Saturday 1 February 2020

Nothing has changed - at 'Newsnight'


3 against 1

After 11pm came and went last night, Newsnight held a studio discussion between John Barnes, Ella Whelan and Jeanette Winterson. It exemplified a familiar Newsnight imbalance. As Iain Dale once said, "When the BBC puts together panels for its shows, for example, it is rare they contain a majority of Brexiteers. Many is the time I have been outnumbered two or even three to one". Here pro-Brexit Ella was outnumbered two to one by gloomy Continuity Remainers. Why do they keep on doing it?

Another thing that hasn't changed is Emily Maitlis's biased behaviour, making it, in effect, three against one. For example, she interrupted Ella to ask, with a tone of incredulity, "You call yourself European?" And after Jeanette began relentlessly interrupting her too, and John Barnes then joined in against her, Emily took their side and joined in. Surely she should have balanced things out by taking Ella's side (in a devil's advocate way) and taking the fight back to the other side?

Such unrepresentative stacking up of Continuity Remainers against Brexit supporters and the presenter-assisted mobbing of the lone Brexiteers on Newsnight must stop. Now.

3 comments:

  1. We all might want it to stop, but it won't, will it? Unless the BBC is broken up, of course, as it is way beyond redemption.

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    Replies
    1. ITV and Sky aren't much better and are sometimes worse. So privatisation is not the answer. Radical reform is, in my view.

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  2. Displaying all the nodding-dog stupidity you need to keep your cred with London media heavyweights, Maitlis asked Nigel Farage if he would now be going to America to work for Donald Trump. Way to go, Em! More Prosecco?

    ReplyDelete

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