The Biased Broadcasting Corporation

[Mic09]

On 11/11/2019 at 14:56, markavfc40 said:

I find it all a bit sad really what the BBC has turned into. I used to always think that you could trust the BBC and what is was reporting as it was impartial but that is now clearly not the case and hasn't been for some time.

No public television in the world is impartial. And it's a tough ask for a television to be impartial, considering the government can pull the money strings that will affect it. 

I understand BBC is sort of a public treasure, a lot of people put a lot of trust in it. I did too, until tonight.

Tonight I was left disappointed. 6 chefs on MasterChef Professional and only one of them any good. Get that shit privatised NOW.

[bickster]

5 minutes ago, Mic09 said:

No public television in the world is impartial. And it's a tough ask for a television to be impartial, considering the government can pull the money strings that will affect it. 

I understand BBC is sort of a public treasure, a lot of people put a lot of trust in it. I did too, until tonight.

Tonight I was left disappointed. 6 chefs on MasterChef Professional and only one of them any good. Get that shit privatised NOW.

Thing is, the BBC used to do a good job of being impartial. It was biased one way here and the other way there but pretty much got it right overall. So we couldn’t give a shit how other state broadcasters are, we know what we had.

[chrisp65]

It’s..... Rebekah Vardy.....no, no, let me finish, it’s actually Lord Gammon of Porkshire

 

 

 

[choffer]

 

[StefanAVFC]

I dont want to be a conspiracy theorist but there does seem to be a legitimate push by the BBC to attempt to show that leaving is still what the public want

[Chindie]

1 minute ago, StefanAVFC said:

I dont want to be a conspiracy theorist but there does seem to be a legitimate push by the BBC to attempt to show that leaving is still what the public want

There's a remarkable alignment with Tory desires.

Funny that.

[HanoiVillan]

He made some good points, and was uncharacteristically fluent for a vox pop, but I suppose it was inevitable the presenter was going to draw it to a close when he said Johnson should be 'thrown in jail' or whatever. That being said, it's astonishing how rarely you hear arguments like these from any vox pops, yet the views he's espousing are held, in some form or other, by at least a third of the population. 

[blandy]

1 hour ago, StefanAVFC said:

I dont want to be a conspiracy theorist but there does seem to be a legitimate push by the BBC to attempt to show that leaving is still what the public want

I’ve not seen that. Vox pops are overdone and not of much value anyway, but they’ve been doing them from various places, brexity and otherwise. It’s not wrong or biased to go to places they usually ignore, like stoke or Barnsley or darlo.  I don’t see them pushing any angle. They do however let too many politicians and spokespersons get away with all sorts of crap. They are nowhere near sceptical or robust enough in challenging government lies, but actively pushing, not for me.

[HanoiVillan]

7 minutes ago, blandy said:

I’ve not seen that. Vox pops are overdone and not of much value anyway, but they’ve been doing them from various places, brexity and otherwise. It’s not wrong or biased to go to places they usually ignore, like stoke or Barnsley or darlo.  I don’t see them pushing any angle. They do however let too many politicians and spokespersons get away with all sorts of crap. They are nowhere near sceptical or robust enough in challenging government lies, but actively pushing, not for me.

I think to some extent it depends here on your definition of 'actively pushing'. Do I think that producers are checking people will stay on a Bexity script before they give them the microphone? No, I don't. But if you conduct interviews with over-65's in coffee shops during the working day, you're inevitably going to get a lot more of one type of opinion. 

[blandy]

7 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

if you conduct interviews with over-65's in coffee shops during the working day, you're inevitably going to get a lot more of one type of opinion. 

Sure. They’ve also done them in remain areas and mixed areas and had a wider range of views. Don’t get me wrong some of the coverage I’ve seen has been poor, some of it overly gammon focused for my tastes, but none of it has seemed to be pushing any agenda or angle. I watch some 24 hour news, some evening news sometimes newsnight and listen to radio news. Don’t watch or listen to anything like Questions Time or debates, so maybe my mix is atypical. If one channel starts showing sh!te I turn over or off.

[bannedfromHandV]

Has the BBC ever actually been impartial?

I mean, it's the state broadcaster, we automatically assume that RT is a mouthpiece for the russian government, Al Jazeera is a mouthpiece for Qatar/Gulf States......so why wouldn't the BBC be just another government mouthpiece?

I wonder if we've been suckered into the concept of impartiality.

[bickster]

1 minute ago, bannedfromHandV said:

so why wouldn't the BBC be just another government mouthpiece?

Because it has a charter that supposedly prevents this

[bannedfromHandV]

19 minutes ago, bickster said:

Because it has a charter that supposedly prevents this

There are a whole bunch of charters, rules and procedures that are conveniently forgotten or ignored on a regular basis, I’m not sure it’s worth the paper it was originally written on I’m afraid.

I think the beeb is exposing itself for what it actually is, and I think it’s a matter of time before someone has the clout and time to seriously challenge the mandatory funding (TV ‘license’) situation successfully.

 

[blandy]

11 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

There are a whole bunch of charters, rules and procedures that are conveniently forgotten or ignored on a regular basis,

Such as?

All broadcasters in the UK have to be impartial by law.

[choffer]

30 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

There are a whole bunch of charters, rules and procedures that are conveniently forgotten or ignored on a regular basis, I’m not sure it’s worth the paper it was originally written on I’m afraid.

I might or might not work for an organisation with a Royal Charter.

If it's the former, I'd be able to tell you there's regular conversations about testing the boundaries of its limitations. 

[bannedfromHandV]

42 minutes ago, blandy said:

Such as?

All broadcasters in the UK have to be impartial by law.

Taking this specific conversation here's an excerpt from said charter:

 

To provide impartial news and information to help people understand and engage with the world around them: the BBC should provide duly accurate and impartial news, current affairs and factual programming to build people’s understanding of all parts of the United Kingdom and of the wider world. Its content should be provided to the highest editorial standards. It should offer a range and depth of analysis and content not widely available from other United Kingdom news providers, using the highest calibre presenters and journalists, and championing freedom of expression, so that all audiences can engage fully with major local, regional, national, United Kingdom and global issues and participate in the democratic process, at all levels, as active and informed citizens.

 

The parts highlighted in bold are not maintained on a daily basis in my view.

[HanoiVillan]

Certainly the part about 'the highest editorial standards' seem to be being missed quite regularly. 

[HanoiVillan]

LOL

*yes, I know he's not from the BBC, but the other guys probably were, and it's relevant to the discussion so

[HanoiVillan]

One element of the whole 'just passing along whatever anybody says to me' dynamic in British journalism is that it has clearly eroded people's critical thinking skills, so that prominent blue-tick journalists pass along or respond to even the most obvious jokes:

EDIT: I know Crick isn't with the BBC, but it's the same 'passing along and reacting to any old shit' dynamic across the media. 

EDIT 2: Here's a BBC example of the same dynamic, where one of their senior journalists was so desperate to get a tweet out instantly passing along blah that he collapsed into pure Demglish:

 

Edited November 19, 2019 by HanoiVillan

[Sam-AVFC]

It’s not just Boris Johnson’s lying. It’s that the media let him get away with it

I thought the Peter Oborne article linked above was pretty damning.

The following quote particularly stood out to me:

Quote

A big reason for Johnson’s easy ride is partisanship from the parts of the media determined to get him elected. I have talked to senior BBC executives, and they tell me they personally think it’s wrong to expose lies told by a British prime minister because it undermines trust in British politics. Is that a reason for giving Johnson free rein to make any false claim he wants?

Really bizarre reasoning (see: excuses).

Apologies if this has been posted elsewhere - I assumed it would have been, but couldn't find it.