Sunday 12 October 2014

It's the West wot done it!



Just a thought on Alan's latest piece at Biased BBC, Peston's Megalomania

There does seem to be something of a trend emerging in the BBC's coverage of Ebola to 'blame the West', just as Robert Peston is doing in his latest blogpost (whilst also pushing the need for greater global governance and a reduction in national sovereignty, plus the primacy of the public sector over the private sector when confronting issues like Ebola "and, yes, many would say climate change too"). The opening question on this morning's Sunday Morning Live - see previous post - is a case in point.

I'm inclined to agree with one of the top-rated comments beneath Robert P's article:
20. Rosemary 
8TH OCTOBER 2014 - 17:51
Then suggest a better way, Mr Peston. Many of my UN and WHO colleagues are on the ground in West Africa now trying to organise the response, not carping safe at home.
As for 'The West', I see huge sums of money and many medical professionals from 'The West' heading to the countries worst affected. Please change the record. 'Blame The West' is scratched, worn, and is played far too often. 
It's a way of thinking that seems to come quite naturally to BBC reporters though, in a rather lazy, knee-jerk kind of way - just as it does at the Guardian. It does seem to be almost automatic for a certain kind of person (usually on the Left) to wonder, 'Is the West to blame for this?' whenever a war or a disaster arrives. 

1 comment:

  1. But he`s a BBC hack of a higher order!
    Of course whitey and the Empire, Thatcher and Reagan/Bush are to blame.
    Saves having to think...but thankfully the UKIP fox is in the BBC/Lib-Lab henhouse.
    The bottom of the guilt trippers barrel of self-loathing is nearly empty...hence the sound of scraping over ebola.
    And as for immigration?...err, bloody UKIP eh?

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