tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post5369607415387137431..comments2024-03-27T09:14:27.496+00:00Comments on All That Is Solid ...: The BBC's Leftist BiasPhilhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06298147857234479278noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-33758309110717258442020-07-17T21:08:41.732+01:002020-07-17T21:08:41.732+01:00"But no-one makes you read the Guardian"..."But no-one makes you read the Guardian", Dipper said complacently. In that moment, eight storeys down inside the Islington bunker, Katharine Viner nodded to her second-in-command, who pushed the button to initiate the launch sequence of the Domsday Satellite. The machine ran through its startup perfectly. Sure, mistakes had been made along the way - she should never have delegated branding to the subeditors - but inwardly she laughed. Did those idiots really think the Scott Trust had ploughed through all that money paying <i>Owen Jones' salary</i>?<br /><br />"The Security Council is on the line," a second lackey informed her. Onscreen, the inside of the UN headquarters appeared.<br /><br />"Ladies and gentleman," Viner said, "my terms are simple..."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-31677852809433403262020-07-17T10:50:55.176+01:002020-07-17T10:50:55.176+01:00I have stopped watching BBC 'News' and am ...I have stopped watching BBC 'News' and am eagerly waiting for the day the licence fee ends so I can stop paying to be lectured by idiots.<br /><br />What really irritates me about the BBC is the complete lack of awareness of its position as a compulsorily funded national broadcaster. This central fact of its funding should inform its every moment on screen. The Guardian is far worse, for example, but no-one makes you read the Guardian, if you don't want to pay for it you don't have to, so I don't object to it I just disagree with it.<br /><br />I don't and didn't like Corbyn, I think most far left are delusional. But it isn't the job of the BBC to agree with me. It is their job to give people with a significant national following an opportunity to put their position and subject it to reasonable interrogation. It shouldn't have a 'line' which it clearly does, and which is effectively Blairite.<br /><br />There has been much discussion recently on the BBC about 'Empire' without ever mentioning 'the 3C's'. I don't understand how anyone can form a rounded view on Empire if that isn't mentioned. Like discussing Socialism without mentioning redistribution of wealth. Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-26649858725832200892020-07-16T21:04:02.630+01:002020-07-16T21:04:02.630+01:00«We are pulled toward the left tribe or the right ...«<i>We are pulled toward the left tribe or the right tribe, when most of us would more happily live somewhere in the boring centre.</i>»<br /><br />That's the enduring myth of english politics, that there is a significant centre. There used to be a centre, during the postwar years, when both right and left were mildly socialdemocratic (working class and lower-middle class politics), and centre-right or centre-left, but that evaporated with thatcherism (upper-middle and upper class politics).<br /><br />There is currently no centre between property owners and buyers, between landlords and renters, between employers and ever more casualized workers, between investors and those who live on debt.<br /><br />What many people call "the centre" is just the class politics of the affluent property owners of southern "Middle England" suburbs, which is the milder thatcherism of the original M Thatcher governments, rather than its more extreme current version. That type of class politics is well represented by the LibDems, and by the cameronians and mandelsonians in the other two parties.Blissexnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-5159938180319220012020-07-16T20:53:26.817+01:002020-07-16T20:53:26.817+01:00The BBC was thoroughly infiltrated during the Blai...The BBC was thoroughly infiltrated during the Blair era, and in any case it is institutionally whig/centrist/thatcherist, like other organs of the state. Currently like so many others it is thatcherite on economic issues and socially progressive on cultural issues, so it gets called "right" (thatcherite) leaning by the left and "left" (identity politics) leaning by the right.<br />We have to remember that every non-trivial hire by the BBC used to be formally vetted by MI5.<br /><br />Also many times since 2010 various tories have been threatening to defund it unless it becomes more "democratic" to support more the opinions of the voters who have elected the government majority, who constantly write to their Conservative MPs complaining about the socialist/EUSSR bias of the BBC.Blissexnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-39491535632627822832020-07-16T11:52:45.728+01:002020-07-16T11:52:45.728+01:00GraunTV? Give me a break! Their coverage has mad...GraunTV? Give me a break! Their coverage has made me give up on them entirely. Why should I support a paper whose editors hold me in contempt: spending the last 5 years suggesting half their readership are dangerous anti-Semitic fantasists. No wonder they're struggling financially. <br /><br />Think you mean Deryck Guyler, not Griffiths? Thought he was at his best as the Police Sergeant in the Beatles' film A Hard Day's Night.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-77494783965677059322020-07-16T08:58:01.185+01:002020-07-16T08:58:01.185+01:00aren't you comparing apples and oranges? It is...aren't you comparing apples and oranges? It is entirely consistent for the BBC's news agenda to be slanted to the conservative right, while other programme-makers and commissioners have absorbed the tenets common to their Guardian-reading milieu. <br /><br />it is, therefore, possible for the BBC to be slanted to both 'left' (or liberalism) and the right. <br /><br />watching Borgen on Netflix, I am struck by the (so-called) Moderate Party - the centrists - and the relative lack of centre-ground on offer in politics (anywhere) and the media. We are pulled toward the left tribe or the right tribe, when most of us would more happily live somewhere in the boring centre. <br /><br />given its slant, the content of both news and everyday programming is rather unreflective of the ordinary experience of most people. Perhaps this tension is what keeps us entertained. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-21481096950562845332020-07-16T08:46:38.477+01:002020-07-16T08:46:38.477+01:00Never, *never* blog late at night.Never, *never* blog late at night.Philhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06298147857234479278noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-4568274169812013512020-07-16T08:21:10.741+01:002020-07-16T08:21:10.741+01:00Terry Griffiths on Play School? That was the famou...Terry Griffiths on Play School? That was the famously slow paced snooker player. I think you mean the God-Emperor himself Derek Griffiths, famous in this house for the 'Magic E' song.Andy DMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03762009221456303236noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-43654016242878176742020-07-16T08:08:49.675+01:002020-07-16T08:08:49.675+01:00There are four academic studies of BBC News that I...There are four academic studies of BBC News that I know of using media content analysis. They all conclude that the BBC is biased against the left and the Labour party. I know of none that conclude the opposite.Braingrasshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12859826435710133646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-14499760545006783142020-07-15T23:58:19.224+01:002020-07-15T23:58:19.224+01:00Derek Griffiths.Derek Griffiths.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com