BBC NEEDS NEW BLOOD
The UK or even the world needs the BBC to be a respected and reliable source of news and the truth, not clouded by the prejudices of its executives. The recent catalogue of carelessness for balanced reporting and bias has tarnished but not yet destroyed its reputation globally and so now represents its opportunity for redemption or bust. Its Governors need to step up and its executives need to embrace the values for which the BBC purports to stand and rid itself of the poison of Group Think. That may mean recasting its management and broadcasters to be representative of a variety of opinion, even executives who may like Reform, so that there is challenge and real debate to moderate and avoid its alleged institutional bias.
The Director General, Tim Davie, and head of news at the BBC, Deborah Turness, have resigned, but notably their comments on departure fail to recognise the level of failure to uphold objective news standards. The deliberate doctoring of Trump’s speech during the Capitol Hill rioting allegedly broke the journalistic camel’s back of integrity. But the blatant Pro Palestinian reporting by BBC Arabica of the Gaza war, showing real antisemitism, is a bigger disgrace and far more damaging to social fabric as it added fuel to the flames of anti-Jewish prejudice. It apologised for having the son of a senior Hamas official lead a documentary. But separately BBC Arabica executives gave air time on BBC to a Jew hater who hailed the correctness of Hitler. Doing that once could be an error, but several times is just a decision to denigrate Jews and promote hatred of Israel and the Jewish diaspora.
Its bias over climate change is being questioned. Its LGBT obsessed editing, apparently by a group of LGBT+ employees, requiring a newsreader to describe pregnant women as pregnant people and the reprimand of her disapproval illustrates the willingness to favour minority groups. The same obsession has suppressed the broadcasting of the views of pro-women organisations, it is reported. This is on top of the recent incompetence in its dealings with big dog presenters like Gary Lineker.
Tim Davie seems understandably passionate about the BBC and defends it mightily, and there is so much in the BBC which is good, arguably still best in class. But perhaps his words betray the underlying inward self-satisfaction and bloated ego at least BBC News has developed:
“We are the very best of what I think we should be as a society… We will thrive… It’s our narrative… We own things.”
Humility and respect for others sounds in short supply. If people think they are the very best – that is the elite – at their job, morally, intellectually or in simple worth terms, hubris beckons. That would explain the reluctance to take criticism from third parties, who are regarded, it seems, as inferior, and the failure to question their own perfection. “We own things” may also illustrate a dismissal of those in society who may want change, especially given the BBC is funded by us all , not just the elite. Tim Davie’s view of society has some value but no more perhaps than the view of those who disagree.
Whether one labels the BBC behaviour as systemic or institutionalised bias is irrelevant: their Chairman denies the accusation as if he too is infected by Group Think. But it is clear that within the organisation there are numerous presumably senior people who are content to allow the bias towards particular groups depending on the topic. This has to be rooted out. Perhaps too the Chairman needs replacing so that an independent root and branch restructuring can occur. After all, the Chairman is in effect conflicted by his presiding over abject failure to be impartial and fair. He only apologises for the Trump speech errors, not even regarding the rest as problematic, for example because the BBC’s Arab team has been restructured. But it is time for the BBC to stop appointing people in the image of the incumbents, a lesson many organisations should perhaps heed.
All people of course have bias and prejudice. The challenge is to acknowledge and control them to achieve objectivity.
GOOD NEWS
All the recent BBC failures have been publicly revealed by the leaked report of Michael Prescott, an independent adviser to the BBC. His frustration with the refusal of BBC executives, including the Editorial Committee on Guidelines and Standards, to even acknowledge the Trump errors and other bias such as on Gaza and trans issues led to the Daily Telegraph reporting on his criticism. This is a credit to UK free speech and press reporting, even if the revelations are so long after the event of the errors it reveals.
The need for whistle blowers to be protected and the press to be free has never been more important. Is there a culture of Omerta, silence, within the BBC? Do enough free spirits exist who are free to challenge liberal attitudes and extremism? Does the BBC example illustrate the risk of the arrogance of those who style themselves as liberal progressives leading to the distortion of truth which endangers all freedoms? Many people who call themselves liberal seem to act in the opposite way of liberal ideals, suppressing or disrespecting opinions and aspirations of others. Should not liberals embrace diversity in all its forms even when contrary to their wishes?
BBC liberals seem to wish to promote their personal ideals and ignore or diminish others’, too dangerous when in charge of the guardian of truth that we wish the BBC to be. The more one reads of the progressive liberal world, as even some Labour people like to portray themselves, one wonders what is progressive. Government policies on employment and tax take us backwards. The Government has taken months to publish, and has now postponed, new guidelines on gender space following the final common sense legal decision that biological sex determines who are men and women for this purpose. Are the elite, which perhaps the BBC executives deem themselves to be, supposed to be able to tell the ignorant rest of us what is best? That seems to be what UK State wants to do? Are not liberal progressives supposed to encourage free spirits to flourish, people to be themselves and allow us all to say and do freely as we believe, provided we do not stop others doing the same?
The good news is that journalists can still reveal the truth even after institutional reluctance to face it. Our free press must be protected. The healthy approach of transparency and open discussion needs to begin once more to permeate our institutions like the BBC and NHS so that group think and terrible errors can be swiftly eradicated. The self-protection that seems to pervade the BBC is an anathema. The constructive idea that mistakes are admissible, and that they are to be learnt from, seems missing from their culture and so it has inevitably reached a point where its existence as the world’s leading news agency is threatened by its own hubris. Other institutions should take note.
WE NEED THE BBC
In a world of misinformation the UK has in the BBC an asset of credibility second to none, which has been badly undermined by those who wish to promote their own ideals not a wide-ranging discussion. BBC NEWS must be reframed to lead the world in reliability. Its own self- serving advertising about verification and “no spin” must prove itself in practice. Its Charter includes a dedication to truth, fact and accuracy and also an obligation to instruct and educate with real information. If only it could distinguish itself from the many other broadcasters and cease to turn news into drama, with speculation rife, rather sticking to fact.
Now is surely the time for a clean sweep with a broom of change, relaunching the BBC’s values, and new senior executives with diverse backgrounds from all political hues, ending the hiring of “people like us” which seems to have led to the inward culture of group think.
See also: THE BBC MUST BECOME A NATIONAL TREASURE – BBC COWED, CHAOTIC AND COMPROMISED – SEARCH FOR TRUTH – STEP FORWARD THE BBC – THE BBC’S BIG OPPORTUNITY – IF IT WILL LISTEN
