April Open Thread

Oh, to be in England/Now that the April Open Thread's there...

Thank you, as ever, for your comments.

Riots will erupt

We haven’t done any ‘housekeeping’ posts for a good while. Or any posts whatsoever for that matter. We’re in blogging doldrums.  That cries out for a calypso; missing Lance Percival now.

Now that the BBC’s leftwing bias is generally accepted, why don’t you and I - the listening public - just stop moaning and carry on regardless, autocorrecting as we go? We’ve got our own antennae, haven’t we? We can edit as we see fit, in realtime.

That is what we do when we hear Mishal Husain introduce an item about riots at Al Aksa, you know, the third holiest site for the Muslims. We know she’ll parrot the Palestinian version of events. It’s expected and we make allowances. Do listen. It’s a bit of a shocker, bias-wise.

     Today Prog; scroll to 2:23:01

As Adam Levick points out, the Guardian sets the tone with its 'erupting clashes':

“…..clashes that erupted when Israeli riot police entered Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque compound ….”

Clashes erupt! Riots occur!  Vehicles run people down! 

Life’s far too short to peel this kind of onion. It’s a multi-layered vegetable. 

(Mishal, I do wonder who you think “started the riots”? The Jews in 1948, maybe? Or should we go back a few millennia to the origin of the oldest hatred)

Mishal Husain may not be interested, but BBC guidelines state: 

The BBC is committed to achieving due impartiality in all its output. This commitment is fundamental to our reputation, our values, and the trust of audiences. The term ‘due’ means that the impartiality must be adequate and appropriate to the output, taking account of the subject and nature of the content, the likely audience expectation, and any signposting that may influence that expectation.

Mishal, this morning's report on the Today Programme cried out for a balanced picture of the incident, but you talked over and obstructed the Israeli spokeswoman you were supposed to be interviewing and you did so with such cloth-eared belligerence that you virtually drowned her out. You mustn’t do that, Mishal. It’s very biased.  Here's the gist of the part you drowned out. To quote JPost:

The Muslims who stockpiled stones, rocks, logs, and firecrackers in al-Aqsa did not do so for religious purposes. They prepared for a riot – to attack police and Jewish worshipers – not for prayers. Police did not storm al-Aqsa Mosque to “conquer” it. They broke in to arrest the rock throwers who had barricaded themselves inside after Friday prayers. Some of the masked Palestinians waved Hamas flags and praised arch-terrorist Muhammed Deif as they tried to bombard the Jewish worshipers who had come to pray at the Western Wall at the start of the Passover holiday.

Did anyone say "They would say that, wouldn’t they?"  I bloody well hope so, too. Someone’s got to say it, and it certainly won’t be the BBC.  

Maybe Mishal Husain let her utter contempt for the Israeli spokesperson shine through because she knows that listener numbers are shrinking and assumes that those remaining wouldn’t care. 

Continually speaking over her guest in one of her rudest, most schoolmarmish, and sneeriest tones, she outdid even her usual self this morning. The self-righteous, prissy, and sneery timbre to her voice on such occasions is as irritating as the saccharine tones that accompany her heartwarming stories. Perhaps she ‘smiles’ while speaking. I hear that's a technique to make the audience like you.  I'm thinking of trying that.  

I implore everybody to listen (link here again and at the top of the page, scroll to 2:23:00) to Husain indulging that malevolent fanatic Husam Zomlot, no stranger to this site, allowing him acres of air time in which to express his opinions.  But wow! Was he allowed to rant and ramble on, barely interrupted - even though he strayed off-topic, wildly, fancifully, and at great length - and fawned over to the point of servility. Did nobody else notice?

This is almost unbelievable when you consider that Tim Davie was supposed to be addressing the bias. I understood that the BBC’s entire raison d’être for co-opting Tim Davie to the maelstrom  — bringing him aboard - was to iron out the bias once and for all!  But when? This year, next year, sometime never?

Not only with regard to the Martin Bashir and Jimmy Savile scandals, but something more fundamental, namely the BBC’s unspoken mission to normalise and acclimatise the British to creeping Islamification.  Does the public want this? Do people want to pay for it?  

I can’t quite follow my own advice here. I can’t just autocorrect everything as I go along and leave it at that. Someone has to say something. I’m afraid this particular issue is bigger than both of us. 

Oh yes, and has anyone noted the recent absence of the BBC’s most ubiquitous guest on Dateline London recently?   One of his rants has apparently been removed from YouTube but does anyone know if his recent (semi) withdrawal from our BBC screens is a coincidence or part of Tim Davie’s nascent decontamination project? Yes, I’m talking about “Barry Atwan or ‘arry Batwan.

Haven’t seen Mr Atwan lately. Did he creep away quietly, or was there a showdown? (Asking for a few million friends.)

The BBC News Channel falls for an April Fools' Day joke

 

Eight times between 12:12pm and 12:24pm yesterday, April 1st, the BBC News Channel repeatedly ran a bit of breaking news across its screen. 

They were reporting that one of Boris Johnson's arch-critics Rory Stewart was to become Number Ten Director of Communications. The news then disappeared without comment. 

The BBC, who have long had a soft spot for Rory, must have been reading his Twitter feed. He'd tweeted as an April Fools' Day joke:

It is an honour to have been asked by the PM to serve as Director of Communications for No 10 Downing Street. I am looking forward to working with the PM, Ministers and Members of Parliament on the issues that matter most to our country.

And the geniuses at Jess Brammar's new channel fell for it. 

The i reports:

A spokesperson for BBC News said it would not comment on the incident.