T’other day everyone was fawning over the BBC’s Andrew Neil for his little rant against Islamic State. “How brave!” they cried, grateful for teeny weeny mercies. It’s not even as though anyone would argue for Islamic State, except perhaps StWC.
Now that Donald Trump has broken the duck - people are venturing into new territory. Not just Islamic State. Moooslims! We’re allowed to discuss Mooslims, as if there’s something slightly antithetical to we atheists and liberals in our cosy western democracies, within their actual religion.
Oh deary me. Whatever next.
Next is Katie Hopkins. In the manner of a Trump-like “I don’t care what people think of my appearance” Katie put forth the best display of how to hold your own against what turned out to be a rather pathetic Neil that one has seen in a long time. Bravo Katie! Her performance bristled with quick thinking and self assuredness the likes of which we rarely see in the hostile, adversarial BBC interview scenario.
In the manner reminiscent of “when Jeremy Paxman met Tommy Robinson” Katie rocked. She startled ol’ brillo out of the complacent stupor in which the BBC’s National Treasures and icons languish, assuming their very presence will be enough to demolish the humble nobody who dares to sit before them.
Katie has acquired one of those tags that attach themselves to Tommy Robinson, Trump and Geert Wilders etc etc.
It goes “I’m no fan of” (insert appropriate pariah) then the “but” and then the reiteration of the appropriate Katie/Tommy/Donald sentiment. That’s a badge of honour to which I aspire / am thinking about aspiring to it.
So as the border between the baddies of Islamic State and extremists, fundamentalists, radicals and moderates continues to blur, it will be less likely that people in power will be able to get away with that “nothing to do with Islam” nonsense.
Amazingly and rather sadly, over at Huffpo they’re trying to convince themselves that Katie was ‘skewered’.
They cherry-picked examples of what they saw as ‘skewering’ more in desperation than comprehension. The mind boggles. I suppose it shows how people can view the same thing and come away with entirely different impressions, but really, skewered? Not even slightly.
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DeleteActually, although nothing is ever truly original and Ed Murrow probably did it first, I believe duck-breaking wise Steven Colbert rather kicked the breast-beating off a week prior.
No matter. All is good.
Except just about everything about this supposed interview.
I did not see it live, but became aware tx to Guido, who had a catch-up version.
I made a note to look again, but forgot until I stumbled across a BBC version on FaceBook.
It was this that moved me to write to my chums at BBc Complaints with a few questions.
Kicking off with why their version seemed a lot shorter than the one of their show Guido had posted, from start to end. What was missing from the BBc one was a ton of context, some great points by Katie H, and Andrew Neil doing a bad Gestapo impression from 'Allo 'Allo.
He also plainly failed to practice what he preached, in terms of accuracy and coherence.
But yes, it is interesting how such major organs as HuffPo and the Indy proclaimed it a savaging the likes of which Katie will never recover from.
Joseph Goebbels would have glowed with pride.
Sadly for them, and the BBC, given a cumulative audience of twelve, including some not really in board with the narrative [waves], the BBc may not be getting quite the back-up in real town they imagine..