Lazy, dishonest and biased.

I’m very sorry but I hardly watch the BBC these days. It’s not really a question of aligning with the ‘defund’ or ‘defend’ side of the argument or whether I think the BBC should be ‘reformed’ or ‘removed’. It’s partly because of the increasingly desperate pandering to a demographic…. 

“Generation Z, or Gen Z for short, are the demographic cohort succeeding Millennials and preceding Generation Alpha” 

 …..that has moved on and doesn’t watch TV! And now, neither do I. (Well, I do, but rarely the BBC) The bias looks more and more entrenched. Who is in charge of this ‘unconscious bias’ training they’re talking about? 17 minutes to 9 (2:44) If the bias is unconscious, then how can the trainers know whether they too are suffering from it? It’s those wretched unknown unknowns again.

This @Guardian article is based on a @BBCArabic hatchet job. The program fails to note that the neighborhood only became 'Palestinian' after Jewish residents were driven out in the 1930s, or that the Sumarin family was evicted because it stopped paying rent.#InconvenientDetails pic.twitter.com/dCpBHlHcFE

— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) September 22, 2020

I didn’t want to watch Panorama last night - I haven’t watched it for years, the exception being the controversial John Ware episode that shed light on the Labour Party’s malevolent racism. However, the programme was on when I walked into the room just in time to see Richard Bilton cycling, W1A style, through deserted city streets. (why?) 

Well, it seems that he had unearthed some dirty dealing, which could be summed up as:

BREAKING NEWS: A man living in Israel donates large amount of money to an Israeli organisation based in the capital of Israel.

Surely worth a Pulitzer no? https://t.co/NHZg4lDNhI

— SussexFriendsofIsrael (@SussexFriends) September 21, 2020

And the reason I’m even bothering to mention this is simply to point out that Bilton’s emotionally loaded language epitomises bias, be it conscious or unconscious, but not only the conscious/unconscious/subliminal repetitious utterance of trigger words like ‘settlers’ and the BBC/ Guardian’s casual scattering of “illegal under international law” and “Palestinian land” etc etc, this emotive background nagging demonstrates how effortlessly ‘unconscious’ or bog-standard ‘conscious bias’ is slipped in, enabling Richard Bilton and his unconscious mates to virtue-signal rather than apply the rigour of genuine curiosity and self-examination to his research.  (Research? What research?)

Meanwhile, in the Med...

Last night's BBC News at Ten returned to the migrant crisis. 

It featured Richard Bilton reporting from the Italian aircraft carrier Cavour on the EU's latest response to the growing tide of migrants crossing the Mediterranean from Libya and featured a short interview with Federica Mogherini, the EU's foreign policy chief.

The report described how the EU is getting so accomplished at detecting and intercepting migrant vessels that the journey across the sea has become a lot safer. Rescue is now virtually guaranteed and interceptions are now happening much quicker. Perhaps not coincidentally, there's been a 60% rise in the number making the crossing in the last six months.

Richard Bilton quite properly raised the fear that the EU's "military might" is making it too easy and that, knowing it has become much safer to attempt a crossing, more and more people will try and make the journey. He even put that to Federica Mogherini, who merely replied that life is becoming harder for the people smugglers.

His report did, however, continue some typical BBC reporting:

This is one of the 26 rescues since Monday - young children in a flimsy dinghy, the desparate who set off hoping help will come. 

The dinghy certainly looked flimsy, but there didn't look to be many young children. It was nearly all adult males - as you can see from these screengrabs (click to enlarge):