BBC under fresh pressure over extent of Reform UK coverage
Nigel Farage’s party featured in considerably more News at Ten bulletins than Lib Dems over six months, study finds
Repeat something enough and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. First it was "Jeremy Corbyn is unelectable", now it's "Nigel Farage is on course to be the next Prime Minister". Same thing.
Nigel Farage as PM is more of a historical inevitability at this point unless something really big happens, but the media is absolutely complicit.
kagis
Ah. I hadn't realized that Reform's polling was nearly that high.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
The BBC's response seems to boil down to "we aim to reflect voices in the UK proportionally to current voting intention".
I don't think that should be their goal, though. I want them to aggressively hold anyone with, or who wants power, to account. Then, when complaints inevitably come from the right, they could justifiably say "our goal is to aggressively challenge everyone equally", and point to examples of them holding the other parties to account too.
I think Private Eye is an example of this done well - they look for corruption or hypocrisy, and wherever they can find it, they challenge it.
Was the BBC ever like that? - much more aggressive and towards anyone in power? - or am I just looking back with rose tinted glasses?
we aim to reflect voices in the UK proportionally to current voting intention
Was there a national poll that I don't recall? Because the last one I was aware of, a majority of people voted Labour, and the BBC have never, ever been pro-labour. Maybe they're claiming that tons of people intended to vote for Farage and co but couldn't figure out how ballots work, which is remotely credible, but it would take some serious research to back that up so I don't think that's it.
How on earth are they claiming to know people's voting intentions in the first place, let alone the rather groundbreaking idea that the election was wrong.
This has a worrying air of the Trump style, post-truth 'any official, scientific, pro-equality and / or leftie information is fake news' that we saw before trump was elected. I remember being amazed that a public figure could so blatantly, confidently lie about important constitutional processes and not be arrested for - Idk but if fraud, libel, aiding and abetting, misrepresentation etc are crimes, then misleading an entire country to disenfranchise them and mis-sell a political position must be quite serious.
We are all legally obliged to pay the BBC if we want to watch live news. That is quasi-governmental, and hella powerful. If I want to watch live TV in this country and don't want to pay to fund a corporation that's flagrantly misrepresenting the existence/ validity of an actual national election, I kinda feel there should be more recourse than 'Dear Sir / Madam, we have received your complaint and will take it on board if and when we ever have the slightest reason to'.
The BBC are telling the world that most people in the UK 'intend' to vote for Farage. That is not just untrue, or biased, or impossible for them to know. It's such an absurd claim that I think the scariest part is the fact that they are getting away with it.
Reform lead 12 councils, and have 881 councillors. Historically, it was the biggest party in the European Parliament after the 2019 election. It’s wishful thinking to carry on as if they’re a negligible factor.
How are people meant to have a good view of the political landscape and show intent to vote for a different party when said parties don't get any coverage? Lol what a joke
The BBC got massive flak when they challenged the case for invading Iraq, and the fallout from the death of David Kelly. They’ve never fully recovered.
So much for being impartial...
I think that all went out the window during the Tory era, with things such as replacing the head of the BBC with a Tory, threatening to pull all funding unless they started promoting the government's right-wing perspective and caving into Rupert Murdoch's pressure that he is poor and starving because the evil BBC is taking all his rightful TV money and viewers.
BBC comedy show and dramas are still on the whole centrist or a bit left leaning, but the news skewed heavily to the right about 10-15 years ago.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oBiryX7a8gA&t=1230s
Skip to 20:30 if the time jump doesn't work.
Comedy has been attacked and gutted from its previous peak as well.
My wife and I had an argument about this the other day. She thinks Farage doesn't want to be PM because too much work, etc. Personally I think he would utterly fucking love to be PM so he could (in his own mind) be held as an equal of Churchill, Thatcher, and any other far higher achieving politician. He craves validity and this would give him all he could ever wish for.
I don't, for a moment, think he'd put the hours in and do any work. He's spent his entire political life doing sweet fuck all (as a statement) and I doubt he'd turn around and change.
Sounds rather like Boris Johnson.
Exactly like him.
To put it into perspective, the LibDem's have 72 sitting MP's whereas Reform has 4 one of which is a populist mouthy cunt.
eh not surprising given they are doing their best to validate other fascists too