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Gary Lineker vs. BBC

In political BBC roles I’d like to see a ban on anyone who has ever been a member or donor to a political party. It is more than possible to get through life without such tribalism. I’ve managed 59 years so far.
You did donate to the Labour Party though & voted Corbyn in as leader.
 
It`s not people having personal bias and leanings that`s the problem, It`s the fact that they act on them and then deny it.
 
Surely it is more that case that we can’t expect anyone to be non tribal. Thee, me, Tony L and Davie are all tribal, just that we see ourselves as rational and the other tribe as irrational. The truth is that of that quartet, only thee and me are properly rational

I’d argue I wasn’t tribal at all. I have never been a member of a political party. I have always viewed myself as a floating voter and have voted for Lib Dem, Green and Labour based upon manifesto pledges and voting behaviour. I have political beliefs, as everyone does, but they have never aligned with any UK party. I view myself as miles away from a multi-millionaire Tory donor/crony/fixer such as Richard Sharp or a failed Tory politician such as Tim Davie. I am politically independent with no ties to anything.

You did donate to the Labour Party though & voted Corbyn in as leader.

Yes, out of frustration/desperation with the useless state of Labour as a political entity. In hindsight it was a total waste of £3.

I’ll pay money for change, e.g. I have a monthly subscription to Good Law Project as I view them as the best opposition to creeping right-wing authoritarianism in the UK at present. Given the lack of credible political opposition I will help crowdfund legal challenge to human rights abuses, corruption etc.

Again I view all of this as non-partisan. I have no political home. I have no political representation.
 
Surely it is more that case that we can’t expect anyone to be non tribal. Thee, me, Tony L and Davie are all tribal, just that we see ourselves as rational and the other tribe as irrational. The truth is that of that quartet, only thee and me are properly rational

Even if everyone is tribal in some way, there are different tribalisms and different extents of tribalism, and only some of them are inimical to the in-principle impartiality of of the BBC.

Whatever the arguments which might apply to other forms of tribalism or roles, for the DG, a history of explicit participation in and representation of a political party which has a vested interest in influencing the nature of BBC output should be on the other side of a very thick red line.

Of course donating huge sums of money and whatever else the current chairman did should too, but I’m thinking of the DG role here.
 
I’d argue I wasn’t tribal at all. I have never been a member of a political party. I have always viewed myself as a floating voter and have voted for Lib Dem, Green and Labour based upon manifesto pledges and voting behaviour. I have political beliefs, as everyone does, but they have never aligned with any UK party. I view myself as miles away from a multi-millionaire Tory donor/crony/fixer such as Richard Sharp or a failed Tory politician such as Tim Davie. I am politically independent with no ties to anything.
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But your language betrays a certain tribalism, referring to anyone to the left of your position as ‘tankies’ or ‘Stans’ and anyone to the right as ‘gammon’ does rather place you inside a political group seeking to protect it’s borders as much as any other tribe.

We all have our own political ideology that makes us seek out common ground with others and we react against those who traduce that hallowed ground with pejoratives. We are no less tribal than anyone else.
 
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But you language betrays a certain tribalism, referring to anyone to the left of your position as ‘tankies’ or ‘Stans’ and anyone to the right as ‘gammon’ does rather place you inside a political group seeking to protect it’s borders as much as any other tribe.

That is just my commenting on tribal behaviour I see in others. A ‘stan’ is obviously a different term referring to parasocial adoration for a specific person (derived from the Eminem track), it is very precise, the other two refer to tribes, the very things I do not belong to! You’d maybe have a point if I had a political home. I don’t. I’ve been an outlier all my life.
 
Isn’t the specific problem with Davie’s appointment not so much his historic political activities but that he was appointed deliberately and precisely because of them?

Absolutely, Richard Sharp too. These people are in these roles for no other reason than to actively push Tory ideology as news. The BBC is now sadly little different to media one would find in Russia, Iran etc. A channel for government communication dressed up as news. The positioning of the likes of Nick Robinson, Laura Kunessberg, Andrew Neil into prime ‘news’ roles etc is nothing new, but the management structure seems to be increasingly partisan as the Overton Window moves ever rightwards both here and in the USA.

Like Stewart Lee above I’m done with it. I’ve not cancelled my license yet, but I certainly want too. My concern is that is exactly what the Tory far-right want me to do. As such I’m taking some time-out to think. I’m certainly sick to death of funding this shit. I can’t even view it as my just paying for The Proms and other arts, science and culture programming, as that’s on the skids too. BBC4 is just a repeats channel now.
 
That is just my commenting on tribal behaviour I see in others. A ‘stan’ is obviously a different term referring to parasocial adoration for a specific person (derived from the Eminem track), it is very precise, the other two refer to tribes, the very things I do not belong to! You’d maybe have a point if I had a political home. I don’t. I’ve been an outlier all my life.
You might be an outlier, but that does not mean that you don’t view the world through tribal specs as much as the next person. Your language of ‘gammon’ and ‘Stan’ mark out your tribal view as much as my use of ‘the far right’ and ‘neoliberalism’.
 
Isn’t the specific problem with Davie’s appointment not so much his historic political activities but that he was appointed deliberately and precisely because of them?

I’d say it’s both. It’s not as if he merely expressed opinions in the past or even was a member or anything like that. He actually held a significant party role and stood for election as their candidate.

That those facts are things which led to his appointment is another, rather than the only or the main, issue.
 
In the US, National Public Radio transmits BBC World News. I’ve listened regularly over the years, and have heard more and more right wing bias in the broadcast.

Yesterday was a good example. The topic was the failure of Silicon Valley Bank, and the interviewer was pushing a BS right wing line that ESG investing was at the core of the failure. This familiar trope was easily destroyed by the interviewee, who then criticized banks who weren’t investing in ESG. Obviously frustrated, the interviewer tried to make it personal, claiming the interviewee had no right to criticize banks if he wasn’t perfect in his own life. It took about half a dozen stupid questions before the interviewer finally latched onto something minor. He claimed the interviewee was a hypocrite for owning an iPhone. It was really pathetic at bullying, so I switched my car’s radio to music.
 
Have we had this picture yet: Twitter? Not photoshopped or faked, just a far-right woman laughing in front of her very own concentration camp. A remarkable signpost as to exactly where we are as a nation.
 


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