tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post1454008873161334345..comments2024-01-01T17:21:52.555+00:00Comments on Is the BBC biased?: Specially-commissioned (BBC) letters from EuropeCraighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08741318067991857821noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-36293535832441028822015-02-13T03:41:07.089+00:002015-02-13T03:41:07.089+00:00Excellent stuff, Craig.Excellent stuff, Craig.David Preisernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-58906002092611723702015-02-13T00:04:37.327+00:002015-02-13T00:04:37.327+00:00Thanks for the information. She's not going to...Thanks for the information. She's not going to say anything that goes beyond the BBC's comfort zone.<br /><br />As for my quip about whether Lydie Salvayre might surprise us all and be a Front National supporter (as if the BBC would EVER dream of inviting such a person to give such a talk on Radio 4)...well, no...<br /><br />In L'Humanite (the old communist rag), there's an article called:<br /><br />Front national, un affront à l’histoire, à la vie<br />(National Front, an affront to history, to life)<br />http://www.humanite.fr/front-national-un-affront-lhistoire-la-vie-564430Craighttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08741318067991857821noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-78457177043114988302015-02-12T23:19:07.543+00:002015-02-12T23:19:07.543+00:00Craig, some background information on Lydie Salvay...<br />Craig, some background information on Lydie Salvayre. I don't think you're going to be in for any surprises. <br /><br />She was - a bit of a pattern by now - born to a family of refugees. This time left wing Republicans from Spain. Strangely right wing refugees seldom get a look in this series. <br /><br />[How very BBC-like to think that "a range of comments" should be invited only from refugees or people brought up in refugee families.] <br /><br />Secondly, she is trusted enough to be a guest editor on L'Humanite - what used to be the official mouthpiece of the French Communist Party. Here's her article:<br /><br />http://www.humanite.fr/lydie-salvayre-decouvrit-quune-haine-sauvage-une-haine-mortelle-animait-de-jeunes-francais-564445<br /><br />Combining my basic knowledge of French and a machine translation, I can report the article performs all the usual mental somersaults, acts of amnesia and denials of elephant-sized facts.<br /><br />She claims she (indeed the nation as a whole) was unaware prior to the killings that such murderous hatreds existed in French young people (she avoids all use of the words Muslim, Sharia or Islam). This despite the fact that France has been subject to murderous attacks since the 1990s by (initially) Algerian Jihadists. <br /><br />She refers to the banlieues without asking why Christians in the banlieues don't engage in such terrorist attacks. <br /><br />She referred to killings in a kosher supermarket, without any suggestion that Jews were being targetted. <br /><br />She refers to her own personal history swimming between two banks (her Spanish and French roots) without any recognition of just how close Spain and France are culturally compared with say Algeria, Saudi Arabia, or Pakistan. <br /><br />She makes no reference to having read the Koran, Hadith or Life of Mohammed. The other contributors are strangely silent on these texts with the terrorists themselves are only too happy to quote. <br /><br />All in all this has been for me one of the most biased and tendentious "factual" series programmes ever broadcast by Radio 4. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-41307988921473546562015-02-12T22:25:33.878+00:002015-02-12T22:25:33.878+00:00I wish I could be as positive as you Craig about t...<br />I wish I could be as positive as you Craig about the contributions. It seemed to me there was lot of special pleading going on and no analysis of why other immigrant communities don't produce terrorists in the hundreds as do the Sharia-following communities.<br /><br />I completely reject Senocak's claim that "It is primarily the failure of Muslim elites to live out their faith and interpret it in such a way that it can be communicated to people of other faiths or none."<br /><br />How on earth could the "elites" live out Sharia - which means treating all non-Muslims and all women as second class citizens? <br /><br />If he means "We need to completely throw out Sharia and make our peace with the modern world" he needs to say so but he is probably - and understandably -too afraid to do so,because that amounts to apostasy and is punishable by death. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-89516561193130662572015-02-12T22:06:35.718+00:002015-02-12T22:06:35.718+00:00Here were my comments from an earlier thread:
I...Here were my comments from an earlier thread:<br />I've been taking a look at the Letters from Europe series on Radio 4. I caught the end of the latest episode and I wondered what it was all about because it sounded like people had just been given a kind of extended "Thought for the Day" pulpit session. <br /><br />I found out it was billed as "reflections on recent events in France and Germany"...well I immediately got the French connection but what were the German "events"...well, wouldn't you know it that refers to the Pergida demonstrations. So - killing blasphemers and Jews in cold blood is somehow equivalent to protesting peacefully about the influences that have led to such killings! <br /><br />Yes we were back in the Land of Go Compare and Conclude There's Equivalence. <br /><br />Now the series of 5 episodes is billed as reflections by 5 European writers. Of the four named we have three people from Muslim communities within Europe. The other was from a Jewish writer who appears strongly sympathetic to allowing in asylum seekers from Islamic countries, no questions asked. <br /><br />Well you can imagine what you get:<br /><br />- Insulting comments about European society being governed by fear of the other...when all the evidence shows that Europeans get on very well with Hindus, Jews, Buddhists and other immigrants. European societies are now probably the most truly inter-racially integrated on the planet excepting perhaps Brazil. <br /><br />- Equivalence: suggesting harsh criticism of Islam (which - though it was never said - is thick with vituperation against other belief systems)is the equivalent of terrorism. <br /><br />- Suggestions it is somehow in the gift of non-Muslim European society to stop the terror by better understanding Islam and Muslims. <br /><br />- No questioning at all of the wisdom of continued mass immigration from backward Islamic countries. <br /><br />Once again, a complete lack of balance and every evidence of bias. <br /><br />A balanced series would have included one or two of those five predictable voices perhaps but should also have included people from Pergida, or champion of robust secularism in France. <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3272054900018746845.post-81568977823033841312015-02-12T22:04:16.457+00:002015-02-12T22:04:16.457+00:00Just testing as your comments identity verificatio...Just testing as your comments identity verification hasn't been working.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com