Parallel worlds

Philip Davies, the MP who responded cynically to Rona Fairhead’s satisfaction with the BBC’s objectivity is in trouble with Channel 4.

Jon and Krish

This piece in The Guardian is about a bizarre row that occurred when Philip Davies visited ITN and was sent packing by Jon Snow’s colleague Krishnan Guru-Murthy

“Davies visited ITN on Tuesday after quizzing new BBC Trust chair Rona Fairhead about the future of the corporation, in his role as a member of the Commons culture, media and sport select committee.The MP for Shipley, who had numerous tetchy exchanges with Fairhead’s predecessor Lord Patten during culture committee hearings, asked the BBC Trust chair: “Have you gone native in record time?” Fairhead replied: “Absolutely not”.

 The below the line comments are from a parallel world where they believe the BBC is right wing and think Channel 4 is  “the only regular news programme that does not seem to cower under the scrutiny of those in power.”

In the sidebar, more media (anti UKIP) stories provide additional platforms for aerated Guardian readers and conspiracy theorists.

Mike Reed has decided to apologise for the calypso. To date there are 2225 comments below the line; it looks like (approximately) a 50/50 split between hatred of Mike Reed, and hatred of UKIP. Everything about this topic is a waste of brain activity including mine for writing this and yours, if you’re doing so, for reading it.

However, I’ve just had a look at the Times where Deborah Ross has wasted half a page of newsprint and a modest amount of brain activity on a rebuttal, calypso style. 

Strangely enough, people’s polarised view of, and outright dismissal  of UKIP as racist is as simplistic as it gets. (Not that I haven’t misgivings of my own, but they’re different misgivings.) Here’s part of a verse of Ross’s ‘Jewish’ calypso:

Ukip you live in a remembered Britain, that’s for sure/A sentimentalised golden age with the border a closed door/We were white, Christian and happy, with trusty phone boxes too/But my family have been here for hundreds of years and we are Jews!

So the argument from Ross and people like David Aaronovich seems to be that if you’re Jewish it’s hypocritical to be concerned about immigration, because you and your ancestors were once immigrants. ....and evidently Muslims are the new Jews(?)  

However, if Ukip are more concerned about temporary economic migrants from Europe than they are  about permanent  ‘cultural’ migrants from the third world, then that’s where I part company with Nige. By the way, I suspect many of the worries that are being expressed about Poles - using our scant resources and hospitals and so on - are a front for unacceptable, politically incorrect but sincerely held worries that are sneered at by ‘the left’ for being “Islamophobic” and ‘racist’.

During the BBC’s baffled response to the breaking news of the Canadian shootings (talking to mother of Muslim convert recently killed in war against IS) Gavin Esler on News 24 suddenly came out with:

 ”I have many Muslim friends so I know that Islam is genuinely peaceful.......”

Talking of parallel worlds, last night's The Apprentice (episode 3)  highlighted the irrational basis of the whole concept of this programme. First of all, the prize isn’t even supposed to be an apprenticeship. It’s supposed to be a business partnership. 

How sustainable would a business be if it was wholly dependent on ripping people off? Come to think of it, there are a lot of companies who seem to do okay on that principle, but    it’s a very sad state of affairs when the girl whose unremitting appetite for ‘the margin’ overrode the principle of creating a quality product, which if they hadn’t made a balls-up of their sales technique, might have won the task for the team. At least that product stood a chance of growing into a sustainable business.

The much anticipated sensation of one candidate suddenly coming to her senses was somehow disappointing.  The firing of Nurun, the girl with the massive Muslim headdress was executed in a tidily non Islamophobic manner, and her appearance with Dara on the You’re Fired programme showed her to be a thoroughly nice lady with a sense of humour and the very model of a modern moderate Muslim. They do exist, as Gavin Esler will gladly attest.

On the other hand Nick Hewer the lefty capitalist is looking more unsustainable with every episode.

I wonder if there’s a parallel universe out there as well as here on earth? Where’s Brian Cox when you need such answers, and the parallel Brian Cox?