This morning on Twitter #marr was, for a while, the No.1 trending hashtag in the UK.
What had driven the Twitterati into a maenad-like ecstatic frenzy was Andrew Marr's interview with George Osborne.
People who comment on Twitter about #marr tend to be overwhelmingly (and aggressively) left-wing, which is why their regular accusations of pro-Tory bias on Andrew Marr's part should be taken with several mountains of salt...
...and such complaints of pro-Tory bias were still coming in right up to the George Osborne interview. Then they stopped.
...and such complaints of pro-Tory bias were still coming in right up to the George Osborne interview. Then they stopped.
Suddenly, endless tweets began pouring in rejoicing at "Gidiot's" destruction at the hands of Andrew Marr and praising Andrew for doing the right thing.
A clutch of right-wing exceptions-to-the-rule protested about Andrew Marr's left-wing bias, saying that he'd let Labour's Harriet Harman off with a much gentler interview, but they were hard to spot among the thousands upon thousands of tweets gleefully exulting in Mr Osborne's grisly fate and 'giving credit where credit's due' to the newly-redeemed Mr Marr.
That should give you an idea, without you even having to watch the show, as to just how tough Andrew Marr's interview with George Osborne was. (Even Andrew Neil would have struggled to pursue the chancellor with more steely purpose.)
There were (more than) double the number of interruptions compared to Harriet Harman too.
Whether this shows bias or not will depend on whether the pattern (tough on the Tories, easier on Labour) persists throughout all the election editions of The Andrew Marr Show.
As the BBC always says (and rightly so), you can't judge bias from a single edition of an ongoing current affairs programme. You have to judge it over an appropriate amount of time.
So we will.
Any BBC interviewer can be as 'mean' or tough as they like with George, Jeremy, Dave or any other hapless pol seeking to lead, especially if they are a bit shy on facts, sense of continuity.
ReplyDeleteAnd the BBC and the Graun and twitter etc are welcome to push any deserved filleting as far and wide as they see fit.
However....
Once it is clear all of the above weigh in like drunk slappers unused to drinking for religious reasons, assured of support all round, but go very mute or scream outrage when boots are on other feet, as you say the differences become stark.
The Conservatives deserve almost all they have sleptwalked into, but the country does not deserve a government installed to suit the purposes of a state broadcaster run on the basis the BBC gets away with.