You kip if you want to. The BBC's not for kipping. (Though plenty of lefties on Twitter think it is).
Tomorrow night BBC Two is broadcasting a programme called Meet the Ukippers. (Those Twitter lefties will doubtless be tweeting away furiously).
The blurb accompanying the programme is already causing some anxiety among UKIP supporters, and I bet you can see why:
An unprecedented insight into the heartland of UKIP that follows the party faithful as they ride high in the polls and try - but fail - to avoid the gaffes the media are looking for. Thanet on the Kent coast is where Nigel Farage has chosen to stand for parliament, but this timely film is about the local party activists who stand firmly behind him rather than the media-savvy leader himself. Filmed over six months, these true believers explain the UKIP phenomena, but there are also jaw-dropping views on race the national party would definitely prefer weren't aired.
Oh yes.
The men behind the programme are executive producer Darren Kemp and director/producer Kevin Hull.
Darren Kemp is a BBC man - a commissioning editor no less. Kevin Hull, however, is the man behind Channel 4's much-derided-by-the-BBC-and-the-Left-but-much-admired-by-right-wingers Benefits Street - which complicates matters somewhat for potential complainants.
There would be no problem if it was part of a series that also focussed on various Labour Party Members (revealing their unreasoning hatred of the bourgeosie), Conservative Party Members (revealing just what unreconstructed money snobs they are), Lib Dems (revealing their weird sexual pecadilloes), Greens (revealing their wish to return to a pre-industrial age of hand woven garments) and the Scots/Welsh/Irish/Ulster nationalists (revealing their antedeluvian attitudes on nationhood).
ReplyDeleteWell, yes. That would be much more balanced. And, when you think about it, it's hardly an unreasonable request. A series of this kind, devoted to a warts-and-all portrait of activists from all the parties in parliament (especially in the run-up to an election) would be worth making - and watching.
ReplyDeleteThose left-wing social media types who claim the BBC's heavy focus on UKIP is evidence that the BBC supports UKIP is one of the battiest urban myths on Twitter. Whatever the BBC's reasons, pro-UKIP sentiment certainly isn't one of them, as I suspect we'll see tomorrow night.
looks like a set up to me.......as if someone with those views would air them in a room full of BBC cameras....unless of course you were being payed!
ReplyDeleteMore smearage from the good ole British left wing media!
Set up? well the trouble is, making entertainment out of UKIP is shooting fish in a barrel.
ReplyDeleteYou only have to point a camera at one of them and they'll say something that'll embarrass themselves and their party......in fact you can't imagine any broadcaster being able to do a programme about them which didn't end in tears - though as saying the stuff the rest of us are apparently too scared to say is their USP, I don't think they'll necessarily see it that way.
Unfortunately, it is also true that such a programme about the other main parties in the general election might well be rather dull.
On balance I think that doing a programme on UKIP alone is justified as UKIP are new kids on the block and its reasonable to give them special attention. If they score a few own goals, that's their problem and maybe tells us something about what they're really like.
Meet The Ukippers @
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fSbpNh9fDY …
Apart from the racist woman who seemed more dense than anything else, they appeared to be an assortment of slightly eccentric and elderly lower middle class/working class white people - the kind that attract the venom and contempt of the metrosexuals who run the BBC. The animal rights brigade looked far loonier and disturbed. Let's have a documentary about them for some balance. I won't hold my breath though.
ReplyDeleteThe BBC is left wing and biased and has its own agenda.
ReplyDeleteThe Pope is also Catholic.
Good grief, it's hardly news.
Nevertheless, why cooperate with a fly on the wall documentary if you are unsure of what the uneducated elderly troglodytes are going to say on camera. It's clueless and UKIP organization appears to be non existent.
On the other hand... it may turn into the most brilliant coup ever.
The negrophobic lady may win UKIP a massive sympathy vote in the coming election. The opposite of the woman whose views Gordon Brown dismissed last time round and contributed to his own loss.
The British love an underdog and this show certainloy was full of cute spaniels.
Farage might just end up in number 10 on the back of this.
The BBC may have scored a massive own goal.
Bias?? Sorry but the argument about doing the same for Labour/Tories etc. is a bad comparison. First, the big 3 parties are under more media scrutiny than UKIP are and have been for decades, even centuries. Newspapers, 24 hour TV news Second, it would be more difficult to get their worst MPs speak so openly, ie brainfart, though it sometimes happens. Third, as the UKIP Press Officer said they are a fledgling party wih some representatives without the PR/political nous to deal with media outlets and they have controversial policies. That's why you have racist, ignorant former NF members getting caught out.
ReplyDelete