Talk:Criticism of the BBC
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See also Talk:Criticism of the BBC/Archive1 which contains posts relating to previous incarnations of this article.
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[edit] New article
At the BBC main article, a new section Criticisms of the BBC has appeared. This quickly grew so large and was so disruptive to the flow of the article that editors - myself included - have removed it in the past.
Nevertheless, a small group of editors have spent considerable time defending the section, putting it back, expanding it and finding all manner of sources to support it.
With that level of intense support, removal of the section is not possible but creation (strictly, re-creation) of this article seems sensible, practical and useful. Certainly I can see no reason why not to do it. Be bold! is something of an important rule here at Wikipedia!
Your comments on this are welcome, of course (this is a wiki) and efforts to clean up the resulting article here are also most welcome (the sources need formatting; counter-opinions, which the creators of the section sadly haven't had time to include yet, need adding; a bit of wikification and a rewrite of my introductory paragraph are both needed). ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:02, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Israel
Whilst it's obviously the case that there is substantial controversy about the BBC's perceived bias or lack of bias in relation to reporting on Israel/Palestine, I think there are many other areas where the BBC often attracts critiques, ranging from excessive expenditure and unaccountable use of license-payers' money, to over-extensive competition, lack of direction, failure to apply moral standards to programming and many others. I wonder if people would object if we slightly reduced the emphasis on the contemporary middle east and increased material on other aspects of BBC criticism? MarkThomas 20:58, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- I think the creators of the original section in the BBC article might object (I haven't had chance to notify them of this move yet) to a reduction. Personally, I think it would be a good idea. But, as a compromise, adding all criticism of the BBC, no matter on what subject (and also defence of the BBC as a counterbalance against a lack of neutrality) would be a good idea. Thanks! ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:05, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- AFAICT the issue the last time it appeared was that crticisms of bias were in BBC News and not in the main BBC article, (the problem being that apparently criticsm wasnt prominent enough) so I have a feeling even this compromise of restoring this article will not be acceptable to all. FWIW, IMHO, the BBC is too massive to include everything on a single page, I see the main page as an abstract summary of the BBC with links to other pages reflecting sub-departments. At that point the main article should have had a small number of criticsms about the BBC as an organisation as a whole and not various bits that are chiefly about BBC News.
- However, other few points:
- 1. If we are to have this page, could it be a good idea to move the criticisms of BBC News to this article as well. AFAICT otherwise we are going to end up with two completely contradictory articles.
- 2. In addition to defence from the BBC, I think it would also be wise to have a strict regulation of the sources (perhaps Wikipedia:Reliable_sources might be useful). There are far too many misquotes, delibrate misinterpretations, quotes taken out of context, cherry picking of sources (I think particularly of the Martin Walker quote: I'm sure with a bit of effort another newspaper leader that was positive about the report could be found) and the like, often sourced from sites with a hidden agenda to proving the existence of partiality on the part of the BBC bias, being posted on these pages.
- 3. I agree we need some real criticisms (as opposed to a list of various rantings) of the BBC as outlined above by MarkThomas. I had hoped that we could have had a sensible measured section in the main article, unfortunately as some members seem to insist we allow rants on any personal axe grind, I agree that there is no choice but to farm this off to a separate article. The problem being, I fear the real valid criticsms of the BBC will be lost in amongst a sea of hand-picked quotes to prove various conspiracy theories. Pit-yacker 21:36, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- I agree completely with all three points here. I have no idea how to implement them without a lot of work (although sometimes one just has to sit down and be a keyboard-monkey on these things!) and, whilst I was aware that I was likely to be sparking an edit war with someone, somewhere by boldly creating this, I hadn't banked on it happening across multiple articles... although I'm old enough and ugly enough to cope! So, can we draft proposals here, between all who are interested, on how we can make this article a good 'un? It has encyclopedic scope, but, as you say, it also has scope for ranting. Perhaps we can all work together on a plan for a sourced, neutral article on the subject? ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:53, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- As a preliminary step, to tidy things up I have merged in the criticsms of BBC News section, and left the same stub that is in the main BBC article. For now I have more or less copied and pasted, with the exception of the two Israel/Palestine Conflict sections where I have attempted to merge the sections and the out of context quote in the anti-American section, which I have removed . Pit-yacker 22:16, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- Ok, my changes to the BBC News article have been reverted, so BBC News has a critcism section again Pit-yacker 13:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
- As a preliminary step, to tidy things up I have merged in the criticsms of BBC News section, and left the same stub that is in the main BBC article. For now I have more or less copied and pasted, with the exception of the two Israel/Palestine Conflict sections where I have attempted to merge the sections and the out of context quote in the anti-American section, which I have removed . Pit-yacker 22:16, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
- I agree completely with all three points here. I have no idea how to implement them without a lot of work (although sometimes one just has to sit down and be a keyboard-monkey on these things!) and, whilst I was aware that I was likely to be sparking an edit war with someone, somewhere by boldly creating this, I hadn't banked on it happening across multiple articles... although I'm old enough and ugly enough to cope! So, can we draft proposals here, between all who are interested, on how we can make this article a good 'un? It has encyclopedic scope, but, as you say, it also has scope for ranting. Perhaps we can all work together on a plan for a sourced, neutral article on the subject? ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:53, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Zimbabwe
The article currently linked for Zimbabwe doesn't mention that the BBC is proscribed as a terrorist organisation - just that BBC News is no longer available in Zimbabwe due to an insistence by the government that it be censored. They may have proscribed it as a terrorist organisation, but we need a better citation for that given the severity of the statement. JohnGray 17:28, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
- A Google for "BBC+banned+Zimbabwe" produces this interesting and very well balanced article from the BBC themselves. First result, too. I'll change the reference (and perhaps the line leading up to it) accordingly. ➨ ЯEDVERS 20:02, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Deleted Paragraph
I have deleted the below paragraph the fabled impartiality summit is already mentioned. The source given here appears to be a mis-report of the initial report in the Daily Mail:
According to articles in Yediot Aharonot in October 2006, "an internal memo, recently discovered by the British media, revealed what the BBC has been trying to hide.
Thats why the BBC streamed the meeting on the web.
Senior figures admitted in a recent 'impartiality' summit that the BBC was guilty of promoting Left-wing views and anti-Christian sentiment.
Not even the Mail twisted it that far. Andrew Marr said the BBC was a socially liberal organisation (that dont have a problem with gay employees, etc, etc) , this is entirely different from being politically liberal (or Liberal) and a country mile from being left wing. The implication that liberal/Liberal political views where then reported as part of an institutional bias is quite frankly on another planet. The "anti-Christian sentiment" was a misreport of the Mail which itself was mis-reporting a exercise in a hypothetcial where executives discussed what they would do if Sacha Baron Cohen, a controversial Jewish comedian tried to put the Koran in to Room 101.
... One senior BBC executive admitted to the ‘Daily Express’,
AFAICT the Daliy Mail.
"There was a widespread acknowledgement that we may have gone too far in the direction of political correctness. Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC's culture, that it is very hard to change it."[1]
So what has political correctness got to do with the Israel-Palestine conflict? Whatever "Politcal Correctness" is, being the most abused term in the English language. In my experience it is usually used by the tabloid press to describe anything they disagree with.
<ref>[http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3319064,00.html BBC seeks to suppress bias report. Network asks High Court to overturn decision that it publishes report into bias in coverage of Middle East conflict] by Hagit Klaiman (YNetNews, October 24, 2006)</ref>
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AFAICT Second report refers to the Balen Report, not this meeting. The Balen Report is believed to criticse the BBC's reporting over the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Pit-yacker 14:07, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
