"Flood of BBC bias claims"

I suppose I’m duty bound to mention this piece in the Mail Online. 

“Flood of BBC bias claims for new watchdog: Viewers have hit out at more than 60 broadcasts since Ofcom became its regulator”

Most of the below-the-line comments are from people wingeing about Laura Kuenssberg, whom they dislike mainly because they see her as opinionated, rude, Scottish and when they’ve done - basically criticising her for doing her job - they start on her appearance. 

Oh well, it was the OMG Daily Mail.

There’s another piece in the entertainment section of the Mail Online. 

“BBC receives record complaints”

"The BBC has received a record number of complaints about its programmes this year.
Viewers lodged 1,596 grievances, more than double the 794 received in the previous 12 months."

They’ve outlined a variety of the issues that have upset viewers. They must have been pretty upset if they were prepared to take on the nigh impenetrable complaints procedure. 

I did try to look up some of the issues mentioned in the article, and I couldn’t fine the one about the BBC 2 series Correspondent that was “biased towards Israel” (That must have been quite a programme) but what I did see was massive list of  ‘decisions not to respond further to a complaint about………” 

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Talking about below-the-line comments, I only look at some of them to get a sense of the zeitgeist. I’ve noticed that even the Guardian commentariat has softened its stance on Israel and the Palestinians. (They seem less sympathetic to the Palestinians and rather less hostile to the Israelis these days.)

However, that is counterbalanced by a persistent strain of overt and covert antisemitic sentiment below-the-line on right-wing platforms, such as The Times and The Spectator.

For example anything in The Times by Melanie Phillips will  attract a lot of comments that start with “I rarely agree with Melanie, but..” or “I don’t usually like anything Melanie has to say” and some of them will dismiss her out of hand without bothering to flesh out an argument.

Her latest piece (£)  "Universities have caved in to dogma and thuggery" is about the growing trend in US and UK universities for ‘no-platforming’ speakers of the ‘wrong’ type lest they cause distress to the delicate type of student that has suddenly sprouted everywhere. Pass the smelling salts. 

A couple of btl commenters accused her of double standards, since she was amongst the voices objecting to hate-preachers and the like being given free rein in our universities (and mosques) to incite hatred or even violence. The thing is, though, that hate-preachers are still given platforms (and so are whole anti-Zionist conferences and rallies and so on) where unwelcome, dissenting voices are dealt with, shouted down or ejected in no uncertain terms. But when a talk or lecture is scheduled by a pro-Israeli speaker, it’s  cancelled, hounded from venue to venue, or drowned out  by screaming activists.)

The double standards are the other way round.  Free rein for the anti-Zios, no-platform for the pros.

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Still vaguely on topic, the BDS movement is still going strong, but it seems to be losing some of its momentum. Michael Gove gave a speech criticising BDS 

 and the Palestinian, Bassem Eid of Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group explains why BDS is bad for Palestinians. 

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Roll on June 8th.