Sunday Morning Live featured an interview with Terry Waite, in the wake of his writing of a comic novel (yes, a comic novel called The Voyage of the Golden Handshake).
I found what he had to say fascinating and found him personally charming, so it's well worth watching.
I found what he had to say fascinating and found him personally charming, so it's well worth watching.
Of course, this was a SML interview so there had to be some typical BBC agenda-pushing along the way.
Amusingly however, one particularly blatant leading question didn't go according to plan. It came courtesy of BBC London, Loose Ends and BBC World Service presenter Nikki Bedi:
Nikki Bedi: You said when you were in captivity you were given the Bible and the Koran. When you read the Koran did that give you a greater understanding of the tenets of Islam and how peace-loving a religion it truly is?
Terry Waite: No. No it didn't.
I would have loved to have seen Nikki's face at that point. I bet it was a picture of surprise and disappointment. Unfortunately (and most unusually) the camera stayed off her face at that point.
Fortunately for her, however, he then added, "Neither did the Bible", which she repeated and then laughed (perhaps with relief).
Agenda? What agenda?
ReplyDeleteI watched the first segment, and haven't gone past it yet. I assume you saw the intro? Sian Williams opened the show by featuring footage of some Brazilian samba troupe before enthusiastically (only my inference, yeah) informing us that the Notting Hill Festival "of course, is a celebration of multicultural Britain".
This set up the first segment: "The UK is set up to become even more diverse now" because mass (only she didn't use that modifier) immigration was at a record high. Again. Only she didn't add that.
"Has immigration made us the nation we are, or eroded British values"
Fortunately, two of the four panelists told her that was a BS false choice, and explained why. The other two panelists also agreed that the whole multiculturalism agenda as practiced by the politically correct is a disaster. Sian Williams had no idea what to do after that.
Of course, this being the BBC, they had to spend a couple minutes chortling at the very notion of 'British values' (What are they anyway? Cameron once said....But those are everybody's values! Exactly!)
But in general, all four guests - and I don't know if it was a balanced panel or anything about them, really - were not playing along with the BBC's false choice agenda, and even called them out on it. One woman even said the attempts to stifle debate by calling people racist is "dangerous".
I was shocked, but in a good way. Maybe there's hope the BBC is losing this culture war after all.
A post is coming shortly on this very subject, David. It will be a case of 'Snap!'
DeleteGot to say - Terry Waite is a man of incredible courage - and eloquence:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUl1BaKGNt4
Think the BBC have always been a bit wary of him...
Thank GOD the camera stayed off her face! She's absolutely frightful
ReplyDelete