Pretty much any independence supporter, such as myself, will
have noticed to continuing outcry from Scotland concerning the questionable
impartiality of the (publicly funded, by us) BBC when it comes to Westminster
government stories, and most importantly any story surrounding the independence
referendum. One might say, surely enough a world-renowned corporation such as
the BBC with decades of broadcasting heritage would not possibly harbour bias
opinions! Wrong.
It has become increasingly apparent to me, and other
supporters/ advocates of the independence movement that any coverage on the
independence referendum has been given the bare minimum coverage, and even when
it does a seemingly bias coverage. Now, it is a well-known fact that the
majority of the Scottish population are extremely ignorant when it comes to the
understanding of their own country. The real state of the Scottish economy, our
history with the union and the swathes of benefits that would come with
independence are forlorn to the knowledge of most of the Scottish population.
I do not need to go into the overwhelming sea of facts about
Scottish independence; there are countless resources available, if you search
for them. Just look at my previous blog posts/ articles and you should have a rough
understanding of my ‘beef’ with the British government/media (hint: McCrone report – check it out).
Over the past say, two years since the independence
referendum became a real issue following the SNP’s landslide victory during the
2010 election, I have seen at most, half a dozen full stories on the
independence referendum debate(on the BBC television news). Even though, as
everyone will admit, it is the most important decision in our constitutional
history in the past 300 years. Even when
there is coverage and interviews it is done by extremely evidently bias
reporters such as the man himself, Jeremy Paxman.
Watching interviews a while back between Jeremy Paxman &
Alex Salmond it became increasingly obvious that Paxman was not the man for the
job. Everything he said had contempt written all over it, the way he seemed to
view himself aloof the Scottish people and claims that Scotland would be better
off following independence. He seemed as though he felt the Scottish population
were personally robbing his personal bank account every time Mr Salmond
mentioned the 8% assets that Scotland would inherit if we became independent.
Dismissing any claim that Scotland would be better off and swiftly moving onto
a new question every time he was countered. I recall incidents such as when
Paxman related Alex Salmond to Robert Mugabe and referred to Burns poetry as
‘sentimental doggerel’. You make your own mind up.
Whilst it is in human nature to put our own agenda’s in
front of the real issue (we just cannot help it) the bias of the BBC is made
increasingly worse by the fact that there is no mainstream media outlet for
pro-independence views, apart from the
collective group of on-line independence supporters known as “Cyber-Nat’s”. There are various websites that provide us
with some form of an outlet, such as Newsnet Scotland, Radio Free Scotland and
Bella Caledonia. They are extremely limited in their audience however, with
only one finding them after personally searching for them, happening to stumble
upon them or having a pro-independence friend. Whilst the BBC and other
mainstream news corporations pump out nationwide news 24/7.
Although the conflicting views have not yet been broadcast
by British media. There have been numerous reports done by foreign news companies,
concerning the impartiality of the BBC.
Russia Today is a prime example.
The link can be found here:
The report highlights the BBC being far too pro-government
in its reports. A prime example being the NHS reform bill being proposed by the
Con-Dem coalition. The report claims that the BBC gave far too little coverage
on the issue, as it was highly controversial and not many people knew the facts
about it. As a result the British public were unable to make any grounded
opposition on the bill. It even prompted the opposition party Labour, to post
an official complaint about their opposing views not being properly
represented. This incident is also reflected when it comes to Scottish
independence as the report claims. There was a video posted on You Tube which
was a training conference by the BBC about reporting. The training video seemed
to devote a lot of time to slandering the independence debate. Although the BBC
claim it was impartiality, it is clear that they will always pander to who is
in power, as it is from the population and government that the BBC receives it
£3 billion a year, paid by us.
The incidents of bias reporting is not limited to the
television, oh no. On the Scottish politics blogs and forums on the BBC
Scotland website, comments sections seemed to be disabled altogether,
especially those blogs made by official BBC reporters. It is no secret that in
a democracy opposing views are vital to the overall breadth of knowledge of the
population, and it is through having opposing views that people truly get the
full picture and are able to articulate their views in a well thought out way
and are less likely to spout opinions based on unfounded evidence.
This issue wouldn’t be so noticeable if the same rules
applied for the rest of the UK political blogs but it is the fact that it was
only the Scottish political blogs & forums that were blocked from comments.
This once again harks back to the point that, the BBC know just as well as
independence supporters do that the majority of the Scottish population are
ignorant to the facts about independence. By blocking out opposing views, they
ensure that the opposing views are never heard and the opinions never change.
To bring this to a conclusion, what can be done to change
the status quo concerning the British media? Well, it is our duty as Nats to
inform the Scottish population on matters about independence that they might
never hear whilst just hearing mainstream news. Through any means possible,
whether that be an internet blog, articles, letters to newspapers, radio shows,
or heck even just letting your friends know. Eventually the word will get out
there and the population will know, we have to keep the pressure on the British
media to change, even though our voice may be small, it will be heard.
No comments:
Post a Comment