More Twitterings [featuring talk of BBC editorial guidelines]

I know that political Twitter is often a blood sport, and that only a surprisingly small minority of the public ever bothers with Twitter at all, but it a favourite haunt of many of my least favourite BBC journalists. 

And do you get delightful cat videos and opportunities to vote on whether the 3-voice, 4-voice or 5-voice mass settings by your favourite Tudor composer you prefer.

One quirk of my Twitter feed is that, over the years, I've 'followed' the following four people: James Delingpole, Maajid Nawaz, Sunder Katwala and Shayan Sardarizadeh. 

You may know them all already [especially as they've all featured on the blog before], but I'll introduce them nonetheless: 

James is a conservative who thinks nearly everything being done in the name of Covid and climate change is a scam. Maajid is an ex-Muslim extremist turned Lib Dem broadcaster who shares some of James's takes. Sunder is a left-liberal think tanker who really doesn't like Maajid. And Shayan is an impartial BBC journalist from  Mike Wendling's BBC Trending/BBC Disinformation Unit with a strong interest in QAnon who works alongside the famous Marianna Spring and often 'likes' in tandem with her on Twitter. 

I'm happy to follow all of them, being broad-minded, even though all four of them irritate me from time to time. I like to hear what interesting people like this are saying. So this today is like a rare astronomical conjunction of planets as it features all four of them together:

There's James doing his thing, and jumping more sharks than Evel Knievel doubling for The Fonz in a David Attenborough documentary about sharks. 

And there's Sunder doing his thing and bullying Maajid for being guilty by association. 

And there's Shayan, the impartial BBC guy, doing his thing and impartially taking sides on the same side he always takes by 'liking' Sunder's attack on Maajid and James.

What are they like!

Of course, James Delingpole, Maajid Nawaz and Sunder Katwala aren't bound by the BBC's guidelines on impartiality. They can 'like' what they want, unlike Shayan Sardarizadeh. 

Those pesky BBC editorial guidelines don't stop Shayan though!

Tim Davie can 'talk the talk' as much as he likes about BBC staff's impartiality-busting on social media because the BBC's been promising to clean it up its act on that front for years now, and yet here we are again. 

Ripped, hench and buff!

 "Check out the 'ceps on young Dougie" is the general consensus. But the conversation is worth a listen as well.

Spectacles

Talking of Andrew Neil, The Spectator has a couple of fine pieces about BBC bias, albeit by the usual suspects - Mr Liddle and Mr Delingpole. 

Rod's piece concentrates on the BBC's deep-seated bias towards social liberalism as reflected in its many outlets (from Today to the Victoria Derbyshire show) firing on all cylinders after Mrs May's resignation honours list included Geoffrey Boycott, who was once convicted of assaulting his girlfriend. Why did the BBC go heavily on that when they could have majored on the stinking "cronyism" of many of Mrs May's other choices - most of her former senior aides and advisers, plus Conservative donors - and the reek of hypocrisy and corruption they might be said to reveal so clearly? Now, I must say that I think the BBC could have concentrated on both stories, but Rod - from my researches - is right that it was the abusive cricketer who dominated the corporation's field of vision. 

James's piece looks at a couple of BBC documentaries and finds them guilty of bias - The Rise of the Nazis and Conspiracy Files: The Billionaire Global Mastermind? 

Except for watching the Ask Sarkar bits (which I ferreted out like truffles and which I agree with James turned out to be "harmless to the point of irrelevance"), The Rise of the Nazis isn't a series I've watched (yet). Of it he writes: 

Back in the day, the BBC might have been content to strive for an objective take on the subject, perhaps with a voiceover by Samuel West and lots of period footage. But the danger of that approach, the BBC has since realised, is that it runs the risk of viewers making up their own minds what to think. Some of them might not be aware, for example, of the obvious parallels between Hitler, Nigel Farage, Donald Trump, Brexit and, to a lesser extent, Michael Gove. 

But I did watch the George Soros programme (you'll doubtless be pleased to hear). It was a straightforward debunking exercise aimed at right-wing conspiracy theorists which focused mainly on the loudest, nastiest figures of the fringe and the wilder, nastier conspiracy theories. But the relentlessness of its defence of Mr Soros struck many online commenters as constituting a whitewash. It also left me deeply uneasy on that count. Is every accusation false? Has he done nothing wrong? Is he such a good guy? Is everyone accusing him bad?

Here, for example, is the programme's (very) brief take on his campaign to prevent Brexit:

George Soros has made no secret of his views on Brexit, publicly contributing £1.7 million to the Remain campaign. Now, talk of a secret Soros plot is spreading to the UK.

This was followed by a clip of Nigel Farage sounding like a conspiracy theorist. 

And that was that. 

A lot more detail on what he has done - e.g. his £400,000 to find Gina Miller & Co. since the referendum - wouldn't have gone amiss. And what is the role (if any) of his Open Society foundation in, say, funding OpenDemocracy in the UK, with the latter's admitted links to the likes of Carole Cadwalladr? 

Anyhow, here's James's less charitable take on the programme:

But the documentary it did on George Soros — Conspiracy Files: The Billionaire Global Mastermind? (BBC2, Sunday) — was worse, much worse. Soros is an intriguing and influential character, well worth a detailed investigation. Apart from the time he famously broke the Bank of England in 1992 when he caused sterling to crash out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism, there’s the vexed issue of what the BBC calls his ‘philanthropy’, but which some of us might consider more akin to bankrolling the destruction of Western civilisation. 

Soros has given away $32 billion to ‘liberal’ causes, ranging from his promotion of the global-warming scare to his campaigning for open borders which involves hefty donations to a number of unsavoury and sometimes violent hard-left activist groups. The documentary’s considered take on all this: Soros gives generously to ‘education, health, human rights and democracy projects’. People who think it’s any more sinister than that are mainly tattooed, racist, far-right conspiracy theorists — and Trump fans, if there’s any difference — whose hatred stems mainly from the fact that Soros is Jewish. I think it’s time the BBC gave up trying to pretend it’s a voice of impartial authority, don’t you?

Don't you? 

A modest proposal?

When This Week with Andrew Neil draws down its final curtain later this year, maybe the BBC can replace it with The Delingpod, in which James Delingpole conducts full-length interviews on a weekly basis?

Just as a long as James is given complete editorial control of course. 

Not that I'm going to hold my breath in expectation of that happening, or I'd be pushing up daisies very soon. 

Anyhow, here's James's latest podcast:

Picking Sides

I watched episode two of Simon Reeve’s journey through the Med. I don’t often watch Simon Reeve’s programmes, but I don’t particularly avoid them either. The raggedy kaffiyeh he drapes around his neck is a bit of a turn-off; but on the other hand, he does seem like a well-meaning kinda guy.

Well, like a programme that’s typical of a kaffiyeh-wearing but well-meaning guy, it brimmed with well-meaning and probably unconscious bias. The bias seemed so embedded - almost subliminal - that the thought of unpicking it all seemed wearisome and not really worth the trouble.

Then I spotted James Delingpole’s review tagged onto the end of Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor Who. (I don’t watch that either)

“Let us move swiftly on to Simon Reeve’s Mediterranean. Even though Reeve is the BBC’s go-to adventurous young travel presenter I’ve never sat through one of his documentaries before. Probably, what with his youth, stubble, cheeky-chappy grin and warmth, I just knew I was going to hate him.”

Ah, there’s a man after my own heart.

“Damn, he’s watchable though. He’s brave, curious, empathetic and tender but never sickmakingly mawkish — a complete TV natural. “

Yep. Still agree. But then I realised Dellers was actually reviewing the previous episode, some of which I saw - when a tearful farmer in Puglia was mourning the loss of his olive groves, which were being ravaged by a disease called Xylella, and Reeve put a consoling hand on his arm. It was sad.

I have no idea what James Delingpole would say about the episode I watched, the following one, and the section about Israel and Gaza in particular.

I don’t want to go into a tediously long and dull transcription of the programme However, I fear I might have to do bits of it, otherwise you won’t know what I’m talking about. And even then, possibly not. It all depends how reliant on the BBC you are for your Middle East ‘education’.

The section about Lebanon wasn’t all hang-gliding and hiking - it did include Hezbollah in the form of a disturbing visit to a weird tourist attraction - a Hezbollah museum with relics from “their victory over Israel”.

Now, Simon is in Israel with the Ashdod Naval Fleet, “patrolling your patch of the Mediterranean”. Very military. Very serious. He narrates the military patrol scenario in a matter-of-fact voice, carefully inserting the obligatory caveat “Israel says” before putting out anything that appears to justify Israel’s militarised activities. 

Simon’s voice-over:

“Israel was founded in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Its early years and often the decades since were marked by conflict and the threat of annihilation. In response, Israel invested heavily in the  military and innovation.”

The simplistic, Corbynesque implication in those few opening words “founded in the aftermath of the Holocaust” didn’t augur well for what we were about to receive, but may the Lord make us truly thankful for the fact that he threw in “the threat of annihilation” to the mix; a nod towards reality.

Suddenly we’re in Tel Aviv, beachside. Two guys on a motorbike give the peace sign.

“Here, this is party town” Simon declares, surprised. He’d been brought up to believe to expect wall-to-wall conflict within Israel.

Then, a section about Israel’s huge desalination plant. The biggest in the world. “Israel has discovered how to make drinking water out of seawater.” 

Energy efficient and almost entirely chemical free, 2 billion litres of fresh water a day. And almost entirely automated.

“Two people operate this place at night. One is drinking coffee, and one is making coffee. Then they change” jokes Dr Boris Liberman who is showing us around.

“This is an example of Israeli innovation, which is something very special about the country,” says Simon cheerfully.

“Israeli is made from the brain. It is technology. How you save money, from the brain” says Dr Liberman in heavily accented English. 

Next, we’re off to Gaza.

“ Over two million people live there. It was the most dangerous part of the journey” intones Simon ominously yet mysteriously.

And now a monologue; superficial, unsubtle, emotive, and very BBC.

“I cross one of the world’s most heavily fortified borders. This is a long walk through a cage. A caged passageway that takes us from the very modern, pretty wealthy, state of Israel to the much poorer and densely packed Gaza Strip. I’ve never been through a border crossing quite like this. It is extraordinary in every possible sense. 

My God! Look across here. Look at the barrier that encircles Gaza; a very forbidding, foreboding place to walk towards, quite frankly. There’s a dehumanisation of the people who live here. The whole process makes you feel like you’re entering the cage of the wild animals. 

Westerners are at risk of kidnap and shooting in Gaza, but also from being caught up in an Israeli military strike. Our crew vehicle had some special modifications.

Footage of a heavily armoured vehicle, in which they can be safe.

Are Westerners really in danger of being caught up in an Israeli military strike? That sounds as if the Israelis are prone to making random, unprovoked airstrikes. I suppose inserting that odd idea into it is the BBC’s idea of even-handedness. And, as for “dehumanising" -  who’s dehumanising whom? Has Simon never taken a peek at Hamas’s school curriculum? 

“Now this is Rushdi here. Rushdi’s going to be our guide in Gaza.”

We’ve met Rushdi Abualouf before. He’s one of the BBC’s reporters 'on the ground' in Gaza, and very well on it he looks too, if I may say so. 

“It’s the most bizarre thing, crossing” remarks Simon.

“Of course. I mean they keep calling Gaza the biggest open-air prison, which is true because it’s closed from (?) sight. Israel is calling this strip of land is like a hostile ….(?)” replies Rushdi, (if I caught, at least the gist of it, correctly)

“Gaza has been controlled by Hamas, a militant Islamic group considered terrorists by Israel and many Western governments. It’s not the only militant group here” 

intones Simon’s voice-over, as an accompaniment to bleak scenes shot from the moving car -  piles of rubbish and derelict-looking buildings.

In the car, he turns to Rushdi.

“That’s the black flag flying there. Is that Hamas, or…?”

“Islamic Jihad” 

murmurs Rushdi

“We’ve just gone past an Islamic Jihad checkpoint.”

“It’s not a checkpoint, it’s like military compound.”

“Bloody hell! Is this a safe..? This isn’t a safe place”



“They operate in this area because it’s not far from the border so they always try to be ready for any Israeli escalation, or..”

“Checkpoint ahead!”

“Put the cameras down.”

“They’ve taken our cameras!”

“They want to see what you’ve been filming. They are Hamas …border police”

“Hamas border force. I’m actually slightly relieved…being stopped by Hamas - phew.” 

Voice-over again:

Since 2006 Gaza has endured one Palestinian war, three wars between Hamas and Israel, ten years of strict rule by Hamas and blockade by Israel and Egypt. This has all crippled the economy”

Aaannndd…back in the room car Rushdi speaks:

“How long you can struggle? How long you have to find a way to produce power and to buy clean water? This is basic. In any part of the world, you have to worry about electricity or water for the safety of your people.” 

Then, Simon’s narrative once again; pure BBC copybook, complete with context-free factoids and statistics regurgitated, direct from Hamas headquarters.

“Israelis and Palestinians have endured endless cycles of violence. Here, militants can fire rockets into Israel. Israel can attack with overwhelming force. Weeks of conflict here in 2014 between Israel and Palestinians left 2000 civilians dead, including an estimated 500 children. 18,000 homes were destroyed. Israel restricts the supply of many building materials like cement into Gaza. Israel says to prevent Hamas building tunnels for attacks. But (a hijab-wearing female) engineering graduate Majid Maserawi (phonetic) has invented an ingenious way to help rebuild in Gaza.

“We call it green cake,” she says, and “Welcome to “our factory” where they’re making breeze-blocks out of what appears to be cinders. 

The demo didn’t go too well; the first samples crumbled to dust when touched. But the next attempt was better, to much amusement. Bake-off cum builders’ merchant and, to a cynic like me, this edit was the BBC’s attempt at pathos. Juxtaposing Israel’s ‘mighty’ innovation - turning water into wine - with Gaza’s plucky response in the face of adversity all wrapped up in a heartwarming, comical and humanising bit of film. So typical of the BBC.

The lady engineer had come back to Gaza, voluntarily ‘To help my people” “Hope! We will achieve our dream one day”.  

“The blockade here has devastated Gaza’s economy. Gaza now has among the highest unemployment rate in the world……..” says Simon. An unsuccessful fishing trip rounds off his visit to Gaza as an Israeli drone buzzes overhead.  

“It’s intimidating and frightening really” he remarks.

“Look, for young people in Gaza, the only thing know about the Israelis is that they are the occupier”

 reflects Rushdi.

“You don’t sound very hopeful for the future”

“The economic situation is hard and people are losing hope. They don’t have job. they don’t have money. The poverty is very high, the unemployment is more than 60 %.
There’s gonna be an exeblution. (!) (Explosion?) I think. But where I don’t know. When, I don’t know. But the possible of war? I don’t know. I think it’s 50%…. 50/50.”

Now for the most disingenuous bit of superficial philosophy in a summary that we’ve heard from the BBC’s go-to adventurous young travel presenter so far:

The situation here is utterly shocking and maddening. So much about the Arab Israeli conflict is about picking a side. 

And personally, I refuse to. 

My heart breaks for the suffering of the Jewish people, throughout history. 

My heart breaks for the suffering of the Palestinians.So many opportunities for real lasting peace have been lost here, and we see two sides - which seem in many ways to be moving further apart, not closer together.

So Simon’s poor heart is breaking. But for the Jews “throughout history” as per the school of Jeremy Corbyn  - not for the present-day Jews, Israelis who have endured endless cycles of violence from Gaza. Not for the Palestinians who have been corrupted by Islamic-rooted antisemitic hatred and indoctrinated by Hamas and misguided useful idiots from the west who perpetuate the conflict by fuelling the false hope of fulfilling their ‘dream’  - the annihilation of Israel and encouraging their belief in a fantasy. Their unique, moral and everlasting Right of Return to land they lost in their own self-inflicted wars.

The BBC hasn’t made much of it, but ever since June, balloons rigged with explosive and incendiary material have been launched from Gaza, setting fire to acres of Israel’s land and turning a child ’s toy into an instrument of terror. 

Hamas has intensified its violent demonstrations against Israel, turning the border between the Jewish state and the Gaza Strip into a "24/7" war zone as the terrorist group amps up its efforts to kidnap Israeli soldiers, according to Israeli security sources and regional reports. 

Hamas ramped up this past week its months-long violent demonstrations along the Gaza border as part of new plans to "kidnap soldiers so that it will have a bargaining chip to use against Israel for speeding up the removal of the blockade," according to an investigation into new ways Hamas is probing Israel's defenses provided by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, or JCPA, a security research institute. 

Violence raged throughout the weekend and into late Monday, with some 20,000 Palestinians participating in the demonstration, which have grown increasingly violent as Hamas operatives begin to deploy explosive devices, grenades, incendiary balloons, and other makeshift weapons. 

Hamas's goal is create as much confusion and violence on the border as possible to elicit a response from the Israeli Defense Forces that could provide the terror group with an opportunity to kidnap soldiers. The renewed border violence is part of an effort by Hamas to test Israel's will and provoke a violent response.

When Simon was in Israel, he didn’t mention inconvenient accounts of Gaza's innovative enterprises like this one, H/T Vildechaye (via Facebook.)

"What does this look like to you? To my neighbors and I, we've had to retrain our kids that balloons are explosives.
Yeah, this is not a school project finding out how far a helium balloon can fly with a postcard at the bottom. This is an explosive balloon sent from Gaza that landed 38 kilometers away in my neighborhood, and that if touched, will explode for max impact.
This lovely gift was just sent to my 'hood from our friends in Gaza. They've sent thousands of these since the summer. The package at the bottom is an explosive device. Balloons like this have burned 1000 of acres of fields, 1000's of wild animals, hundreds of small businesses face financial ruin with their fields and crops destroyed. Yet the world is silent. 

Gazans wants peace? Gaza is Israel's problem? Gaza is a humanitarian disaster? BDS is the answer?
Well, here's a newsflash. We pulled out of Gaza 10 years ago. We destroyed 17 Israeli communities and the lives of thousands of families to do it. We did everything the world asked us to. Everything. We asked for one thing in return. Stop the terror against our cities. 

We've sent them more aid than any other location in the world has ever received (per capita). We continue to transfer aid in 18 wheel trucks every day. What does Gaza look like today? Abject poverty, minimized water and electricity (they attacked the plants we left them for both and ruined them --they've gotten billions and never built another), terror tunnels and thousands of missiles rained onto our cities. And last but not least, thousands of incendiary balloons.
What did y'all think would happen?
Were you expecting Kumbaya and a prayer circle?  

Gaza has proven time and time again it cannot lead itself out of this mess. Their leadership is corrupt. The majority of the aid money stolen. Their people suffer. But you asked us to disengage, so we tore up our country and did it. 

Now what?
Why balloons? Because they know the value we place on human life and our children. Hamas is once again targeting our children. On purpose. Explicitly. 

PS. In case you thought it was just explosives at the bottom...nope, they pack them with rat poison and nails for maximum damage when they explode. Oh, and even you can learn how to make one on YouTube. Because while a nursing boob is apparently offensive to humanity, instructions for how to make killer Gazan balloons don't appear to violate any community standards.
What next? I honestly have no idea.”

Simon refuses to pick sides. But ‘sides’ are not something you just ‘pick’. Only if you’re completely ignorant of the facts, past and present, can you see it as a mere matter of “picking sides".

I’d be very disappointed if James Delingpole thinks this episode of Simon Reeves's documentary demonstrates bravery or curiosity, and if Simon Reeve thinks he’s made a fair and even-handed documentary about suffering, he is deluding himself. On this particular topic, he’s shown us that he’s certainly not curious. He may be empathetic and tender and only a little sickmakingly mawkish, but Dellers is quite right about one thing - he is a complete TV natural. 

Utter tripe

This blog never properly addressed the much-hyped Bodyguard. Craig, who hadn’t watched it himself, covered it by way of Laura Perrins's Live Tweets.

Bloody Richard Madden

The BBC bigged up Jed Mercurio’s series shamelessly, but at the end of the day, to quote James Delingpole, it was a load of utter tripe.

The only way one could make head or tail of the story was by visiting the Guardian’s recaps - one of that paper’s few redeeming features.

It astonished me that so many viewers actually knew the names of the many indistinguishable characters, whom they referred to with such familiarity, ”Craddock”  and “Sampson”,  you’d think some of them actually knew what was supposed to be going on.

Haddock and Salmon

Anyway, Dellers has done such a good job, we at ITBB need go no further. Here are some of his best bits:

Even more distracting than the gratuitous sex, mind you, was the diversity casting. The whole exercise was like an extended United Colours of Benetton advert, with black female snipers, an Indian/Pakistani SWAT team head, an oriental bomb disposal expert, etc. If you sincerely believe — as the BBC demonstrably does — that the primary function of contemporary TV drama is to act as a make-work scheme for BAME actors then this is admirable. But from the point of view of most viewers it is distracting, insulting and discomfiting — for it forces you into noticing something you’d rather not be forced to notice. 

Worse still than the diversity stuff, though, is the relentless equality agenda. […] In BBC dramas now, it is absolutely de rigueur for anyone in any position of authority, including most of the police force, to be a strong, capable, confident woman. That includes, in this case, the female Muslim suicide bomber who — to allay any concerns that this might be racist stereotyping — was indulged with a little speech at the end announcing how proud and omnicompetent she was, not some male jihadist’s stooge, but an independent trained engineer with a mind of her own. 

I wonder, do BBC writers like Jed Mercurio feel any twinges of artistic self-disgust as they churn out this Social Justice Warrior propaganda? Isn’t it a bit like being a composer under Stalin, knowing you’re free to write whatever music you want, so long as it’s revolutionary, anti-bourgeois and celebrates the struggles and triumphs of the proletariat? Do they never worry at all what the audience might think?

They should because some of us have had just about enough. If it weren’t required for my job, I would seriously be thinking about stopping paying my licence fee. It’s a monstrous injustice — and, of course, a betrayal of its charter principles — for the BBC to charge people £150 a year on pain of imprisonment only to spit in their faces if they don’t hold the correct ‘woke’ views on anything from climate change and the EU to multiculturalism and feminism. My prediction is that the BBC is going to become increasingly marginal, partisan and irrelevant” 

I haven’t acclimatised myself to new-look Channel 5 yet, since I firmly associate it with voyeuristic topics like nature’s ‘freaks’ and physical abnormalities. But recently, according to James Delingpole, it has reinvented itself and it’s now the place to go for proper documentaries.

Whereas with Channel 5, what you see is what you get. Michael Buerk’s How the Victorians Built Britain (Saturdays), for example, tells you most of the stuff you need to know about the Industrial Revolution, why they built the Manchester ship canal, how the sewing machine changed fashion, and so on. You don’t get quite the production values that the overindulged BBC can still afford. But you don’t get the PC bollocks either, for which relief much thanks.

Poetry Please

I remember reading a James Delingpole piece recently (though I can't find it again now) where he actually, in passing, praised a Radio 4 programme. (Yes, really!) 

That sole, shining star was Poetry Please. 

I also remember James writing a Spectator piece recently on the rewards of trying to learn poetry by heart, so I imagine he'll have liked the latest edition of Poetry Please as it focused on that very subject.

Learning poetry by heart is something I've tried to do too, but I find it hard - except for very short poems. (I still remember that Stevie Smith poem I learned for my O Levels. In its entirety it ran: "Aloft/In the loft/Sits Croft./He is soft".)

But it is obviously possible to manage long poems with a bit of willpower. After all, actors learn large numbers of lines and, as we know from their political pronouncements, many of them aren't exactly the brightest bulbs in the theatre's neon light display.

Now I, for example, made a determined effort to memorise the entirely of T.S. Eliot's The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (always a favourite of mine) and nearly succeeded, after days and days and day of trying. Most of it has now crumbled to ruins in my memory though, yet I still remember enjoying the stimulation of the challenge. 

This is one of the few poems I have managed to learn by heart:

I was struck though by Poetry Please presenter - and poet - Roger McGough's ready admission that he was unable to recite any of his own poems from heart. 

('Roger McGough' is a splendidly poetic name, incidentally, brimming with assonance). 

Death of Facts

Idly flicking through the ridiculous abundance of TV channels yesterday and landing, serially, on a seemingly solid wall of adverts, I realised once again the importance of the BBC. We do need an ad-free broadcaster. No, really we do. We need to be informed educated and entertained without being browbeaten or brainwashed.

James Delingpole explains why it matters that the BBC fails to live up to its charter obligations

“to produce output that is rigorously fair and balanced.” 

Part of the problem is that the BBC believes that it is already fair and balanced.  Talk about a divided nation! The BBC is in its bubble, all lefty and consensual, and the other half are in theirs; alt-right, far right and “altfas”. 

One thing nearly everyone seems to agree on is that the BBC is biased. Some think it’s biased to the left, some to the right. So it’s a bit unfair on the BBC. They’re damned before they start. 

However, the BBC is “left-blind”. (I got that from an ad, you know the one with ‘nose-blind’, which means acclimatised to one’s own stench.) The BBC has slipped and slid into a default position wherein left means good ad right means bad.  

So, as many of us have worn themselves blue in the face trying to point out, labelling something “right’ or ‘far-right’ is understood to be pejorative. The kind of pejorative that is wrapped so loosely in ‘code’ that it’s still just about possible to deny with a knowing  “innocent face”. 

Critics of the BBC claim that think-tanks are frequently tagged with a ‘right-wing’ health warning, whereas ‘left-wing’ views are unlabelled.  

James Delingpole was cross, and rightly so - (sorry) because his (London branch) online site Breitbart has to endure being lumbered, and implicitly denigrated, by being tagged ‘far-right’, and on this occasion “very extreme right”. 

Of course, within the framework we’re obliged to use, Breitbart is right-wing - in that is it’s a staunch critic of the left, and will use the terms ‘left’ and ‘progressive’ as a pejorative, and in that respect I suppose the one mirror-images the other.

However, Delingpole’s criticisms of the edition of Word of Mouth with professor George  Lakoff were spot on.

I like words and linguistics as a topic. In a parallel world I might have been one of Professor Lakoff’s students. 

(But I fear the droning timbre of his voice would have turned me off, pronto.) 

Professor Lakoff’s superior, and dare I say patronising explanations of the terms “snowflake”, “alt right” and “antfas” were so off-beam that I almost felt sorry for him. They were the “dad-dancing” version, if you like. Misunderstood and uncool. Not to mention his definitions of “virtue signalling” and “Social justice warrior”.

Even more irritating than that was his assurance that these terms were ‘hardly ever heard of’  in the mainstream. That is to say, in the ‘left’ world he inhabits. Only experts like him would be aware of them at all, he explained, and we were lucky he was here to enlighten us. I think even Michael Rosen was taken aback at that.  

Another, even more disturbing and hypocritical aspect of the ‘progressive left’s attitude  was exposed too. 

The ‘hardly ever heard of’ aspect. So much so that alternative (another misrepresented term) view, that of the so-called ‘right’ has now become verboten. (There you go.  See what I did there? “Sorta, kinda, like Hitler”.)

This no-platforming malarkey, of which Berkeley, the professor’s stamping-out ground, is a hot-bed. 

Melanie Phillips was there.  Her “Zio” lecture was so ‘against the grain’ that it had to be carried out in a secret location. In a university. (You know, a seat of learning, where a plethora of ideas are explored) Or not.

Douglas Murray has written many articles, including The Death of Facts, about this state of affairs. 

Universities are now silencing free speech. It’s not only in California that this is happening though. No Israeli or pro Israel speaker can even think of speaking in a British university these days without an angry mob screaming and shouting abuse.

Oddly enough a teeny counter movement is burgeoning. Did anyone see Alastair Sooke’s anti-Trump programme yesterday? Another of the BBC’s supposedly ‘above it all’ investigations, full of baffled and despairing  lefties and progressives. 

Did you see Nadya Tolokonnikova from “Pussy Riot” ?(I thought the Pussies were in a Russian prison?) Her forehead and part of one cheek was adorned with shards of mirror. What if one of them stuck in her eyeball? I suppose punk is all about living dangerously.

The pro-Trump movement was not completely ignored through. Matt Rich, a publicist who worked for Trump, pulled Sooke up for saying people who work in the arts feel a “natural” resistance to Trump… “why do you say ‘natural’ of all things? […] I would certainly not call it ‘natural’. ” 

A black singer called Sam Moore shocked his former fans and compatriots by singing at the inauguration, attracting opprobrium from “Snoop Dog”. 

Sooke provided the obligatory opposing view again, in the form of an ironic gay, “counter-culture” “Twinks for Trump”.  An alternative alt-right Trump fan-base.  

I mean, here I go again. I’m forced into the position of defending Trump and the ‘extreme right’ not because I support them unconditionally, which I do not, but merely because ‘someone has to do it.’  

  

Let's talk about BBC Radio 4

Talking about James Delingpole...

When BBC reporters (et al) talk about 'blue on blue' attacks during the present EU referendum some of us politically-minded obsessives know what they mean. And some of you will easily be able to work out what I mean by calling James's Radio piece in last week's Spectator a definite case of 'Speccie on Speccie' attack. 

As soon as I read it I knew it was an attack on the Spectator's main Radio reviewer Kate Chisholm (who I've always felt is a good deal more New Statesman than Spectator in her political outlook). Dellers criticised those Radio reviewers who pretend that Radio 4 is endlessly fascinating, wonderfully civilised, often transcendent. He thinks it's usually mostly somewhat boring and irritating. And, as a regular listener myself, I think he has a point - though he deliciously overstates it for rhetorical effect.  

Our Kate obviously realised that it was indeed aimed squarely at her (despite not naming her) and her piece this week was a clear riposte. It began by saying, "Just to prove my esteemed colleague wrong" (despite not naming him), then talked about something other than how great Radio 4 is, and then said that there is something on Radio 4 she doesn't like, and then, pivoting round - her coup de grace - coming across another magical BBC moment (someone saying how great it is that "a black man" is now president of the USA) and hymning the wonders of Radio 4 all over again, triumphantly. It brought a tear to my eye. (I was pealing onions at the time).

James Delingpole's original piece was deliciously provocative and struck a chord with me. 

He finds Today "maddening", Mishal Husain biased, Woman's Hour "hateful" and "sanctimonious", Anita Anand the most irritating presenter on Radio 4, and the station's afternoon plays "the ne plus ultra of Radio 4 boringness". 

And I can see his point about all of those. 

He also finds Jim Al-Khalili's The Life Scientific "dreary" and Eddie Mair the second-most irritating person on Radio 4. 

But I disagree with him about both of those. I've enjoyed many a The Life Scientific, and was both amused and delighted to find so many of the otherwise strongly anti-BBC commenters below his piece also going out of their way to exempt the wonderful Eddie Mair from their criticisms. 

Thank goodness for people like Dellers though. Agree or disagree with them, or do both at the same time, but bless the non-BBC contrarians (especially the ones who are often right)!

What James Delingpole And I Think Muslims Really Think

Having written about the reviewers’ reaction to the programme What Muslims Really Think I might as well say something about my own reaction.

James Delingpole says most of it for me, here, in his Spectator review of the programme on Channel 4.. 

Of course, like us, and no doubt many of our readers, James Delingpole is already familiar with the issues raised by Trevor Phillips.   

We’ve been on about it for ages, lamenting the fact that the mainstream press are too timid to risk throwing off the political correctness that binds them. Binds them and blinds them.

The fact that Trevor Phillips was once a notorious proponent of political correctness gives his awakening added value. The non-Jew that defends Israel gets double points for objectivity, by way of his/her/their non-tribal status. Trev gets his for being black and a Guardian reader. (Not that we know which papers he reads, but ‘Guardian reader’ is a code word these days.)

James delingpole says:

Normally the PC response to these surveys is to shoot the messenger, as the BBC and the Guardian and the usual dhimmi apologists did last year, when the Sun revealed that one in four British Muslims sympathised with the motives of the Charlie Hebdo killers. 

They’ll find it harder this time, not just because Phillips is black and probably reads the Guardian, but also because the survey was so thorough. It was conducted, face to face, by people of the same religion. And when it came to the really tricky question — the one about terrorism — a blank envelope was provided for the answer, so that respondents felt freer to say what they really thought.

I forgot to mention that. The survey was face to face, Muslim-to-Muslim. An envelope was provided for discretion and privacy when the terrorism question came up.

Back on my particular hobby horse, I have a slight quibble with James Delingpole when he says:

 “There wasn’t much to disagree with in this brave and honest programme, except for the odd momentary lapse, as when Phillips said, of Islamophobia, ‘I’ve no doubt that most of it emanates from sheer blind prejudice.’ 

That wasn’t the only lapse. What about the talking head - apparently a comedian of some sort - who tried to make the point that you mustn’t hold Israel’s malevolence against every Jew. Now I’m sure he meant well, but it’s very annoying when people get away with saying that. It amounts to saying not all Jews are bad - there are good Jews - the ones who denounce Israel. 

There are several forthright comments below the line of James Delingpole's piece. Worth a read.

Maybe the tide is slowly turning. The case against Tommy Robinson has been thrown out by a sensible judge. 

Browbeater Anita

My bumper Christmas edition of the Spectator arrived through the door yesterday and I had a good laugh today reading James Delingpole's Twenty things I will ban when I am elected your Dictator For Life in 2016. 

(Of course, some of you might have read it for free online, but I'm not going to let my inner fury about that spoil my fun!)

No.9 in James's to-ban list is the following:

9. That frightful woman who does BBC Radio 4’s Any Answers. She’s just awful: so hectoring and disapproving and opinionated in an all-too-predictable BBC direction. Any Answers is supposed to be where Real Britain responds to all the drivel they’ve been infuriated by on Any Questions. Not a place for them to get sneered at yet again.

You may have read something like that on this very blog many, many times before but it's good to know that we're not alone. 

Following on from the previous post, noting the BBC's online downplaying of the findings of anti-Semitism by Ofsted, guess how Anita Anand - the "frightful woman" in question - introduced the subject today? 

Yes, by also completely cutting out the anti-Semitic element. Oh, and by removing the Muslim element too:

Good afternoon. Welcome to Any Answers? Ofsted has discovered unregistered schools in Birmingham which are peddling what they are calling "misogynistic and homophobic" education.

No, Anita, Ofsted are actually, unequivocally, calling it "misogynistic, homophobic and anti-Semitic" education. Why on earth is Anita Anand also missing the 'anti-Semitic' part out? 

She continued, still avoiding the 'Muslim' question: 

So, is the home school system itself too open to abuse? Do your children maybe go to an unregistered school?

Ah yes, the familiar charge against 'home school' teaching - never a favourite with pro-state education types!

And Anita's next question, generalising away from the 'Muslim' question?:

Should we say 'no' to all types of segregated learning? What about faith schools? Are they OK? I mean, they are religiously exclusive too. I'd love your thoughts on that. 

Her first caller, however - Neil Winton - came straight back at her, albeit politely not putting her in the frame:

The first question gave me a bit of a problem because it was explained as a story about corrupt education in schools and it didn't mention the crucial element of the newspaper story that it came from - that this was a Muslim education institute. Your chairman should have explained this so that it wasn't completely mystifying to your audience and your four fearless opinion formers should have mentioned it too, but they all skirted around the issue and didn't mention the fact that these were... these schools being criticised were Muslim schools. 

"Hmm", said Anita in an unambiguously sceptical way.

That seems to me [continued Neil] to be rather a shirking of responsibility on the chairman's part, apart from the participants too. 

Anita then leaped in:  

Well, I think...I think the thing that was important from the Ofsted point of view was not that they were Muslim schools but that they were unregistered schools. They didn't investigate them on the premise that they were teaching Islamic teachings. They were investigating them because they had unregistered and...not approved or DPA-cleared teachers who were teaching pupils, that some of them were dirty. That was...that was the reason that they were investigated and that was the reason that they were talking about there.

Neil leaped back at her:

No, there were three points. The points were that they were being taught homophobia and, erm, anti-...er...Jewish...er...

"Anti-Semetic?" offered Anita, interrupting [and pronouncing it exactly as I transcribed it - ie. as 'anti-Semetic' rather than 'anti-Semitic'] - thus obviously revealing that she knew about that aspect of the Ofsted report all along (so why not mention it earlier?)

...anti-Semitic, yeah. So that gives the clue I think as to what we're talking about here [continued Neil] that your chairman...

Anita began interrupting again, saying "But what exactly...yeah", but Neil ploughed on: 

...and your panellists wouldn't talk about there.

As per James Delingpole, the hectoring presenter of Any Answers? [as her tone really did sound pretty 'hectoring' here] then disapprovingly huffed (as if that wasn't a good enough reason by itself to ring Any Answer?):

Well, apart from berating them what was the point you wanted to make?

Neil, having made the main point he wanted to make, he could make no other immediate answer than: 

Well, apart from that, well, there was no point in having answers to a question where the main point isn't mentioned...

...which, obviously, brought Ms Anand panicking right back in, "All right, well, let me...let...", but Neil's attempts to continue and give that other "point"..:

...But the second is...but the second is....

...were halted by Anita's "All right, well, let me...let me put a question to you if you don't have a point. I will put a question to you", but Neil was up to the challenge and charged on:

I do. The second item was on Donald Trump and how outrageous he is about his references to Muslim immigration. Your participants have fallen into the very trap that makes Donald Trump so appealing to some people. They didn't mention it themselves, so they censored themselves on the previous question and then they had the audacity to criticise Donald Trump for actually mentioning what some people think is the truth.

All credit though to Anita here for not instantly indulging in her usual behaviour and responding, "OK, that's interesting. So you would actually say that Trump dares to tread where others don't?"

"Erm", began Neil.

"And you applaud him for that?", continued Anita, not allowing him an immediate response but seemingly thinking aloud and saying, "I mean I want to know where you're coming from as far as...I mean, if we're coming onto the Trump point of view..."

Neil continued:

Well, we come onto the issue of freedom of speech and will the BBC censor that? And...

Guess what happened there? Go on, go on, go on, go on! Have a guess!

Answer: Anita crashed back in. Here's the exchange:

Anita: I'm not censoring...

Neil: [hard to decipher the first bit as Anita was talking over him...]...all the time.

Anita:....Look...

Neil: ...but you're not doing it now. No.

Anita: Neil, there's not much point talking about censorship when I'm asking you direct questions and allowing you time to speak. Tell me whether you think Donald Trump is speaking for you and whether there should be more of that kind of sentiment that's expressed.

Neil: Well, he's not speaking for me but he does attempt to tell the truth as he sees it. and...

Anita: Well, everybody tries to do that Neil, but is that something that...

Neil: Yes they do but when your audience want to ban him...and...

Anita: OK.

Neil: ...some people don't but we don't want to ban him. We want to hear what he's got to say and disagree if we do...

Anita: OK.

Neil: ...and...

Anita: OK, and a direct question to you Neil: Do you disagree with what Donald Trump has been saying?

Neil: Yes, I do disagree, yes. 

Anita: OK. OK. Thank you very much.

As soon as Neil had gone, Anita did what she so often does. She read out the phone number for Any Answers? and continued the argument with the previous caller - with the added benefit (for her) of him having gone and no longer being able to answer back!

She started, chewing on the same bone, by saying "No censorship here. You're all welcome to call", and then introduced her next caller by going straight back to Square One - ignoring the chief inspector's concerns about anti-Semitism and focusing on her original point: 

Good afternoon. Now you also wanted to speak about this Ofsted inspection. So let me make it very clear: Ofsted. They made a report on unregistered schools. That's what they were talking about. And their main worry, according to the chief inspector, was misogynistic, homophobic education being taught, teachers who were not registered and not cleared in any sense of the word. And also lack of hygiene in one particular school was fairly disgusting in their...Chris, what did you want to say about this?

Quite what Chris said, or anyone else said, in response to that I really can't say and I'd had enough of Anita again by this time....and, amazingly, we were still only five minutes into the programme. 

James Delingpole's Speccie piece was meant to be light-hearted festive fun, but his point Number 9 is both spot on and bears repeating in the light of what's gone before:

9. That frightful woman who does BBC Radio 4’s Any Answers. She’s just awful: so hectoring and disapproving and opinionated in an all-too-predictable BBC direction. Any Answers is supposed to be where Real Britain responds to all the drivel they’ve been infuriated by on Any Questions. Not a place for them to get sneered at yet again.

I suspect Neil Winton would second (or third) that!

Watertight oversight

A bit of advice I took on board from a certain 'below the line' commenter at B-BBC was to be highly wary about claiming that the BBC website hasn't reported something which we think they should have reported.

Bloggers don't want to end up with egg on their faces after all.

After all, the BBC could, perhaps, choose to publish any such 'unhelpful' stories somewhere relatively obscure - say, in their Entertainment & Arts section - or somewhere even more obscure still! - say, in some 'local news' part of their website ("buried it in Wiltshire", as we used to say).

That said (as you may have noticed) I don't always avoid such posts.

Why? Because 'bias by omission' is widely considered an integral part of media bias and thus, if shown, can provide valuable evidence of BBC bias.

On those occasions when I do post something claiming that the BBC website hasn't reported something (especially when most other media organisations have reported it), I check and check and check (and check again) before posting it.

James Delingpole, over at Breitbart, may, however, just have fallen into just this very trap through not checking the BBC website at least twenty times or more before posting.

He posted something today mocking the BBC website for failing to report Ofcom's surprisingly sharp criticisms of the BBC over its environmental coverage (a report published on 17th August). 

Ofcom found that the BBC was guilty, across quite a range of programmes, of seriously breaching Ofcom's impartiality rules.

Indeed, as the Independent reported on 17th August, the BBC was found "repeatedly" to be in breach of Ofcom's code on "propaganda content". 

Dynamite stuff from Ofcom - i.e. BBC bias 'officially' proven! (so please read what Ofcom said about the BBC, if you have time).

James notes, however, that the BBC website's initial response (on 17th August) to the Ofcom report (which covered a whole range of subjects and broadcasters) was....

....wait for it!....

....to single out that Ofcom report's criticism of ITV...yes, ITV...over a dog-related Britain's Got Talent feature, and then post a BBC News article about just that (ITV-incriminating) story!

And he's quite right about that.

Ah but, James...

...the BBC News website did post an article about Ofcom's verdict against itself. When? One day after both that doggy piece and that Independent article outlining Ofcom's findings against the BBC - i.e. on 18th August. 

It's not a BBC report that I myself noticed either yesterday (i.e. on 18th August) I have to say (despite registering this story on Monday). I merely found it through checking on Google News on the off-chance (using 'Ofcom BBC' as my search term), having read James's piece and needing to check it out for myself before posting anything...

...but, yep, there it was, that 'missing' BBC article, apparently merely posted on the BBC website's Entertainment & Arts section under the (non-self-incriminating) headline News channels broke sponsorship rules, Ofcom says.

If you click on that Entertainment & Arts section now you won't see it though (19th August). It's already vanished into either a (Richard) black hole or Davy Harrabin's Locker.

So, I'm not surprised that James Delingpole didn't spot it flashing by like a neutrino in an underground observatory.

Why would he? Why would anyone?

Still, if James - or anyone else - now puts in a complaint about the BBC for ignoring this damaging, BBC bias-related story, the BBC will be able to say, "Aha! But we did report it. You just didn't see it!" 

The 'oversight' (on the BBC's part) could not be more 'watertight'.

Ignorance or design?

If I worked at the BBC (winking emoji) I might be one of the views-my-own Tweeters who whiles away their spare time opining on antisocial media. I might take on matters about which I know dangerously little, and I might promote causes by reTweeting political messages. (innocent face) 

I’m not though. I don’t have a Twitter account and I access Facebook vicariously. That means through someone else’s Facebook account, like I’m a spy. A peeping Tom, if you will. Something about Facebook makes me uncomfortable. The most prolific posters are so confident that everyone else has the same political outlook as theirs that they link to creepy stuff with total bravado. I don’t want to see it, so that’s why I’m out. Logged off.

It’s already like that on Channel 4, and now it’s getting more and more like that on the BBC. You often have to switch off just because you don’t want to see people with agonisingly wrong-headed opinions, opining.

Further to Craig’s post about last week’s ridiculous edition of Sunday Morning Live, there was a lively thread on Harry’s Place about Dilly Hussain’s longing for the Ottoman Empire and loathing for the UK. 

Do read it. The particular aspect I wish to pursue is to ask why the BBC persists in inviting misfits and, well, fruitcakes - virtually into our homes? More specifically why do they bring them on to their Sunday Morning religious-ish slot. 

The producers might be hoping liven up a boring topic, and think they’re hiring people with outrageous views. They seem unable to tell the difference between the mavericks and iconoclasts they might wish to recruit and the fools and knaves they end up with.

Listening respectfully to the opinions of Hussain and the unprepossessing Peter Owen-Jones reduces the level of discussion to absurdity.

They engage similar spokespersons for some of their dumbed-down political-themed jamborees  on other days of the week as well, like the youth forums they put out on BBC3.

Somehow Dilly Hussain, Asghar Bukhari and Mo Ansar managed reach positions of  authority; head of this, spokesman for that and leader of the other. They seem quite like impostors who pretend to be doctors and get away with working for the NHS for years before being found out; they don’t even have any medical knowledge whatsoever, they just wing it.

The truth is, many of these telly imams and celebrity religious experts don’t know much about anything, let alone the religion they’re supposed to represent.

And it’s exasperating that they get treated with so much respect and are given so much  credibility till someone exposes them.

On Harry’s Place Mark commented:

  “I've no idea if it was through ignorance or design that the BBC invited him on. His smugness was tangible, but he got even smugger when "clergyman" Peter Owen-Jones trashed all British History in a kind of ashamed, head-bowed manner.In fact, what Peter Owen-Jones did was to feed the talk of radicalisation on a kind of Asghar Bukhari level.While I wouldn't go around saying that the British Empire was completely built on countries asking us in for a cup of tea and then agreeing to everything, there's otherwise much through history to actually be proud of.Dilly Hussain is one of those who hate this country, and certain people in the media, nod sagely and say, "I think you have a point." Who else gets that sort of treatment?

Lamia replied:

On previous form, it is absolutely deliberate, Mark.The BBC ought to be ashamed to keep inviting Hussain on as a commentator. He's a crypto-ISIS fan who has a habit of abusing people - especially women, and extra especially female Muslims - who disagree with him. To put him into perspective: when even the odious Haitham al Hadad and other Islamists went through the formality (sincere or otherwise) of 'urging' ISIS not to murder hostages, Hussain angrily refused. He's pretty much on the level of Anjem Choudary, and in a sense is a worse influence because while the mainstream media views Choudary (rather inadequately), as a nasty clown, it seems to think Hussain's a completely different species of Islamist.

James Delingpole was on the programme too. "The BBC's new pet Islamist::

Now I’m all for the BBC canvassing as wide a range of viewpoints as it possibly can on programmes like this (yes, even evil climate change deniers!) but it does worry me — as a licence fee payer, a keen upholder of the nation’s moral standards, and a tireless campaigner against prejudice in all its forms — that the BBC may inadvertently be guilty of racism by having invited Dilly onto the show. No worse, of full on Islamophobia.
Certainly if I were a typical, law-abiding, well-integrated British member of the religion of peace, I think I might find myself being mildly troubled that this Dilly fellow had been invited on by the BBC to represent my faith. “An incredibly thick and ill-informed extremist,” I’d be thinking. “That’s just what we British Muslims need to improve our tarnished image.”