Nanu nanu

Like any other self-respecting blogger, I only (quite rightly) give credence to reports and opinion polls that back up my own beliefs, so I'm pleased to say that YouGov has it right over Robin Williams:

89% of British people say Robin Williams made them laugh

Nine in ten British people say Robin Williams made them laugh...

He certainly made me laugh in Mork and Mindy. (Not so much in The Fisher King though). 

I was a mere boy when he first called Orson and said 'Nanu nanu' to Mindy's motorcycling granny, but I remember enjoying his performance at the time, and then enjoying re-watching him in my teens (though, as a teenage boy, I think part of the appeal of watching Mork and Mindy might possibly have been 'Mindy'.)

Reinforcing my own Morkish tendencies, I was driven by reading comments 'at another place' about there being too much Robin Williams coverage yesterday to do a classic 'Is' study into exactly how much time Radio 4's main news programmes gave to the death of this much-loved star. (There were complaints that the BBC was going OTT about him at the expense of what the complainants considered much more important stories like the genocidal goings-on in Iraq).

So for geeks and Orkans everywhere, here's a run down of yesterday's Radio 4 coverage. What did they cover? (Beam me up, Mindy!)

TODAY

6.00 News & weather

6.07 Morning papers

6.10 Death of Robin Williams: Clips

6.13 Iraq: Interview with the BBC's Aleem Maqbool

6.16 Business News

6.30 News summary

6.32 Death of Robin Williams: Interview with the BBC's Alastair Leithead

6.36 Iraq: Interview with the BBC's "Ramir Ruhyim" in Erbil

6.40 New rules to promote British values in the wake of the Trojan Horse affair: Interview with the BBC's Alex Forsyth

6.42 Morning papers

6.45 Guns on campuses in the U.S.: Report from the BBC's Rajini Vaidyanathan

6.50 Why women seem less supportive of Scottish independence: Interview with Rachel Ormston, ScotCen Social Research

6.54 A copyright case involving street artist Stik: Interview with Stik & Gilane Tawadros, Design and Artists Copyright Society

6.58 Weather

7.00 News

7.09 Death of Robin Williams: Interview with David Hasselhoff (The Hoff)

7.13 Iraq: Interview with Kieran Dwyer, OCHA

7.19 Business News

7.22 Grouse shooting & hen-harriers: Interview with hen-harrier enthusiast Chris Packham & Amanda Anderson, Moorland Association

7.27 Sports News

7.31 News summary

7.33 New rules to promote British values in the wake of the Trojan Horse affair: Interview with Colin Hart, Christian Institute & Ghaffar Hussain, Quilliam Foundation

7.40 Death of Robin Williams: Clip from Jonathan Ross interview with Robin Williams

7.41 Morning papers

7.43 Henry Thoreau and the idea of solitude: Interview with Michael Sims, author of 'The Adventures of Henry Thoreau'

7.47 Thought for the Day: Rev Lucy Winkett 

7.50 Prisoners' right to vote in the UK: Interview with the BBC's Danny Shaw

7.53 Prisoners' right to vote in the UK: Interview with Tony Kelly, acting on behalf of the prisoners

7.58 Weather

8.00 News

8.10 Iraq: Interview with an relief crew member in Iraq

8.16 Iraq: Interview with Marie Harf, U.S. State Department

8.22 Death of Robin Williams: Interview with Alexei Sayle

8.29 Sports News

8.33 News summary

8.35 Why women seem less supportive of Scottish independence: Natalie McGarry, blogger Tessa Hartmann of Hartmann Media

8.41 200th anniversary of the birth of Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone. Interview with Astrid Herman, Brussels' Musical Instruments Museum & Soweto Kinch, saxophonist

8.46 World Humanitarian Day (aid workers who die in the line of duty): Report from Mike Wooldridge, BBC

8.51 Iraq: Interview with Dr Saeed Shihabi, friend of Haider al-Abadi (named as Iraq's new prime minister)

8.55 Death of Robin Williams: Interview with Peter Bradshaw, 'Guardian' & Jamie Graham, 'Total Film'

9.00

WORLD AT ONE

1.00 News

1.07 Iraq: Interview with the BBC's Caroline Wyatt, BBC World Affairs Correspondent

1.10 Iraq: Interview with Matthew Barber, University of Chicago

1.14 Iraq: Short interview with former Air Commodore Dai Whittingham

1.15 Iraq: Short interview with Dylan Winder,  ‎head of Humanitarian Response at the Department for International Development

1.17 Iraq: Interview with the BBC's Jonathan Beale, Defence Correspondent

1.19 Iraq: Interview with Sir Ming Campbell, Lib Dem

1.23 Death of Robin Williams

1.25 Death of Robin Williams: Interview with Giles Matthey, actor

1.29 Death of Robin Williams: Clip from an interview with Robin Williams

1.30 Death of Robin Williams - comedians and depression: Gordon Claridge, Emeritus Professor of Abnormal Psychology, Oxford.

1.32 Police chief constable served with a criminal/gross misconduct notice: Interview with the BBC's Danny Shaw

1.35 Use of untested drugs on Ebola virus sufferers - Interview with the BBC's Jane Draper

1.37 Politicians and soundbite pledges (universal free school lunches): Report from/interview with the BBC's Jon Manel

1.44

PM

5.00 News

5.05 Ebola virus: Interview with the BBC's Tom Burridge

5.10 Use of untested drugs on Ebola virus sufferers: Interview with Charlie Chan, breast cancer specialist

5.14 Iraq: Interview with the BBC's Jonathan Beale

5.17 Iraq: Interview with Afzal Ashraf, RUSI

5.21 Advert

5.22 Scottish independence and the arts: Report from Vincent Dowd, BBC arts correspondent

5.26 Panda news - the panda is pregnant: Interview with someone from Edinburgh Zoo

5.30 News summary

5.32 Death of Robin Williams

5.37 Death of Robin Williams - Creativity and mental illness: Nancy Andreasson, neuropsychiatrist, University of Iowa

5.43 Protests in New York - Report from Matt Wells, BBC, on protests against curbs on pushy performers in Times Square

5.48 Advert

5.49 Amazon.com - heroes or villains? Interview with Milo Yiannopoulos, author, 'The Sociopaths of Silicon Valley' & Andrew Warren-Payne, Senior Research Analyst at Econsultancy

5.57 Weather

5.59 Sounds for a listener - sounds from rural Warwickshire (rain and thunder)

6.00

WORLD TONIGHT

10.00 News

10.08 Iraq: Report from the BBC's Paul Wood

10.11 Iraq: Interview with Col. Cedric Leighton, former member of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff

10.16 Iraq: Interview with Vali Nasr, former U.S. State Department official

10.20 The Neapolitan Mafia: Report from the BBC's Alan Johnson

10.26 The economics of pregnant pandas: Geoff Wallace, Professor of Applied Economics, University of Memphis

10.29 Tension in eastern Ukraine: Interview with Ewan Watson, Red Cross

10.33 Tension in eastern Ukraine: Interview with Mark Almond, Oxford University

10.37 Japanese population decline & "womenomics": Report from the BBC's Mark Whittaker

10.43 Death of Robin Williams: Short interview with Terry Gilliam

10.45

Well, Robin Williams' suicide certainly got a good deal of coverage, but then so did Iraq. The balance doesn't seem a problem to me. 

Interestingly, besides the tributes, Radio 4 went for the mental health angle on the Robin Williams story - as befits a channel that sees itself as an adult channel. Eddie Mair's  PM interview with Prof Andreasson was genuinely thought-provoking. I kept thinking about it throughout last night - one of my lesser thoughts being about how difficult it must be to talk neuroscience and celebrity suicide in the course of one interview.

Other thoughts struck me too - such as how eager I am these days to flee into escapism (probably escaping all the cognitive dissonance). Panda stories? Yes please. The story about the anniversary of the birth of the inventor of the saxophone, Adolphe Sax? Yes please (despite the fact that his actual anniversary doesn't fall until November). Henry Thoreau? An escape into solitude and nature? Yes please. (Oh my goodness, yes, yes, yes!)

BBC Bias? Ah yes, almost forgot about that! (Easily done on blogs like this.)

Getting fancy-footed commie comic Alexei Sayle and some Graun journalist to talk about Robin Williams may reveal something about the Today mindset. (Possibly.)

And what about dismissing the deeply worrying Trojan Horse affair (a proven Islamic plot) by bringing on some 'hardline Christians' opposed to the government's promotion of British values?

Well, yes - though giving 'hardline Christians' like the likable Colin Hart a place on 'Today' raises all sort of other dissonances, cognitively-speaking, and then putting him up against a 'pro-government, pro-British values' figure like the likable Ghaffar Hussain from the Quilliam Foundation sends those very dissonances into regions full of cognitive whirlpools, the waves of dissonance apparently which cancel each other out and leave me grabbing onto any available flotsam in their wake.

What then about promoting the anti-grouse hunting campaign of environmentalists like Chris Packham at the expense of the Moorland Association (supporters of grouse-hunting)? 

Well, yes, on 'The Glorious Twelth', giving prime airtime publicity to a 'greenie' campaign against 'landed' types certainly does smack of lefty bias, but the actual debate (on Today) between the passionate Chris Packham (who I've both met and like) and Amanda Anderson of the Moorland Association was (again) genuinely thought-provoking with both Chris and Amanda making good points and Mishal Husain giving Chris Packham the harder time. 

Chris, unlike some environmentalists (who are 'red' inside and 'green' outside, like watermelons), is genuinely interested in the plight of hen harriers. Unquestionably so. He loves sparrowhawks too. I, on the other hand, love sparrows, so I'm somewhat less keen on his favorites - though I too have gaped in admiration at them whilst they perch on the fence on the house next door, attempting (simultaneously) to stare them out and to steer them away from my chirpy little protegees. 

Sticking with yesterday's Today, Alan at BBC was sharply critical of John Humphrys for pursuing the angle that the 2003 US/UK-led invatsion of Iraq is responsible for the rise of 'IS' (not us, me and Sue, but the genocidal Muslim maniacs formerly known as Isis), and I can see Alan's point. Admirer though I am of him in many ways, John Humphrys has never really tried very hard to hide his disapproval of the Iraq War. (He could, of course, be right though. With hindsight). It's his especial bias, and these kinds of interview tend to bring that bias out.

What though of Mishal Husain's encounter with the lawyer defending the prisoners' demanding voting rights? Well, only one side of the argument was interviewed but Mishal was full of interruptive fire whilst interviewing him and countered him (to my mind) pretty well. (I'm not on his side).

Lucy Winkett's Thought for the Day told us that being nice to people who change gender is nice and that Jesus would think we're nice too if we had nice thoughts about other people, including people who change gender. Amen sister.

Women, women, women. Woman's Hour. Women. Today tackled 'gender' in relation to the Scottish independence debate (women ain't so keen on Big Eck's arguments in favour of Scotland's unique brawness as men, it seems ) and The World Tonight tackled 'womenonomics' in Japan. Women, women, women. 

Was The World at One showing anti-government bias in spending a fair while on Jon Manel's investigation into how the Lib Dems' 'universal free school meals' pledge, now being put into law, is causing chaos in some schools? Hmm, it's anti-government, boo!, but it's more anti-Lib Dem so, as a rightie, let's say "hurray!" Actually, let's say it was (I believe) simple reporting of a problem and that Jon Manel is one of the more unpredictable BBC reporters (i.e he's annoyed me on many an occasion and pleasantly surprised me on others). 

The ethics of testing un-trial-tested drugs on people (if they so choose) is one that always needs debating. The Ebola virus is bringing the issue back to the fore again. The Radio 4 discussions about it were involving and I'm still rather conflicted about the answer. Non-compulsion remains my touchstone.

PM 'went after' wicked capitalist success story Amazon but it gave that fine free-marketeer Milo Yiannopoulos a good go against an 'econsultant'.

Did you listen to these four programmes yesterday? What did you make of them? Were you seething about their bias? Or not?

For myself, I tried this as another 'Is the BBC biased?' experiment. What did I really find?

Well, some story choices that seems to reflect a left-wing way of thinking, but evidence of attempts to balance it with alternative views as well.

You, of course, have a few days of 'listen again' time to assess these four programmes for yourselves and to give an honest appraisal of them (as I've tried to do). What gets your goat? What delights your sheep? Please feel free to share (in more than 140 characters).

Catching up, falling behind

As you may have noticed, this hasn't been a particularly busy week of blogging here at Is the BBC biased?. It's not that there's been nothing to write about, rather the reverse: There's been far too much to write about. 

For starters, there's the news from Iraq, where a small band of medieval-minded Muslim fanatics have attempted to seize control of the Iraqi Midlands, and there's the news from England, where a small band of medieval-minded Muslim fanatics have attempted to seize control of the country's second city. 

On the Iraq story, I'm not going to be disingenuous here. I think the range and quality of the BBC's coverage has been impressive. So many interesting experts have been invited into the BBC's studios this week that I actually feel properly informed for once  - though, of course, I'm not expert enough to tell whether they really are right  or merely if they sounded right). 

Also, having listened to and watched a lot of BBC coverage this week, I know what I've heard and I really have heard a dazzling variety of voices - defenders and critics of the al-Maliki government, defenders and critics of President Obama, defenders and critics of George W. Bush, defenders and critics of Tony Blair, pro-and-anti-Saudi voices, pro-and-anti-Iranian voices, etc. 

As for 'angles', well, yes, some programmes have 'pushed' one particular angle at me (such as this morning's Broadcasting House which concentrated its criticism on President Bush and Mr al-Maliki), but those have been balanced by other programmes which either (a) 'pushed' a contrasting angle at me (such as today's The World This Weekend where President Obama's policy came under fire) or (b) 'pushed' a variety of contrasting angles at me (as on last week's editions of Newsnight, where various experts, two U.S. Republicans, two U.S. Democrats, a former UK ambassador to Iraq, a former head of the U.N., a Conservative MP, a Blair advisor, an ex-Labour left-winger, an Iraqi government supporter, an Iraqi government critic (and former PM), and an FT journalist were all brought in to give their widely differing views). 

In all honesty, I really cannot fault it. Can you? (Please say if you disagree).

On the 'Trojan Horse' story though, I believe that Monday's BBC News at Six coverage was deeply biased (especially Reeta Chakrabarti's report) - and argued so in an earlier post.

Then, blow me down with a feather, on the following night's News at Six the BBC didn't just not bury the story, no, they actually took it forward, reporting that the claims of an Islamic plot (confirmed by Ofsted), were supported by evidence that something similar has been happening in schools in Bradford. [Alan at Biased BBC spotted this too, joking that it showed that the BBC "has started its own Islamophobic witch hunt".] 

Newsnight's coverage was, I believe, rather too mired in BBC (PC?) caution on the one hand [with Chris Cook's reports continuing to resolutely downplay the story] and sensationalism on the other [with Emily Maitlis getting carried away with the programme's 'scoop' in getting Sir Michael Wilshaw of Ofsted to criticise Michael Gove then refusing to be straightforward when reporting Sir Michael's retraction of those criticisms - despite her BBC colleague, Jon Manel, unearthing for The World at One what seemed to me conclusive prove that Michael rather than Sir Michael was remembering events correctly] - both trajectories tending toward taking the story away from its main focus and onto 'Westminster Bubble' matters instead. 

As we've written here before, the BBC's 'Trojan Horse' coverage has been a real curate's egg. They've done some decent investigations of their own on this, and they've done some serious downplaying and deflection too. You might take that as a sign of their impartiality, or  that they are beginning to see the light. I suspect it's also a sign of their utter confusion. 

Most unusually for me, I even watched part of this morning's The Big Questions, which asked "Should the British stop tolerating intolerance?" 

The guest list was largely familiar, predictable even, but it can't be faulted for variety. It included Ajmal Mansoor, Adnan Rashid and Myriam Francois-Cerrah [see-no-evil-hear-no-evil Muslims], Maajid Nawaz [a see-some-evil-hear-see-evil Muslim], Kevin Friery [an atheist], Peter Hitchens [a right-wing contrarian who takes an indulgent line on Islamic extremism], Douglas Murray [a right-wing contrarian who doesn't take an indulgent line on Islamic extremism], Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner [a liberal Jew] and Daniel Hannan [a liberty-loving Tory MEP], among others. 

I also watched The Andrew Marr Show all the way though. A Middle East expert critical of Tony Blair and the editor of The Sun reviewed the papers. [I was shocked to learn that I didn't know who the editor of The Sun is. Victoria Newton was a new name to me]. Then came John Reid (Blairite ex-minister), actress Kathleen Turner, Tony Blair (Blairite ex-prime minister) and Sajid Javid (Conservative). 

The world of Twitter exploded in rage at the mere presence of Tony Blair. Some also moaned about the BBC inviting a Murdoch Empire editor on. Accusations of bias inevitably poured in: Andrew Marr was too soft on Tony Blair. Andrew Marr was too soft on John Reid. Andrew Marr was too soft on Sajid Javid. Well, frankly, the Andrew Marr of today is not the Andrew Marr of five years ago. He's a kinder and gentler interviewer these days. He's soft on everyone...

....which at least gives us a chance to hear the views being expressed. I much prefer this way of interviewing, generally-speaking - unless the interviewee is being blatantly evasive [or if I really dislike the interviewee!]. It's much preferable to the relentless attack-attack-attack style of interviewing that too often topples over into being too unthinking and inflexible. [Mishal Husain's interviews on Today this past week have occasionally fallen into that trap].

What's next? Well there's also been Desert Island Discs with "Palestinian author and human rights activist" Raja Shehadeh and Kirsty Young making sympathetic noises as he told his passive-aggressive, embittered account of his personal experiences [h/t Sue] followed by Edward Stourton on The World This Weekend being oh-so-impartial in giving half of his report to the Israelis and half to the Palestinians but giving the 'woes' of the Palestinians a noticeably more sympathetic hearing, and the final word. If I may quote my friend Sue here:

So, even as the Trojan Horse rumbles on and the Islamist uprising rapidly spreads throughout the entire planet, the reality of the Palestinians' rejectionist attitude to peace with Israel remains a mystery to the pundits at the BBC.  

In other news tonight, the Islamists of ISIS in Iraq have posted photos of what they say are huge numbers of massacred soldiers, the Islamists of Hamas are in the frame for kidnapping three teenage boys, at least nine people have been killed in an Islamist suicide bombing in Baghdad, Islamist suicide bombers have attacked checkpoints in Benghazi in Libya, the Islamist regime in Sudan has been accused by America of bombing schools and hospitals in two of its states, Islamists have attacked a coastal town in Kenya, Somali Islamists have rounded up 100 women and ordered them to comply with Islamic dress code or risk being whipped, a Christian teacher in Egypt has been jailed for six months for insulting Islam, al-Qaeda has released a video calling for jihad against India, etc, etc.

Well, that's me caught up then. Good night.