Friday 31 January 2020

New Open Thread



The old Open Thread, like Lord Hall himself, must now make way for a new, more diverse thread. 

Thank you for all your comments. They are much appreciated. 

71 comments:

  1. The Timesarticle : Radio4 must provide regional diversity, its new controller says

    A tweeter says
    \\ Head of Radio 4, Mohit Bakaya, is brother of Samir Shah, member of the BBC executive board who also produces "independent" programmes for the BBC and is a friend of Lords Paedo* Mandelson and John Birt //

    * his accusation, not mine.

    In December he said
    "The stations will look for solutions to society's problems both in the UK and around the world,"
    ... em that's activism not journalism

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, that is activism not journalism.

      Delete
    2. There’s to be a new series “exploring the White Helmets”

      “Comedy is tricky” ..”Haven’t a Clue and News Quiz are safe” ..oh dear

      He studied PPE and Oxford

      Re licence fee “I don’t think it’s at crisis point”

      Delete
    3. I'd heard of Shah before as a big wheel around the BBC and broadcasting circles but I'd never have guessed the sibling connection.

      'Prior to taking over Juniper in 1998, Samir was with the BBC working as head of current affairs and political journalism across radio and television. Samir career started at the London Weekend Television as a tv researcher and by the time he left LWT he was series producer on several different shows.'
      ...
      'Samir was appointed a Non-Executive Director on the BBC Board between 2007 and 2010. ...'

      http://junipertv.co.uk/people-samir-shah.html

      Delete
  2. The comedy is no longer funny as it is just left wing commentary and denigration of all who do not subscribe to the (il)liberal leftie Islington smug sanctimonious view of their right on opinions.. News Quiz Nish says Laurence Fox should be shovel ready - what into the gas ovens or an empty grave? That is racism to assume that is the destiny of white males and if said about Pakistanis or Indians there would be outrage from people like Nish Kumar and all the right on Lefties.

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  3. H/T to StewGreen

    Rod Liddle in full "I come to bury Lord Hall, not praise him" mode. And quite right too! Here is the charge sheet:

    "Under Lord Hall’s administration, a moronic wokeness began to infest each and every part of the BBC’s output. For sure, the news and current affairs programmes were hideously biased on the issues of the European Union, immigration, Israel, Islam and identity politics, even more so than they had been before. And one became used to presenters sneering and snarling at anyone who dared to offer a different view to their own. But it was as nothing compared with the rest of the programming.

    The rapidly dwindling audience for the latest, execrable Doctor Who series is the obvious case in point, a once glorious piece of fun for kids which is now a propaganda sheet for agitprop middle-class London liberals (and, for kids, virtually unwatchable
    … Every drama had a message shoehorned into it.

    There was no respite on comedy panel shows, either, where participants thought it enough to say ‘Trump’ or ‘Boris’ to gain a laugh. Radio 4 meanwhile transformed itself into an endless fugue of misery and victimhood: listen to it for more than an hour and you begin to reach for a razor blade. No wonder the audience share plummeted.
    The great mass of people simply do not agree with the BBC’s vision of the world..
    Then BBC appoints diversity czar Sarpong a remainer
    part of the CONFORMITY of thought brigade.

    If it were forced to live in the commercial world, the BBC might suddenly begin to comprehend the need to understand its audience a little better and to champion meaningful diversity — not of colour of skin or sexual orientation or gender, but of political and cultural views."

    Lord Hall was a disaster for the country, but also for the BBC who, for the first time, now thanks to Hall's toadying to the PC Liberal-Left find themselves facing a real existential threat.

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  4. BBC website leading the news with the death of basketball star Kobe Bryant; a man who committed a horrible rape on a young black woman and then intimidated her into not pressing charges against him. Why does this event need to lead the news (celebrity death) and given his track record why are the politically correct BBC making this excuse for a man into a hero?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm guessing he's a black man. I'd also guess that the BBC likes basketball and wants to promote it for some reason.

      Delete
    2. Yes, he was a black man but also a very flawed individual. It is very disappointing to hear the nonsense talked by commentators ( who appear to have totally ignored his personal history) on all channels about a man who treated his wife like a human chattel by conducting numerous extra marital affairs and rape. I do not condemn this man by his actions; it is just that others are judged by an entirely different moral code.

      Delete
    3. Heard quite a long eulogy to him on Radio 4 this morning. Once again, not a single mention of the serious assault charge which was eventually dropped after he paid the female victim a large sum. In other words, just Weinstein behaviour. But for some reason - because he ticks all the PC boxes - it's been written out of history.

      And in any case, it's absurd that our MSM channels have been leading on this. Probably 90% of the UK population haven't a clue who he is and of the 10% who do probably only a small minority have ever followed his life and career with any great attention. Also basketball (good game though it is) is only a very small minority sport in the UK.

      Delete
    4. It was the first item on a news bulletin this morning on Radio 4. This about a man I'd never heard of until someone posted here and isn't of general interest. Yet it was deemed by the BBC to be more important news than the virus epidemic or anything else of substance and general import that's happening.

      Delete
  5. Can the bigwigs at the Times really do no better than Giles Coren for the new Times Radio? Coren is thoroughly PC, thoroughly superficial and thoroughly nasty, judging by a couple of his nasty tweets.

    https://inews.co.uk/news/media/rupert-murdoch-to-launch-bbc-radio-4-rival-called-times-radio-1376034

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. He has also worked for the BBC, if I remember right. He's a bit of a smart arse. I tend to confuse him with that nasty person who used to be married to Amber Rudd.

      Delete
    2. Giles Coren left Twitter a few weeks ago
      He mocked Owen Jones ..and queermob turned up at his house.

      Delete
    3. The case for the prosecution:

      https://www.standard.co.uk/news/giles-coren-s-twitter-tirade-at-neighbours-boy-for-playing-drum-kit-6720441.html

      Delete
    4. AA Gill is dead (once married to Amber Rudd) and in fairness must have suffered quite a lot being hitched to Amber. So he gets a pass.

      Delete
  6. As predicted, the BBC - having had to throw away their "Yes to Jess" badges are now putting on their "I Love Lisa" ones. Here James Clayton gives her a great big cuddle:

    https://twitter.com/JamesClayton5/status/1221455496659591171

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  7. Not related to the BBC but must say, I'm disappointed at the rumours about the government's forthcoming important decisions.

    - Will they really stick with HS2? God, that would be depressing. Think what we could do with the £100 billion. We could have people travelling in comfortable buses with proper suspension, rather than the boneshakers the public have to endure now. We could link up with Hyperloop and develop a really fast inter-city transport system - 4 or 5 times faster than HS2. Perfect for wealthy travellers.



    -

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ...and meant to mention Huawei. As the US are warning us, that really is a threat to our national sovereignty. Ironic if we regain our national sovereingty only to throw it away again.

      ...and then there's handing over control of a nuclear power station to China as well, to produce absurdly expensive electricity.

      All these problems bequeathed us by a previous coke addict Chancellor!

      One millstone around our necks would be bad enough - but three!

      Delete
  8. Justin Webb on Today, Radio 4 this morning just before 7am. Not prepared to accept the Auschwitz commemoration as a memorial to those who died, he desperately tries to "broaden out the discussion" with a Jewish American... who just happens to be a Trump supporter. Before you know it we are on to whether "people" should be more careful about how they describe "people" in case they "other them". I was driving at the time...but I think he might almost have said it's important not to "other others", itself an othering of others! We can see what he's trying to do: it's absurd but also deeply offensive to Jewish people.

    On a related point, I watched some of Tom Mangold's rather good swansong documentary on the Profumo affair. It was full of how the establishment works: the nods and winks from government encouraging the Police to investigate certain individuals deemed dangerous to the establishment's interests, the careful deployment of the judiciary to deliver the coup de grace and use of the media to keep certain facts from the public. Geoffert Roberston was full of orotund outrage at the way the basic rules of justice were set aside... seeming to suggest it couldn't happen now. Really? I couldn't help thinking of Tommy Robinson...it's just a different establishment now but the same approach has been used.




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    Replies
    1. I see Quisquose on the "other channel" also heard what you might call Webb's Holocaust Diversionism as well:

      "Did anybody else hear Justin Webb’s interview with Ronald Lauder at 6:45 on to the Today Programme? Ronald Lauder is the president of the World Jewish Congress, and he is also chairman of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation.

      Today is 75 years since Soviet troops cautiously entered Auschwitz and the remaining survivors were liberated, so Ronald Lauder was on to remind us that Auschwitz must remain a permanent reminder, so that we are sure that “never again” truly means never again. He told Justin Webb that these lessons are particularly important because Antisemitism is on the rise, and he sees parallels with the mid 1930s.

      At this point Justin Webb then decided he should ask “Given that, should we be more robust in our criticism of the language used by Donald Trump?”

      I can’t quite find the words to express how disgusted I was when I heard that question asked."

      Delete
    2. I heard that and was equally disgusted. Who was it who referred to voters as 'deplorables', Justin? And who smears people as 'far right' and 'racist' at the drop of a hat? It's de rigueur with Justin and his BBC colleagues to seek, find and shout 'racism' everywhere and always, regardless of substance or evidence.

      Delete
    3. Yes, but what do they say in private? For all we know, they might be as bad as John Sweeney was shown to be.

      But this was a particularly gratuitous offence on the day of the Auschwitz memorial, I thought, taking the WJC spokeperson as a Trump spokeperson, not someone representing the Jewish people.

      Delete
    4. He introduced him by referring to him as Ambassador and I was left wondering Ambassador from where? Israel? I couldn't remember if we'd had a new one from Israel. At the end he still didn't explain who he was or which country he represented.

      Delete
    5. Lauder was an Ambassador under Reagan. In the American tradition, people retain their high honorifics - ex Presidents are still Presidents, from a titular point of view.

      Webb was probably correct in terms of that tradition but I suspect that he was happy to associate Lauder with the current administration as the set up for his Holocaust Diversionism.

      Delete
  9. On Radio 4 at 14h15.


    Episode 1
    Riot Girls
    Dykes
    Episode 1 of 3

    Episode 1: Six of one and half a dozen of the other. An original three part series by Sarah Daniels, which follows the friendship of three radical lesbian feminists from the 1970s to today, and takes in the pioneering campaigning of the ‘70s and ‘80s, the backlash of Clause 28 in the 1990s, and the more recent fractures in the LGBTQ+ community. Starring Nichola McAuliffe, Jessica Turner, Jelena Budimir, Lucy Reynolds, Scarlett Courtney and Sinead MacInnes.

    This fourth season of Riot Girls - provocative writing by women - offers no-holds barred dramas that explore themes of gender identity, lesbian relationships and the intersections between the feminist and LGBTQ+ movements.

    I am sure that most people will be straining at the bit to listen to this - NOT

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Don't radical lesbian feminists ever want to hear a holds-barred drama about conservative heterosexual stay-at-home wives, just for a change? I hope they're not "othering" them as somehow different from themselves. That's not allowed I'm told.

      Delete
    2. Here's one I spotted earlier on today's schedule:
      'Riot Girls Trumpet
      Episode 1 of 5
      When his jazz trumpeter father dies, Colman makes an extraordinary discovery - the man he adored as his Dad was, in fact, a woman. Jackie Kay's novel is dramatised by Tanika Gupta.'
      https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dq1t

      Delete
    3. Incidentally isn't that a 'wrong' word in the title posted by DAD? Or is it that it can't be wrong so long as the right people aka the BBC are the ones using it? What if the PM had used it?

      Delete
    4. Yep, "Girls" is Ok if used by women to suggest the female gender is more "feisty" than the male.

      Delete
  10. Lisa Nandy pens a few banalities for Aushwitz remembrance...

    https://twitter.com/lisanandy/status/1221707447095767040

    Meanwhile, although neither she nor the MSM will tell you, she is Chair of Labour Friends of Palestine and the Middle East.

    Looking across the globe, Palestine and the Middle East is the virulently anti-semitic region in the whole world. Has Lisa Nandy ever mentioned, let alone called out, this gross anti-semitism? Er, no.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Sopel soaping the Democrats' back while singing softly of lurv:

    https://twitter.com/BBCJonSopel/status/1221780415972827137

    Couldn't be more anti-Trump if he tried...

    H/T to Roland Deschain

    ReplyDelete
  12. There's something very odd on the BBC News website where two very similar stories have been posted simultaneously:

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51259614
    .... 'Varadkar: UK won't get 'piecemeal' EU trade deal', by Layra K' ...

    and, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51260282
    .... 'Varadkar: EU will have stronger team in trade talks with UK' (no detail of who has written the story)

    The stories are almost identical, with Varadkar being given a chance to put forward unquestioned opinions as to how the EU have the upper hand in post Brexit negotiations and will seek to drive a hard bargain (because the EU has a much larger population the the UK).

    Why do the BBC give so much credence to Varadkar's views? and, why are there two similar stories being run concurrently? I wonder whether Laura is not sufficiently pro-Eu for the mainstream BBC narrative, and thus needs to have her story reconstructed.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Barnier is visiting Ireland to discuss Brexit with Varadkar (who incidentally is facing a general election on 8 Feb, which he may well lose), before heading up to Northern Ireland to visit Stormont and give a lecture.
      I had to go to RTE for a more informative report: https://www.rte.ie/news/2020/0127/1111122-varadkar-barnier-brexit/.

      I see the EU is laying down pre-conditions. What a surprise!

      Delete
    2. Quite possibly. Just saw her interview with LV in which she did challenge him on the EU's previous bogus insistence it would never renegotiate the WA.

      Delete
    3. Tweet from Laura K: 'More from our intvw with Varadkar on #BBCNews6, and the portrait of Michael Collins that watches over him in from wall of his office, and why he doesn’t think the UK ‘has yet come to terms with the fact it’s now a small country’

      Varadkar must feel he is a European and therefore his country makes the UK 'small'. The last time I checked, Ireland was the 'small' country ranked between Finland and Croatia - 20th out of the 28. Let's see how the Irish voters feel about being labelled Europeans.

      Delete
  13. 'Get woke or go broke?'
    Analysis

    When you buy your trainers, do you want to make a political statement? Businesses want to attract consumers by advertising their commitment to liberal causes like diversity and tackling climate change. It is a phenomenon known as woke capitalism.But is it a welcome sign that multinationals are becoming socially responsible? ...'

    Another from today's schedule. I dispute the characterisation 'liberal cause', of an imposed Labour doctrine in the first case, and a Green and Establishment-mandated one on shaky grounds, of the second.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dq2w

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yep, it's not "liberal" to want to crush the free speech principle which guided us successfully for 200 years or so.

      Delete
  14. According to a report in the Mail, OFCOM considers Jo Brand's battery acid jibe was unlikely to encourage or incite commission of a crime and no further action will be taken.

    Now there's a surprise.

    They took into account the context, freedom of expression, that comedy programmes can be challenging and that she said she didn't mean it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. OFCOM are a disgrace and without purpose. They should be abolished.

      Delete
  15. Hmmm. Can't get onto BBBC site. I hope that's just temporary and nothing sinister.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Just heard Thought for the Day and Giles Frasier banging on about homosexual relationships and his disagreement with the bishops statement that sex is for heterosexual married couples only. He was angry and seems to think that what the Bible says is wrong when it's his job to uphold its teaching. Giles like every other priest promised before God to uphold the Bible as the revealed Word of God. in denying the truth of the bits he disagrees with, he has broken his promise as a priest and so is no longer a follower of Christ but a follower of his own humanist beliefs.

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    Replies
    1. He's a minister in the Church of England, as far as I know, yet he got divorced and remarried. Not sure how that works.

      Delete
  17. Mixed feelings. On balance OK on free speech and throwing back at the BBC if they ever give a platform to anyone on anything again, and especially for getting worked up about sod all of concern other than their activist 'story' sources.

    ReplyDelete
  18. That's for the Brand/OFCOM thread. I am clearly in Blogger purgatory again.

    ReplyDelete
  19. So who will they replace the sainted Nicholas Parsons with and so ruin an enjoyable show? Calling Sandi, calling Sandi!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hope she doesn't get to choose the subjects. Sixty seconds on dialectical materialism would be hard going.

      Delete
    2. I don't think Amol Rajan has ticked that one off in his Ian Allan BBC Spotters Guide yet.

      Delete
    3. That bl**dy Balding woman ?

      Delete
    4. Just as “Sorry I haven’t Clue” was Humphrey Lyttelton and “Top Gear’ was Clarkson et al, “Just a Minute” was Nicholas Parsons. The BBC don’t know how to quit when they’re ahead. But I suppose it’s jobs for the boys… and upgrading to the new woke standard. They really do ruin everything. The Friday comedy slot that they seem to be so proud of is utter drivel.

      Delete
  20. 6pm News. John Sopel, reporting on the Huawei threat to a UK/US trade deal, abandons all pretence of impartiality and treats us to a prolonged triumphant grin at the prospect of trouble ahead.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Just caught sight of an article in the Telegraph about the Today programme, stating that it is expected to be protected from cuts despite a Tony Hall admission that its political journalism is failing.

    I couldn't actually open the article as it's one of those Premium ones for subscribers only.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I see they've altered the heading. Now it says Tony Hall admits failings in BBC's political journalism but Radio 4 to be spared cuts.

      Interesting. That broadens it to embrace the whole. Look out, Newsnight, Mr Sopel and all.

      Delete
  22. Good news for Greta Thunberg, if not Roger Harrabin:

    https://www.psmsl.org/products/trends/

    There is a continuing reduction in sea level at Stockholm. Been going on for more than a hundred years. Might be worrying for the local fish, but no cause for concern for the humans in Sweden. Perhaps someone should tell her.

    Also the modern port of Immingham in the UK has shown a significant reduction in sea level rise.

    Are we being peddled a huge lie about sea level rise?

    We are always being told what NASA says but never hear much about the Permanent Service for Mean Sea Level based in Liverpool - maybe because they can't bend the data so easily.

    PS I do know that land can rise as well as sea level, and that probably explains what's happening in Scandinavia, but it exemplifies this is not a straightforward story around the globe.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Also the modern port of Immingham in the UK has shown a significant reduction in sea level rise."

      Sounds like one for Tom Heap, "Is the UK's biggest container port doomed as the North Sea retreats?"

      Delete
    2. In front of Immingham to the north lies Hull
      ... there were no Romans in Hull cos it didn't exist
      Only in the Middle Ages was there a big storm which changed the path of River Hull... thus an Island was formed where the present market is..and Hull started.
      Henry VIII came a bit later and stayed near Immingham whilst he built Hull's City walls.

      Just East of Hull lies Sunk Island
      Activists sometimes put up maps of Hull area showing what land will be flooded due to Climate change ..featuring Sunk Island and Ancholme Valley etc.

      Doh those areas were always under water until the 17th century people .drained them.

      West of Immingham , Reeds Island. is getting smaller.

      But further west there is Whitton Island
      a brand new Island that has only existed 10-15 years.

      Delete
  23. From today's offerings:

    10 41 - Riot Girls - a man/woman trumpeter
    11 00 - Beth - why no gays in men's football?
    2 15 - Repeat Riot Girls
    16 00 - Laurie Taylor: Hidden Gay Lives

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/schedules/p00fzl7j

    And for variety, there's a snippet of Extinction Rebellion and a bit of history - or rather 'saffronising' history.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was about to put R4 on just as I was reading your post ... to find "OpenBook" had an item about "gay love in 1980s Poland"! BBC promotion of gay issues and opinions is way out of proportion to UK population's interest. But the BBC isn't listening and never has, because it doesn't have to.
      (I suspect even the overall UK gay "community" wouldn't be that interested either).

      Delete
  24. Oops! Fran's in trouble.

    Some remarkable diagrams here of the BBC's doings.

    NB the one in the World bubble which reads 'USA and Trump'.

    Yikes. Is Trump a country now? The USA and Canada...

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-
    7943733/Furious-Victoria-Derbyshire-asks-BBC-News-bosses-lied-her.html

    ReplyDelete
  25. Rachel Cunliffe on Sky News Press Preview tonight...reminds me - she did a review a while back (might have been BBC rather than Sky News) during which she said, in passing, she hates Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time because people in her generation can only dream about getting a property with a garden...

    A heartfelt comment which accords with my analysis. Even highly skilled professionals like Rachel can't get buy a decent home in the London area.

    But of course the problem is that people like Rachel - very pleasant and thoughtful people I might say - would rather stick a dagger through the palm of their hand than blame her inability to secure a home with a garden on mass immigration and the resultant population increase.

    That's a snapchat of where we are.

    It's very, very sad for Rachel, for those even worse off than her and for the whole of our society.

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    Replies
    1. I think I meant snapshot not snapchat! lol

      Delete
    2. I eagerly await the BBC Briefing on Housing.

      Delete
  26. I must say I am enjoying the Great Pushback of 2020:

    - BBC licence fee under threat.

    - Lord Hall resigns.

    - Lord Hall criticises rottweiler journalism fixation at the BBC. (Hypocrisy, I know but still good!)

    - 450 BBC News journos get the boot.

    - Labour Left in disarray (Paul Mason criticising the Corbynistas).

    - Various unlikely people like Ayesha Hazarika declaring that they finally accept the Brexit result.

    - Transgender Propagandists under attack.

    There's a lot more but it's late! :)

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  27. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V__GmSk24qw

    Free speech in the free world? Er no...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Basically Canadian electoral law is badly written.
      In reality all journos are political campaigners.
      So politicians know that you can ADVERTISE your cause in newspapers/books.
      The Canadian rules say that political election spending must have limits, so what they do is monitor political advertising spend
      ..and to guard against NGO fronts they require that NGOs register as a third party interest if they are going to carry political messages.
      However the rules exempted journalism and publishing
      So Rebel worked out that they can support a political cause by putting out books ..and get around the rules.

      The main point is that other POLITICAL campaigning was not prosecuted.
      eg Greta et al clearly campaigned in Canada for Trudeau yet was not registered.

      Delete
    2. Just like we had the Irish PM over in the UK campaigning for Remain...but no one seemed to find anything strange in that.

      Delete
    3. It's not about the book.
      it's about his advertising for the book.
      Lawn signs that looked a lot like election signs during the election.

      Emm it was cheeky but AFAIK you can advertise a book any way you want.

      The main point is that Trudeau actually won the election, so it terms of proportion it didn't sway the election .. and it was only released 12 days before the election.

      Delete
  28. Formidable, according to Fran: 'She has commissioned a series of formidable guest editors from Greta Thunberg to the Duke of Sussex. We thank her for all her hard work and wish her well for the future after she leaves the programme this summer.'

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    Replies
    1. Formidably stupid as well...thinking that taxing people's brains with mathematical and logic puzzles first thing in the morning when they've just woken up and are rushing around getting themselves and/or kids ready for the day is a good idea! Brilliant!!

      Delete
  29. This comment has been removed by the author.

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