Clowns & Jokers

Stuck in the middle.... Left, right, centre. It's a mess out there.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Little Green Rugby Balls might be sticking to its guns over the BBC at the moment but the fact is the message is finally getting through regards bias and its always worth pointing this out .

"The BBC has a problem with impartiality. The row over BBC bias has been rumbling on longer than war in Sudan... no matter how much BBC bosses swear blind there is no problem, the issue refuses to go away. Why? Because for many licence-payers, the BBC's skewed assumptions about what the world is about and how its inhabitants should think is the most annoying thing about it – more annoying than dumbing down, than the universal licence fee, than Jonathan Ross's £18 million pay packet. More annoying even than Natasha Kaplinsky. And particularly infuriating when the BBC denies it outright, as did Michael Grade, the BBC chairman, in an article published a few days before a governors' impartiality summit a month ago.

We all saw Spooks, LGF, its laughable. If anything it does more to damage the BBC. As the author of the Telegraph article demonstrates by citing it as an example.

I wouldn't know where to start in tackling the political correctness of BBC drama, but I think the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves would go to Spooks, BBC1's flagship series about impossibly right-on MI5 agents. The series was originally praised (by the BBC) for its accuracy about the real work of the Security Service. So what did it kick off with on the first episode? A pro-life extremist bomber out to cause mayhem. Come on, you must know about them! No? Well, what about episode two, which tackled the equally pressing issue of racist extremists in league with Right-wing politicians plotting mass murder of immigrants? I lost interest in Spooks, but tuned in again a few weeks ago for the start of the fifth series. It was about homegrown al-Qa'eda terrorists taking over the Saudi embassy and murdering innocent people. Except that they weren't British Muslims at all, but undercover Israeli agents. Once again, the villains are a million miles away from the ones you might expect, and top-heavy with the forces of reaction.

Good stuff. And equally I look forward to reading an honest piece of reporting about the UK in the New York Times one day...or watching a CNN news report that isnt busy patronising us.

I won't hold my breath.


1 Comments:

At Sunday, 29 October, 2006, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I reckon i was the first to blog about the Spooks it was the Jews episode

Now Mel's on the case (though she didn't actually see it)

http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/?p=1370

 

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