Should Newsnight have given a platform to the depraved British-Pakistani 'laughing jihadi'?
On Wednesday night Newsnight featured a report from BBC reporter Secunder Kermani ("Disillusioned revolutionary, serial daydreamer, sporadic narcissist, @SecKermani") during which the views of a British-born IS fighter were broadcast to a sleepy BBC Two audience.
This vicious Islam-besotted prat (whose 'alias' was given in honour of some dead al-Qaeda pervert) said that Islam allows the kind of atrocities IS commits, that he'd only return to the UK to plant a bomb, and [indirectly] that the brutal murder of Lee Rigby was justified. On BBC Two.
I watched this and felt nothing but disgust for him.
I also felt that I was actually hearing what some British Muslims really think, and hoped that it might be a wake-up call to a few BBC Two viewers.
Such people hate us, live among us, and would happily slaughter us with a clear conscience. We need to do something about them. And question their friends and family. Now.
Such people hate us, live among us, and would happily slaughter us with a clear conscience. We need to do something about them. And question their friends and family. Now.
Plus I was slightly taken aback to hear Newsnight's Richard Watson tell us that [according to the UK security services] some 260 out of the 500 or so British Muslims who have gone out to fight for IS and the barely-less-extreme al-Nusra Front [yes, by choice, the most extreme groups] have already returned to the UK, harbouring Allah knows what wicked intentions against us.
I found this alarming, to put it mildly.
The Daily Mail, however, reports that former security minister Dame Pauline Neville-Jones said the interview shouldn't have been aired on the grounds that it might boost the terrorists' reputation, their status...
...or, to put it in a way Dame Pauline probably wouldn't herself have put it, that over-bearded pondlife like this shouldn't have its ego (and silly beard) stroked by the BBC.
I can see her point. So we're in the middle of a classic 'oxygen of publicity' controversy here.
But, if my reaction to this pervert was typical, then I'd say that the 'publicity' was poisonous air.
However, I'm not a British Muslim, and if broadcasting this British Muslim's bigoted terrorist views gave any British Muslim succour and inspiration, then broadcasting such views would be dangerous, wouldn't it?
Tricky territory this. What is a British broadcaster to do?
Of course the BBC should have this caveman on the programme. The word "platform", though, is key. After all, they had Nick Griffin on QT, and you wouldn't consider that a "platform" for his views, right? But that's the important difference between the way they gave Griffin air time and the way they give this lunatic a spot.
ReplyDeleteGriffin was not given the opportunity to speak his views without the whole panel, plus the host, plus the entire audience piling on. No "sunshine is the best disinfectant" for him, oh, no. But the jihadi was given free reign, without any interrogation from anyone.
You can be sure there was some agonizing in the production meetings before this went to air. Editorial decisions on these issues often seem to be made out of fear as much as out of any journalistic integrity. And you can be equally sure that they decided it was okay to go ahead because they were merely informing people how bad the jihadi views are. Nothing more than that. They are so blinkered and morally twisted that they don't think there's anything wrong with the different way they presented Griffin and the way they presented this idiot.