Tuesday, April 10, 2007

The BBC: Not fit for purpose

The Telegraph reports that the BBC has pulled the plug on a drama it commissioned telling the story of Private Johnson Beharry's courage in winning a Victoria Cross during the Iraq war. The Telegraph claims that the BBC was concerned that the drama may "alienate" those who opposed the Iraq war by being "too positive", although the BBC themselves refused to comment other than to confirm they have withdrawn support for the project.

Once upon a time, Britain was a nation that was proud to celebrate it's heroes in a fitting way. Films depicting men such as Douglas Bader, Guy Gibson or the Cockleshell Heroes were commonplace in the fifties.

The BBC is supposed to be a non-partisan organisation. It justifies it's protected and extravagant funding by claiming that it is will be impartial and unbiased - yet it clearly isn't. It is utterly dominated by leftist liberals and their politically correct thinking. It sucks up millions of pounds of our cash to regurgitate the liberal progressive claptrap.

Wouldn't it be better if we got rid of it altogether and gave the cash to companies who want to support and celebrate Britain and it's heroes?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wouldn't it be better if we got rid of it altogether and gave the cash to companies who want to support and celebrate Britain and it's heroes?

50% right.

Left wing thinking is predicated on the idea that a benign state can take decisions for us that improve or lives. Right wing thinking assumes that a minimal state is required only to create the conditions for people to maximise their individual freedom.

Your assumption that you can pick better beneficiaries for the TV licence money is therefore no less statist than the current situation and if enacted would in the fullness of time result in a broadcaster over-populated (as now) by people who thought that the state knew best.

Stan said...

I guess I didn't make myself clear with that. What I mean is that the government should stop funding the BBC through the licence fee and allow it to sink or swim as a commercial organisation.

But I'm in favour of retaining the licence fee, at a considerably reduced rate, to provide funding and support for independent film and tv programme makers and not to subsidise a state broadcaster.

The idea being that by doing so we could rebuild our film industry to the point where it can sustain itself and once more produce quality fims that are popular with mass audiences - not just popular with left wing liberal critics.

Having said that, even though I am conservative and right wing in my basic politics, that does not mean I am 100% against the state taking a more active role sometimes. Indeed, I believe that is one of the primary roles of a government - to defend the national interests above all others.

It is my view that the "national interest" includes ensuring that we have a proper capbility to defend ourselves and the industry to produce the means to defend ourselves. My first thought with that is that the government should have a "buy British" policy when it comes to defence procurement.

However, if that isn't an option then the government needs to take an active role in ensuring that it is an option in the future. If that means setting up a state owned company to produce the required item(s) then so be it.

Anonymous said...

But the problem is you define "national interest" to suit yourself. The liberal elite that controls the media and promotes political correctness has done exactly the same the same thing. I'd grant you that they might prefer the term "trans-national interest" or "public interest" but the core idea of a collective good remains the same.

I'm prepared to acknowledge that your idea of the national interest is going to be similar to mine, but that doesn't blind me to the fact that it is the very idea of a state determined national interest that is the problem.

Stan said...

I don't agree that the "national interest" can be defined to suit yourself. Of course, different people have different viewpoints on whether a particular policy will benefit "the national interest" and all governments will tend to spin the results of policies to demonstrate that a policy has been of national interest - immigration is a case in point.

You're right to suggest that national interest is not a simple, easy to define thing, though. These days, "the national interest" often comes down to cold, hard economic facts - GDP, interest rates, etc - as these are measurable and recordable, but that does not tell the whole story.