As to whether this is ommission or commission, here's another BBC example of outwardly sloppy reporting. Funny that it is consistent with their overall bias however.
One of the Islamic clerics who faced being imprisoned for stirring up trouble, fled to Lebanon recently to avoid it.
On an impulse, I decided to search the BBC website and see what they had previoulsy written about him' - Omar Bakri Mohammed'.
Initially referred to as a 'Syrian-born activist', he featured in a BBC article on 14/10/2000 for this statement:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/972207.stm

"A Syrian-born activist has called for Muslims in Britain to join a holy war against Israel following the outbreak of violence between Palestinians and Israelis in the Middle East.
Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed said it was the duty of all Muslims to give support to the Palestinians.
"They are obliged to support their Muslim brothers in Palestine by raising funds, giving them complete moral support and even some of them going abroad to be joined with their Muslim brothers fighting against Israel," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. "

Just over a year later, on 7/1/2002 they refer to him as 'A radical Muslim cleric' and quote him as saying
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/17.../uk/ 1746454.stm
'....But Mr Bakri Mohammed, a spokesman for the al-Muhajiroun group, said ..."We are an ideological, political party. We do not recruit people to go and fight on behalf of anybody or to indulge in any military activities."

Now this is totally opposite to his previous quote above, AND NO-ONE at the BBC picks up on it. If you read all of the articles, you will see that this is not the only time he contradicts himself, as the prevailing political wind demands, without seemingly any BBC ears pricking up or pointing out the real story behind this man.

Since, mysteriously, the BBC have now removed the second of these articles from their website, I took the precaution of saving it before they did so, and it can be viewed at http://www.geocities.com/ teddy_1...mdismissed.html

Ugh....BBC. "Bush-Bashing Corporation".
"Blatantly Biased Coverage".
"Bombastic Bush-hating Communists".
I'm currently trying to look up the relevant legislation, to find out exactly what steps I need to take so that I am no longer forced upon pain of imprisonment to contribute financially towards these treasonous pro-terrorist, pro-Islam, pro-Palestinian, anti-'white Christian heterosexual' moonbats. I think it's simply a question of donating my television set to the local tip (it won't be an insufferable loss these days, there's nothing worth watching anyway).

> there's nothing worth watching anyway

But there is, though not generally on the BBC. It pisses me off that I have to pay the BBC in order to watch CSI and Law & Order on 5.

Teddy Bear, why don't you complain to the BBC? As it's publicly funded and obliged by the government to provide news and programming for all sectors of society (even tedious, self-important, neo-con no-marks like you), they'd have to take note. Better to do that than have a love-in about it on some other right-wing tool's reader-free blog, I'd have thought.

> On an impulse, I decided to search the BBC website
You sad, sad man. [irrelevant & profane insult] Sitting there, hunched over your computer, like a digital-era Disgusted of Tunbridge [deleted] Wells, combing through the BBC's massive website looking for the ambiguous turn of phrase or out of place comma that will, to you, fully justify your pathetic, received opinion notions that the BBC is actually spewing forth pro-Left, pro-fundamentalist Islam propaganda. It's all true Teddy, it's all true. Everyone at the Beeb wears regulation hammer & sickle underpants, the female staff all have abortions at lunchtime and Osama Bin Laden picks the Lottery numbers.

Explain why you're flagging up the use of the term 'Syrian-born activist' on one article and 'radical Muslim cleric' on another. The terms are not mutually exclusive, both are applicable to Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, and neither seems more ideologically loaded than the other to me. Would you rather we just used the term 'Paki' universally? Then you could be racist without having to search for justification for it.

So some public figure changed his tune to suit the prevailing political wind. Ooh, that's never happened before in human history, has it? A quick websearch generates "about 525" hits for "bush contradicts himself" (in 0.44 seconds). Although I suppose you think Google is run by the ghost of Yasser Arafat, [irrelevant profanity].

> Since, mysteriously, the BBC have now removed the second of these articles from their website
They haven't. Both articles are still there. You thought for a while there that you'd exposed the big cover up, didn't you? You reckoned the BBC were on the run, and were incriminating themselves in the rush to hide evidence, but that your months of work was about to pay off, and that you'd nail those nigger-loving lefties. Nope, you just made a mistake, exposed your inflated ego, and made a right prick of yourself. Move along everyone, nothing to see here.

So no one noticed a change of heart by a minor-league Islamic fundamentalist (although the quotes could be interpreted as him giving his personal opinion in the first statement and quoting his party's line in the second), in two different articles, written over a year apart, possibly by different authors, with the more recent of the two being nearly four years old? Fuck me! Shut the corporation down and give the airtime to the Crazy Frog immediately!

I'm no 100% BBC enthusiast - it reserves as much contempt for the far left as it does for bleating WASP [another profanity — oo, how clever] like you - but seeing you and your pitiable turd-sifting exercises make me want to hug Jeremy Paxman.

[deleted entire paragraph due to its nastiness]

PS You seem to enjoy making up pointless and rather childish names with the initials BBC. How about Bum Bollocks [and yes, I'd better delete that one too, just for consistency's sake]? Have you got that one?

Sorry, the PS section is directed towards "Tom Burrows".

[deleted]?
[deleted]?
[deleted]?

This forum is moderated, like it says down there somewhere.

I've left the gist of your comments up, as all — well, most — opinion is welcome here, and because I don't think I could do a better job of making you look like an eejit than you've done yourself. But hurling four-letter insults at people isn't welcome, because I don't want to see my website degenerate into a bunch of students screaming at each other, as has happened to so many sites. I'd rather keep the comments open, but too much trolling and they'll have to be shut. Which would be a shame. Any further posts containing the same sort of crap will be deleted in their entirety, as it's quicker.

I'll just reiterate my original point that my criticism of the BBC is that they now seem to see everything as a difference of opinions. They do this in all sorts of directions, not just pro-Left.

Tom & Squander - Check out Anti TVL SIte for empowerment on how not to pay.

Oooooh it seems like I really hit a nerve there.
Not many people would take so much time out of there lives to express themselves so childishly about something they feel is so foolish and disagreeable. But seeing your response to an anti-BBC observation MAKES IT ALL WORTHWHILE.
Thanks for that.

Hi -

/Shameless Plug Start
I've linked this to something I wrote at my blog at:

http://21stcenturyschizoidman.bl...zoid- world.html

which ties into this...
/Shameless Plug End

John

> I've left the gist of your comments up,
I apologise for the swearing, Squander - something about [deleted — someone failed to get the point] angered and disgusted me somewhat.

> I don't think I could do a better job of making you look like an eejit than you've done yourself.
So exposing Teddy Bear's mistakes and inconsistencies, and bursting his pompous little bubble makes *me* look like an eejit? We'll have to disagree there. My delivery may have been a little OTT, but my points are spot on.

> I'll just reiterate my original point
Oh, I don't disagree with your original argument - just Teddy Bear's reactionary nonsense. In fact, it was pleasing to see you not only avoid backing him up, but actually distancing yourself from him by reiterating your original point.

> Oooooh it seems like I really hit a nerve there.
Is that the best you can come up with, TB? Observing that you've lost the argument, you resort to the equivalent of telling the people beating you up that their fists might hurt a bit later on. You can hardly crow over getting someone else annoyed if they've just publicly torn you new a**ehole.

> Not many people would take so much time out of there (sic) lives
[shakes head] Another classic response from the soundly beaten, implying that I'm as sad as you because I spent time writing my post. I don't have a problem sparing 20 minutes on a slow day to make the likes of you look stupid. You don't need to thank me.

> But seeing your response to an anti-BBC observation MAKES IT ALL WORTHWHILE.
So, being proved wrong, being made to look an idiot, and having your big, anti-BBC crusade exposed as baseless, reactionary, hyperconservative, WASP paranoia makes it all worthwhile? I can only assume that you're some kind of emotional masochist - but there are surely easier ways to get those kind of kicks than posting bogus conspiracies and other easily disprovable rubbish on the internet?

A final question, (a rhetorical question, as you didn't bother replying to any of my real ones). Instead of looking for a pro-Left bias that doesn't exist on the BBC, why not try looking for instances of the already well-documented (by actual journalists rather than saddo internet survivalists) pro-Right bias in other news media?

Just to be clear, it's not swearing I object to; it's fighting. There's a line between arguing and fighting, which is what you crossed. The problem with the swearing is that it was part of a personal attack entirely unconnected to your arguments.

The BBC aren't pro-Islam — that's ridiculous — but they are so concerned about not appearing to be racist that they will avoid subjecting Muslims to the same sort of analysis that they would subject Christians to. Since both religions are pan-racial, I don't really understand that myself, just as I don't understand Mr Newsbeat's "Paki" and "racist" references — I'm against religion, as a rule, and I don't see why being against the most popular religion in the Middle East makes me a racist while being against the most popular religion in the Caribbean doesn't.


> So exposing Teddy Bear's mistakes and inconsistencies, and bursting his pompous little bubble makes *me* look like an eejit?

No, screaming with rage when you see an opinion you don't like, not to mention ranting about Tunbridge Wells, makes you look like an eejit.

> Everyone at the Beeb wears regulation hammer & sickle underpants, the female staff all have abortions at lunchtime and Osama Bin Laden picks the Lottery numbers.

That makes you look like an eejit.


> So some public figure changed his tune to suit the prevailing political wind. Ooh, that's never happened before in human history, has it? A quick websearch generates "about 525" hits for "bush contradicts himself" (in 0.44 seconds).

You're making the point that you hope to disprove here. If Bush says one thing then, later, says another, it results in "Bush contradicts himself" reports on the BBC, among other places. Hence your many Google hits. The point is that the BBC didn't do the same for Omar Bakri Mohammed. That's not a pro-Islamist bias; it's sloppy reporting. Their anti-Bush bias is strong enough to make them pull their fingers out and report less sloppily. Then again, sometimes it's so strong that it increases the sloppiness.

> Another classic response from the soundly beaten, implying that I'm as sad as you because I spent time writing my post.

You can't call someone sad for taking the time to search the BBC's website but then claim that any criticisms about taking time to do things on the Internet are a sure sign of being beaten.


> Is that the best you can come up with, TB?

Well, he clearly did hit a nerve. Either that or you're that obnoxious all the time.

Radio 1 - Newsbeaten - The only thing that you're right about is that the BBC did re-instate the page that they had originally removed. As for defeating your argument, it's like shooting fish in a barrel, but I'm disinclined to spend any time doing so for the likes of you. I am cetainly intelligent enough to understand your motive in posting so obnoxiously, but if you had any genuine argument you would have put it forward in a civil manner, and let others decide whos points are valid.
Try again with more respect if you really want an answer, otherwise slag away until you're removed for wasting everybody's time and patience with childish ranting.

"Radio 1 Newsbeat",
In all fairness to Squander Two, I must agree that his/(her?) nah, think it's "his" somehow... blog is not the one accusing the BBC of blatant left-wing bias...that would be MY blog. Come over to my livejournal and argue with me if you like. Honestly, I'm not being sarcy with you, you ARE welcome to argue with me, only please be polite.
I don't want my LJ to consist merely of comments which agree with me, that's boring. If you're OK about cutting out the name-calling and presenting some intelligent (or even half-formed) arguments, I'll certainly post your comments on my LJ, no matter how much they disagree with my views. And if you prove me wrong on a point, with backup evidence, I won't be too proud to admit it. OK?

> his/(her?) nah, think it's "his" somehow

It's not a secret or anything. Read the FAQ.