PEGIDA and the BBC

Even when the BBC is giving an 'impartial' guide to a 'controversial' phenomenon, they tend - especially if it's a subject they're really fretting about - to give their own position away.

There's a new piece on the BBC website about the German anti-Islamisation movement PEGIDA entitled Who goes to German Pegida 'anti-Islamisation' rallies?

The scare marks in that headline are a foretaste of what's to come. 

In the opening paragraphs outlining what PEGIDA is about there are more 'rabbits ears' than in pre-myxomatosis Australia, all casting doubt on PEGIDA's concerns.

When the piece moves onto the critics of PEGIDA, the warning marks fade away. We are into the area of 'the truth' (minus quotation marks).

And can you guess what the article's final word is - a word included without scare marks? 

I bet you can. 

[Clue: It rhymes with Pislamophobia].

PEGIDA is associated with the right, the right-wing, the far-right, neo-Nazis, football hooligans,  the Nazis, and...er...some "ordinary people".

It's based in Dresden, "yet Dresden has far fewer immigrants than many other German cities."

Its leader "insists" he's not a racist. He's had criminal convictions in the past, including for drug-dealing. (I'd have thought the BBC of Mark Easton & Co. would have approved of that part of his back story!)

In contrast, PEGIDA's opponents want openness, diversity and tolerance. Thus (inevitably), they want PEGIDA to shut the f*** up.

Hmm, I don't think the """"""impartial"""""" BBC likes PEGIDA.