I imagine that even we hardened watchers of public affairs are getting a tad bored by the Murdoch/phone-hacking/police corruption affair, but an angle that is starting to gain some ground in the last few days or so is just how biased the BBC has been in its coverage. There is, of course, a website, Biased BBC, that tracks the failings of the BBC. As a state-licensed broadcaster in receipt of a licence fee collected on pain of imprisonment, the network has a status, and a presence in the media world, almost unlike any other. (I often have to explain to my American friends how the BBC is funded: they are frequently shocked when they find out).
Stephen Glover at the Daily Mail has a particularly good item on just how biased the BBC’s coverage of the Murdoch business has been. And here is a good item by Charlie Cooke at the National Review’s “Corner” blog.
When all is said and done, News International and its sister businesses do not send me a letter demanding that I pay for its services and products with a threat of fine or worse for non-payment. That fact needs to be pointed out more than it has been. The BBC needs to be broken up more urgently than any other media business.
At one time people referred to Prussia as “An army with a state attached to it.”
Nowadays one could refer to Britain as “A media organization with a state attached to it.”
Thisis amusing.
I’m fairly limited on what english language news I can get on sat here but in following the Murdoch story I’ve used Sky & France24English. Why not BBC World Service? Last night’s Hard Talk dealt with the subject. Greg Dyke – Labour party donor, Jaquie Smith – Labour Ex Home Sec & some guy from the Greater London Assembly I’d never heard of. That’s supposed to be a range of opinion for the overseas viewer?
On the particular subject of France24. Increasingly I find I’m turning to it. The sheer depth of its discussion programs is breathtaking. One particular example earlier this year put a Moslem head to head with a representative of, what by UK standards would have been the extreme right, for an hour. Watching the compère getting the two sides exploring where they were in agreement was an education. Compare that with the contempt openly displayed on the BBC to anyone not toeing the multiculti line.
Bloke: thanks for the tip. I get France24, but never bothered to watch.
My pleasure .
I’m afraid I now regard BBC World in the same way as Russia Today & that peculiar channel that seems to originate somewhere in China. Occasionally interesting but not to be trusted & classified along with the channels offering phone sex lines. ‘Unlikely to deliver what’s shown on the tin.’
For coverage of the Murdoch issue, strangely enough, I can’t say I can fault Sky. They’ve hardly tried to shelter their employers but have given a much better balance overall, in my opinion
Consider stopping paying the BBC tax. The money saved could go on better things, and the pleasure of receiving those angry BBC letters demanding money, knowing that they don’t stand a change in a court of law and that they’re wasting money sending them, is more than the pleasure most BBC output gives.
I just want Journalism. You know, where facts, and little else are reported. Foolish I know.
I will check out this France24 business, however.
“knowing that they don’t stand a change in a court of law”
Hmm.
If you have a television, or anything else that can receive television signals, then they do have a chance in a court of law. More than a chance, in fact, because that is the law.
BBC? Don’t overlook the world wide corrosive effects of their ideological siblings, ABC, CBC, SABC……..
I am thoroughly in favour of boycotting the TV licence, and it is some years since I paid for one.
However, if they get you to a court of law and you do own a TV and don’t have a licence, you will lose. If they have managed to identify who you are, and they have clear evidence that you have a TV, then you should pay up at once. On the other hand, if you just ignore the frequent threatening letters address to “The Legal Occupier” and decline to let anyone from TV licensing into your home on the very rare occasions when they knock on the door, nothing will happen.
I got an email posted to Instapundit on this the other day.
http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/124554/
This doesn’t scratch the surface of the application of anti-trust law to the BBC. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that breaking up the BBC is a necessary first step to privatizing it and moving it into the market. At the moment, people generally respond by talking about the genuine public services that the BBC performs, which involve a trivial proportion of its funding. Separate out the channels, different media, and each part becomes either much more difficult to defend, or much more acceptable to publicly fund (e.g. personally, I would be more than happy to pay a reasonable rate for the shipping forecast if it transpired that the private sector was unwilling to broadcast it.) Even if it did not result in an ending of the ideological abuses involved in government speech, a breaking up of the monopoly could only improve the output.