariel Sharon or any Israeli/American or right-winger by any Beeboid.
Case proven - BBC biased.
As for BBC and bombers, here is what I actually said (not what you try and distort)...
Undoubtedly there are people amongst the Beeb who think exactly along those lines. Former (indeed current) Communists, pro-Republicans and those who will of course blame any future UK terror attack on the Iraq war work there.
Hillhunt - more distortions than a fairground Hall of Mirrors.
hillhunt:
jbh:
This most certainly proves that the BBC is institutionally biased.
And so does this.
And so does this.
Debate over. B-BBC won. You lost.
Evidence 101.
1. Predictable opinion from predictable sources is not evidence of anything. Almost everything you quote comes from the usual less-than-impartial sources.
2. Media-on-media criticism these days is increasingly tinged with self interest. Broadcasting and print now compete aggressively with each other and their new rival, the web, for the same audiences and, increasingly, the same revenue.
3. Murdoch and the Mail have been at it for a very long time indeed. They're entitled to these views. But they are by definition biased.
4. The Telegraph and various right-wing magazines are politically opposed to the existence of a public service broadcaster like the BBC. That's not news.
5. Liddle revelled in the role of in-house maverick at the BBC, pushed it too far and got fired for the very partiality that you rail about. Now he performs a similar function, mostly for right-wing media.
6. Pollard may be a Labour supporter but that does not make him any less partial in his predictable views, Blair himself is no fan of the BBC.
The one exception to all this is Robin Aitken, but he has had his say and not much changed.
Your journalistic obsessions are two-fold:
1. That Neil Hamiton was treated unfairly. You have no compelling evidence to prove this, other than a general unease that Fayed was the source of the original allegations. No less a figure than Stephen Glover has told you this in clear terms.
2. That, by collecting a mountain of press cuttings of criticism about the BBC, you have evidence of something. It is evidence that papers with an inbuilt animus to the BBC keep attacking it.
Most good investigative journalists find themselves frustrated when editors fail to share their belief, evidence comes up short, or opponents outsmart them.
The good ones put their obsessions on hold, find a fresh story, build a case on hard evidence and prove a point. If new evidence emerges, they may then have another pop at an old obsession.
But opinion is not evidence. Until you see that, you're doomed to a Flying-Dutchman existence...
Hillhunt: Career Advice. For Free.
hillhunt:
Anonymous:
Embedded: How long is a piece of string? Let's agree to disagree.
Plett's tears: She made an error of judgement which has been widely criticised. You seem to be suggesting that criticism (including that from within) is not enough, and only blubbing over Sharon and Reagan would end the bias. It would do the reverse - prove another BBC corr showed bias, just in a different direction.
Bombers: You accused me of lying over the notion that BBC staff might welcome further UK attacks. It was true: John Boy had made that nasty allegation on this blog. You then try to slyly suggest that BBC staff would want to gain advantage from such terror. I suggest the distortion is all yours.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Most good investigative journalists find themselves frustrated when editors fail to share their belief, evidence comes up short, or opponents outsmart them.
The good ones put their obsessions on hold, find a fresh story, build a case on hard evidence and prove a point. If new evidence emerges, they may then have another pop at an old obsession.
Sorry to disappoint. I like the story I have already - principally because it exposes the Guardian and its mouthpiece the BBC as two inherently dishonest, unlawful organisations. The Guardian over its criminal cover-up and its perversion of the Downey Inquiry; and the BBC over its sustained illegal news blackout of the exposure of the cover-up.
Why on earth would I want to move on to another story? Given the BBC's contention that the controversy in question "helped bring down the last Conservative government," I'm not likely to find any story that's bigger than the one I have already! And the longer the BBC maintains its silence the bigger it gets day by day!
hillhunt:
jbh:
Why on earth would I want to move on to another story?
Because you don't really think like the investigative journalist you pretend to be.
They all ditch stuff that's not got traction.
Curiosity is never limited. Time is.
Get on with something else and earn your credits that way....except you don't want to. Do you?
Confused.com?:
hillhunt BBC
"Media-on-media criticism these days is increasingly tinged with self interest" etc
Y-e-e-e-s! Absolutely shocking isn't it all those despicable unreliable media outlets. Attacking the BBC its just not right. They're all worthless and have legenday bias don't listen to any of them they all have an axe to grind. The BBC is best. It stands alone as a beacon when all around flounder.
Filthy media, only the BBC will do.
"the USA's primary overseas voice seems to have fallen into the same trap (as do the world's premier news agencies, among them Reuters and AFP)." etc
Y-e-e-e-s! Those wonderful media types. Reliable unbiased experts who do so much good work. They go for the same line as the BBC totally justifying everything the fantastic BBC does. Co-operation and accuracy under BBC rule.
The BBC sets the example. Media shall talk unto media.
hillhunt:
confused.com:
Absolutely shocking isn't it all those despicable unreliable media outlets. Attacking the BBC its just not right.
No, it's not shocking. Or wrong. It's free speech and they're welcome to it.
It's just not evidence. It's opinion from a predictable source.
The Mail on the BBC is like Billy Bragg on the Thatcher years. You know what you're going to get and it plays well to the devoted.
But it doesn't prove very much.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Hillhunt:
Get on with something else and earn your credits that way....except you don't want to. Do you?
No, I don't. I like this story far too much.
Confused.com?:
hillhunt BBC
Yes but Reuters, AFP, channel 4, guardian and voice of america are so very different.
Great organisations, lovely people and a joy to work for who really care about what happens in the world.
Its nice to have organisations like this that can be relied upon to have absolutely no opinions they just give facts and whats more facts that always agree with out beloved BBC.
So different from the vile Fox, Sky, Times, Sun, Mail, ITN, Express and Telegraph.
hillhunt:
confused.com:
Yes but Reuters, AFP, channel 4, guardian and voice of america are so very different. Its nice to have organisations like this that can be relied upon to have absolutely no opinions they just give facts and whats more facts that always agree with out beloved BBC.
Channel 4's licence has much in common with the BBC's; it is expected to be impartial. AFP as a leading international agency supplying other media with news would not succeed in many different markets if it had a reputation for bias and inaccuracy.
Voice of America is an American Government broadcaster.
The Guardian acknowledges its liberal-left leanings. It frequently disagrees with the BBC - check out its Media Guardian pages - but its overall philosophy is supportive of a public broadcaster, so its criticism is less relentless than the Mail/Murdoch papers, for example.
Jack Hughes:
David Gregory (BBC) first of all, thanks for coming on to this site and debating with us.
I guess that as a scientist working in the BBC you have at least 2 challenges:
(1) Covering specific science stories - new technologies, medicines, concerns.
(2) Trying to explain the basis of science - the scientific method.
I am very concerned that you keep using words like "consensus" and "majority". These have no place in the scientific methodology.
Science teaches that there are some absolute truths, laws, facts. These are basic and immutable - rather like, err, the laws of physics.
We may or may not understand all of these. There are gaps in our understanding and knowledge. Unknowns. Areas of confusion.
But the basis of knowledge and understanding keeps ratchetting up and increasing. Things are not unlearnt. Not forgotten. Techniques are not uninvented. Each generation can build on the work of previous generations.
Nowhere does any of this involve "consensus" or "majority voting". No - an idea or theory is either correct or its incorrect - compared to the laws of physics. Not the habits of man.
Time after time a maverick or radical will overturn the orthodoxy of the time with a new - and correct - way of seeing things.
Notice what the test is - the idea is correct or its not. The test is not of popularity or modishness.
Jon:
"Global Warming, as we think we know it, doesn't exist. And I am not the only one trying to make people open up their eyes and see the truth. But few listen, despite the fact that I was one of the first Canadian Ph.Ds. in Climatology and I have an extensive background in climatology, especially the reconstruction of past climates and the impact of climate change on human history and the human condition. Few listen, even though I have a Ph.D, (Doctor of Science) from the University of London, England and was a climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg. For some reason (actually for many), the World is not listening. Here is why."
http://www.canadafreepress.com/
2...rming020507.htm
NeoMancunian:
Jack Hughes | 22.06.07 - 7:42 pm
It may be the case that David Gregory is unwilling to depart from the BBC orthodoxy re MMGW. He may have a mortgage to repay. The BBC pays his salary after all (well actually daft sods like you and I pay his salary, whether we like it or not). I bet no one got very far in the BBC by rocking the 'groupthink' boat.
Jon:
Melanie Philips at
http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/
quotes from an article by R. Timothy Patterson, professor and director of the Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Centre, Department of Earth Sciences, Carleton University.
If he is right - we are in for a cooling period - we may need Al Gores hot-air to keep us warm.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
NeoMancunian | 22.06.07 - 10:03 pm:
I bet no one got very far in the BBC by rocking the 'groupthink' boat.
You got that right. And the groupthink phonomenon is not limited to the BBC either. My last effort for Granada resulted in the NW Royal Television Society (RTS) shortlisting me as Best Reporter of 1997. However, during the edit I'd had an almighty row with my producer over her insistence that I put a Leftist spin on my reports. Accordingly it was the last thing I did for them. Cute eh? Sacked for a report that won me an RTS shortlisting!
I'm left suspecting that there must be several other instances where non-Leftie TV reporters got booted out of the broadcast media, whether by Granada, the Beeb, or any of the others.
NeoMancunian:
JBH
I believe you live on SG.
Do you know the pub in M20 that does the cheese ?
Anonymous:
Plett's tears: She made an error of judgement which has been widely criticised. You seem to be suggesting that criticism (including that from within) is not enough, and only blubbing over Sharon and Reagan would end the bias. It would do the reverse - prove another BBC corr showed bias, just in a different direction.
No. I'm merely pointing out that no BBC staffer to my knowledge has admitted to blubbing over anyone. Not when Rabin was assassinated nor any other tragic event concerning a public figure.
Y-e-s, if such events took place it would indicate bias and I am not asking that BBCoids take out onions every time a politician passes on. All I'm saying (s-l-o-w-l-y for your benefit) is that a BBC reporter doing what Plett did, shows bias.
That she did it for a corrupt, blood-stained terrorist makes it even worse.
But this one incident, a broadcast of a pre-recorded piece, shows bias not just on Plett's part, it shows it on the part of those with editorial control of the programme she was making, it shows it on the part of the those working in the Jerusalem/London offices who had pre-broadcast knowledge of it, and it shows bias on the part of those elsewhere in the BBC cocoon who high-handedly dismissed the initial complaints.
pennance:
A Fable of Global Warming
See http://pennance.us/?p=4 for a parable showing that the same set of data is rigorously compatible with both global warming and cooling, ergo, implicitly proving that both sides in the nonsensical climate debate are correct.
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
NeoMancunian | 22.06.07 - 11:32 pm:
Sorry NM, I don't. I live quite close by too - M16.
David Gregory (BBC):
Jack Hughes. Quite correct. I fully accept the gist of what you are saying. But the point is I'm responsible for reporting the science as it is right now.
I realise I started this conversation by responding to something about climate change, but I'm outlining the general principals that I follow in all my science reporting.
So; Climate Change is real and man-made. Mobile phones are safe. MMR is safe. The Earth is more than 7000 years old. Power lines don't cause cancer.
Now I love a good maverick scientist as much as the next journalist... but often these sort of stories say more about the vanity of the journalist than science.
If I could find the climate change equivalent of Robin Warren that would be really interesting
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicobacter_pylori ) but nothing so far.
Can I just once again politely discount the views of Melanie Phillips. She tends to be a bit selective in her evidence.
NeoMancunian: You may not believe this but I've had robust discussions with other BBC staff about Climate Change, MMR and the safety of mobile phones. Group-think would make my life so much easier. Assuming everyone agreed with me, of course!
GCooper:
David Gregory writes:
"If I could find the climate change equivalent of Robin Warren that would be really interesting "
Did you, by any chance visit the site I suggested the other day?
If so, you will have seen the e-mail from science journalist David Whitehouse, discussing this subject.
You will also, I hope, have read and considered Professor Bob Carter's views on GW.
Quite how someone with Prof Carter's credentials can be ignored, I simply cannot understand.
And in case you missed it, the link again is http://antigreen.blogspot.com/
Biodegradable:
Can I just once again politely discount the views of Melanie Phillips. She tends to be a bit selective in her evidence.
David Gregory (BBC) | 23.06.07 - 12:08 pm
Do you discount the evidence of the scientists Melanie Phillips quotes?
If so aren't you being selective?
http://www.melaniephillips.com/d...m/diary/?
p=1563
Mick McDonald (formerly 'small:
David Gregory: In response to your post at 23.06.07 - 12:08 pm ;
1. Climate Change is real and man-made
2 Mobile phones are safe.
3. MMR is safe.
4. The Earth is more than 7000 years old.
5. Power lines don't cause cancer.
I agree with nos 2-5, I disagree with no 1, not because I accept or reject the "consensus", but because I do not see compelling evidence to the contrary.
Jack Hughes @ 22.06.07 - 7:42 pm:
I intend to quote your last 3 paragraphs when I'm next in 'pub philosipher' mode - thanks for the ammo!
Mick McDonald ('smallheathen'):
oops - name's too short - should read; (formerly 'smallheathen')
pennance:
David Gregory, consensus does not imply truth. There is a "consensus" in the literature that temperature is an interval random variable when the truth is that it is ordinal [see
(http://pennance.us/?p=32)]. This means that temperature averages are scale dependent and hence relative. The same data set can be consistent with an increase in mean on one thermometric scale and a decrease in another. Today's climatologists do not take enough math courses.
Bryan:
You may not believe this but I've had robust discussions with other BBC staff about Climate Change...
David Gregory (BBC) | 23.06.07 - 12:08 pm
I assume they were "robust" since those other BBC people disagreed with the concept of man-made climate change? If so, they must be really frustrated since there's no way they'll see their views broadcast by their employer.
Face it, Mr. Gregory, the BBC may be 22000-odd strong but it's a closed club with a narrow agenda on virtually any issue you care to name, from Iraq to fox hunting. And anyone who doesn't go along with the general consensus is no doubt faced with extremely poor career prospects at the BBC.
Jon:
"Can I just once again politely discount the views of Melanie Phillips. She tends to be a bit selective in her evidence."
And the BBC gives us a whole range of views from Al Gore to David Pembleton (Ex BBC now Christian Aid) to Green peace and Friends of the Earth.
Can't argue with that range of opinion.
Jon:
While the BBC rely on "environmentalists" for their "science" -
Here are some "maverick" voices not heard on the BBC.
A new theory to explain global warming was revealed at a meeting at the University of Leicester (UK) and is being considered for publication in the journal "Science First Hand". The controversial theory has nothing to do with burning fossil fuels and atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.
Vladimir Shaidurov of the Russian Academy of Sciences
http://www.physorg.com/news11710.html
Dr. John Christy of the University of Alabama and climatologist Dr. David
Legates of the University of Delaware and others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f...related&
search=
S. Fred Singer is the founder and president of the Science & Environmental Policy Project. He is emeritus professor of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia and former director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service.
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=212
Claude Allegre,(One of the most decorated French geophysicists and former government official and an active member of France’s Socialist Party.
http://epw.senate.gov/public/ind...82-
87381DE894CD
Danish scientist: Global warming is a myth
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, March 15 (UPI) -- A Danish scientist said the idea of a "global temperature" and global warming is more political than scientific.
University of Copenhagen Professor Bjarne Andresen has analyzed the topic in collaboration with Canadian Professors Christopher Essex from the University of Western Ontario and Ross McKitrick of the University of Guelph.
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Sci...5-012154-7403r/
Dr. Tim Ball, Chairman of the Natural Resources Stewardship Project, is a renowned environmental consultant and former professor of climatology at the University of Winnipeg
Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide
Global Warming: The Cold, Hard Facts?
http://www.canadafreepress.com/
2...rming020507.htm
Scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Sci..._global_warming
Could have gone on but haven't the time.
Jon:
I wonder if the BBC are going to act on this report (FROM SEESAW TO WAGON WHEEL )in the future so the public can have a range of views given to them and not the view of the journalist or corraspondent.
"Impartiality does not entail equal space for every attitude, but it should involve some space provided that points of view are rationally and honestly held, and all of them are subject to equal scrutiny. It is not the BBC’s role to close down debate."
"It remains important that programme-makers relish the full range of debate that such a central and absorbing subject offers, scientifically, politically and ethically, and avoid being misrepresented as standard-bearers"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/
b...rtialitybbc.pdf
The BBC are the standard bearers of so-called MMGW without a doubt.
Jon:
"Campaigners say the UN must take urgent action to protect six World Heritage sites, including Mount Everest, from the impact of climate change.
Groups, including Greenpeace and the Climate Justice Programme, have been petitioning the global body to list the locations as "in danger"."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/t...ech/
6231358.stm
Need I say anymore?
Jon:
"We can save our world heritage for future generations, but only if we take urgent action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution," said Phil Freeman of Climate Action Network Australia."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/t...ech/
6231358.stm
No other opinion here - its on message.
They are even allowed to say "greenhouse gasses as polution"
Thom Boston:
Earlier up this thread, JBH referred to a "sustained ILLEGAL news blackout of the exposure of the cover-up."
Assuming this exposure of the cover-up is a reference to his own work, can he explain where the illegality lies? I'd be very keen to know. Any chance of JBH vs BBC in the courts?
Jonathan Boyd Hunt:
Thom Boston | 25.06.07 - 12:25 am:
Thom,
I've just seen your post. I'll get back to you presently. In the meantime, you might take a 5 minute skim read of some of the docs in this folder:
http://www.esnips.com/web/Hunt-02
Followed by a similar assessment of the docs in this one:
http://www.esnips.com/web/Hunt-04
David Gregory (BBC):
GCooper:
Did you, by any chance visit the site I suggested the other day?
If so, you will have seen the e-mail from science journalist David Whitehouse, discussing this subject.
GCooper | 23.06.07 - 12:21 pm | #
I didn't see that particular email on the website no. But would that be David Whitehouse the former BBC Science Correspondent?
On the subject of Melanie Phillips. She's selective with evidence and she wants to push a certain point of view. I did engage in a brief email discussion with her about a post on climate change and she closed it down pretty quickly.
I thought that was a shame because her original point was interesting. But by simplifying it she reduced a nice piece of research to the equivalent of "it's really cold in NY right now, global warming PAH!"
Anyway, we seem to have reached an impasse. I've explained how I work as a Science Correspondent. And I also take on board your points and any research you think is interesting. Perhaps people may want to continue this via email david.gregory@bbc.co.uk rather than clog up the board with increasingly rarified point and counterpoint.
But I had another question, why are so many on this board convinced climate change as a piece of science is incorrect? Why has the science become so political (as opposed to what to do about it which is as I've said before is totally something of the political realm)
Hope that makes sense, long day with car parking robots.
Bryan:
But I had another question, why are so many on this board convinced climate change as a piece of science is incorrect?
David Gregory,
I'm not clued up at all on this issue, but I should point out that many feel it's the concept of man-made climate change that is incorrect.
As regards why has the science become so political, thanks for the chuckle. The BBC has evidently played a significant role in this with its energetic endorsement of one side of the debate.
The BBC politicises everything it touches, even sport. At the risk of exasperating regulars who've heard this from me before, I repeat that the 2006 Football World Cup saw BBC journalists falling all over themselves to back any side but England, especially when it came to England's opponents. It was apparently going against the flow to show just a touch of interest in the prospects of the home side, and commentators could barely withhold their disappointment when England scored and their glee when the other side scored.
Look around you at your BBC colleagues, Mr. Gregory. I can assure you it'll be quite an education.
Ryan:
"But I had another question, why are so many on this board convinced climate change as a piece of science is incorrect?"
@David Gregory (BBC).
Well David, I'm not totally convinced that MMGW warming is false, but I can certainly understand why people have come to believe it is false. The reason relates to various myths that have been perpetrated on the public over the years:
1] The CO2 follows a hockey stick curve and so will temperature. Myth. The hockey stick temperature effect has been widely discredited.
2] Venus is much warmer than earth because of greenhouse gases, and so will the Earth. Myth. Venus has an atmosphere that is predominantly CO2 whereas in the Earth it is a trace gas (
Ryan:
sorry - last comment got cut off:
3] London will be inundated by the sea due to MMGW. Myth. London will be inundated by the sea as the land beneath it is subsiding.
4] The Maldives are sinking into the sea due to MMGW. Myth. The Maldives are built on coral right on sea level. The coral sits on soft sediment which is subsiding.
5] CO2 is pollution. Myth. It comes from fossil fuels. Fossil fuels were grown from atmospheric CO2. We are returning what nature extracted.
6] CO2 is at unprecedented levels. Myth. If we burnt all the fossil fuels we still wouldn't return CO2 to prehistoric levels. Much is now in the form of limestone (calcium carbonate)
Ryan:
there's more!
7] The climate is changing at an unprecedented rate. Myth. Natural climate change wiped out the Moche civilisation of Peru. Egypt was wetter when the Sphinx was built. It will also cause the next ice-age, just like it caused the last one.
8] Decreased snow in the Alps is caused by global warming. Myth. Ten years ago the Alps had their heaviest snowfall ever recorded. Last year Bavaria recorded record low temperatures - but there was very little snow. Snowfall is complicated...
9] Ice core data shows CO2 causes temperature increase. Myth. The ice core data shows CO2 increasing 800 years AFTER temp increases. Scientists try to explain this by saying that increasing CO2 feeds back and dominates temperature rise - in which case why does it fall at the start of an ice-age, when CO2 is at its highest?
10] Physics shows that the basic theory is correct. Myth? The basic theory is that CO2 bonds are such that they reflect the energy back towards the earth. No major test of the physics of the basic theory has been performed as far as I am aware. It has not been supported by satellite measurements.
The dissemination of too many myths leads to cynacism I'm afraid!
crossbow:
The climate changes all the time.
The questions are: does current man-made activity cause such change? And if so, what should be done about it?
The BBC promotes the "man-made global warming" answer to the first question because its answer to the second question is: state intervention, restrictions on personal consumption, higher taxes...and so forth.
That is the BBC's answer to everything. As a state-funded institution it has a vested interest in doing so. The rest of the BBC coverage on this issue is just the usual slop from the usual sentimental leftists.
David Gregory (BBC):
Fair enough
Crossbow: As I've explained I don't promote anything. I just report the science. On climate change as on many other contentious issues. I've never "promoted' state intervention on the issue.
anony:
Al Beeb promises to discuss a 'wider range' of views in future to counteract any perceived bias.
Will it discuss this, on Islam and the Haymarket bomb plot?:
"Britain, an unresponsive body being eaten alive by its enemies" (29 June)
http://amnation.com/vfr/
Commenting by HaloScan.com
