Talk:BBC

	This Media related article has not received a brainstar for quality. Please consider expanding the article appropriately. See RationalWiki:Article rating for more information.

(create an archive)

Topic

This should be moved to BBC. Nobody ever uses the full company title & the BBC itself very seldom does. Most of our articles on organisation currently known by an abbreviation use the abbreviated version as the title (PBS, PETA, NASA, NAMBLA, etc.) Wēāŝēīōīď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 17:26, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Alright. Moving in 5,4,3,2... Тy^Talk. 17:32, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Jimmy Savile

Should we cover the Jimmy Savile scandal once the dust is cleared? I'm nto sure if it's entirely on mission, but it's been compared to the Catholic child molestation scandals. Balaam (talk) 09:11, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

We should have something, the BBC are in the shit about this. The power of celebrity is something RW could have a good go at anyway. Sophie^Wilder 10:30, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

It's not really on-mission, and I don't think it's as massively relevant to an article on the BBC. Give it a month or so and it'll be one of those forgotten footnotes and we'll be wondering why it's on this page. By all means consider writing it up as a separate piece, perhaps contrast to cover ups by the Church (we apply "fair game" to them, so I suppose a reasonable contrast with the BBC can be made) as that might be an interesting RE-relevant angle. ^gnostic 10:45, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

The scandal is being used by the BBC's usual enemies to attack it but it's not directly relevant to Auntie itself. Hospitals, charities and the government itself were all taken in by Saville. rpeh •T•C•E• 10:55, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Possibly an article on the Savile scandal itself, then? Balaam (talk) 11:00, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

And a few months later, after a few more old celebs are taken to police stations... I think the missionality of celebrity itself has gone up a notch. Sophie^Wilder 16:32, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Its coverage of the British royal family tends to be the most partial

Is this true? Granted all the channels seem to fall over themselves to arse-lick the royals, but I seem to recall (back when I had a telly) ITV being the worst offender. But then again, it wasn't ITV that did It's a Royal Knockout, the worst thing ever done by anyone ever. Sophie^Wilder 16:08, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Not sure it is massively true. Royal correspondence is mostly arse-licking from all the major television news, but that's specifically Royal correspondence where you don't really expect "Wills and Kate got married, Wills is fucking freeloading scum!" type reporting. None of them as overall networks shy away from stories that are critical of what the Royal Family get up to. I think that's just taking the BBC not being outright and unnecessarily vicious towards them and interpreting it as unfair bias. ^theist 16:19, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

It certainly is. Watch anything with Nicholas Witchell (or however he spells it) talking about the royal family, and remember to bring your sickbag with you. Note also the ridiculous coverage of foreign tours, which are touted to be a huge success. (With any local protest only mentioned in passing, and made to look insubstantial.)--Albannach (talk) 16:21, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Nicholas Witchell is so awful even Prince Charles hates him. Sophie^Wilder 16:29, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes, he's nicknamed Poison Ivy. That crawler Jenny Bond is just as bad.--Albannach (talk) 16:47, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

So there needs to be coverage on the recent BBC controversies

Namely, there has been accusations that the BBC is too hard on Labor and ridiculously softballs the Tory side, particularly Boris Johnson (like promoting puffpieces of Johnson scoffing scones). BBC had Andrew Neil give very hard questions toward candidates but didn't schedule Boris Johnson to be interviewed by Andrew Neil (which prompted very angry responses on Twitter], and BBC has also been weirdly silent when Tories and Boris Johnson has been saying what should be political suicide like wanting to sell the NHS. So this stuff is relevant IMO, but I'm not hugely familiar with British politics, maybe that's covered already? --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 21:15, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

You're correct. I've been thinking of adding a section for the last four years specifically - what started with their chief political editor that faked an interview with Corbyn in 2015 has snowballed into a national broadcaster entirely unwilling to challenge the government. Minish (talk) 08:49, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

@Minish You really should talk about it when you can because some people like me sometimes don't know better about how underhanded it all is. --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 22:20, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

Transphobia

The BBC has been fairly biased against trans people as of late, which should probably be covered.

• Held a debate on trans conversion therapy with no trans representation [1] [2]
• Platforming the transphobic (as well as homophobic) LGB Alliance [3] [4]
• Promotes conspiracy theories such as ROGD and mass detransitioning [5]

Their latest antics is a one-sided hit piece against trans lesbians. 'We're being pressured into sex by some trans women'

—ShapeshiftingLizard ~▲~ hear me roar ~▲~ 04:15, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

Apparently, one of the women the BBC featured in their 'trans women are pressuring lesbians into sex' article was actually a serial rapist herself. https://twitter.com/christapeterso/status/1453149042125332480?s=20 — 𝗦𝗾𝗿𝘁-𝟭 ^{talk stalk} 12:18, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

twitter is not an appropriate source for such an allegation AMassiveGay (talk) 12:45, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

the bbc is not transphobic. it has a commitment to balance which on occasion as noted by ofcom is inappropriate. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:48, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

see [6][7][8][9][10][11]. one swallow does not a summer make AMassiveGay (talk) 13:04, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

Added a section about the criticisms, but took care to note that the BBC is not transphobic. BBC did remove the contribution by Lily Cade as they did verify the claims about her violent comments on her blog. Any suggestions? Did I characterize what's going on here accurately? --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 09:17, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

feel like its giving a little to much weight to one or two pieces put out the bbc. it a fucking huge organisation, the largest broadcaster in the world, but its no monolith either - tons of regional branches all over the world. and as giant multimedia corporations go, it about as accountable as is possible for such beasts to be. but shit gets through once in a while. these few instances, as egregious they may be, are not just a fraction of its output, but a fraction of its output of on trans issues. AMassiveGay (talk) 11:47, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

I see. Any way I could adequately summarize? --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 01:35, 23 November 2021 (UTC)

Bump, but just noticed the Shaun video. I precisely had it in mind while writing the section. I've watched it before I wrote the section, though this talk page and writing the section made me more skeptical of the video. I know he outputted more of these videos but I'm still not sure if the video is appropriate for this section. --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 03:16, 26 July 2022 (UTC)

Open access paper

"Rethinking balance and impartiality in journalism? How the BBC attempted and failed to change the paradigm": https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1464884916648094 Chillpilled (talk) 23:49, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

context. the paradigm in question is the ‘paradigm of impartiality-as-balance'. essentially if they report on the views of the government, then for balance, the the need to to include the views of the opposition. the boths sides thing essentially. the problem this results in is that only a narrow range of views get reported. usually that of politicians and journos - the establishment essentially and balance here tend to reflect party political conflict. the birdcut report recommended the bbc move the concept of impartiality to include a wider range of views to reflect the diversity of the audience. this paper was commissioned by the bbc trust to asssess the effect of the measures implemented as suggested by the birdcut's report. this is what the title refers to as attempted and what failed to effect the desired change. the reasons are many, including the uk political system, the limited air time (for tv and radio news programming - online media had a lot more diversity of views) and the political exposure the bbc is under resulting in scrupulously ensuring balance to ward of the continual political assaults on the bbc from all sides leaves little room on tv for opinions outside the westminister bubble. important to note that this issue of a narrow range of opinion is not unique to the bbc, but is an issue with other uk news media, such as itn and channel 4, and is in fact an issue across the globe for public service broadcasters. it seems its an issue the beeb cant fix with a top down approach but requires major shifts in the whole news landscape. its not a new issue either, the article cite papers from the 70s identifying the issue. what is new or unique, to me at least, is the bbc is attempting to address this issue and its endless self flagellation of commissioning papers about its short comings.

i say all this because if one didnt read the paper, and lets face it, not many of us will, we are left with a title that tends to attack rather than inform. without knowing where this paper fits into our article, a summary was required. AMassiveGay (talk) 14:57, 10 April 2023 (UTC)