On BBC bias

Much as I like this piece by Ian Leslie, there’s something I disagree with. It’s this:

Almost as a blanket rule, don’t bash the BBC…The BBC is about the only thing standing between post-Brexit Britain and a Trump-style reality-free culture war.

He has a point, insofar as a lot of BBC-bashing is just narcissistic whining that the corporation doesn’t echo one’s own prejudices. Nevertheless, I fear there is a problem with the corporation.

One fact tells us this - that the public are horribly wrong about many basic facts. Of course, this isn’t wholly or even mainly the BBC’s fault. But such massive ignorance should alert us to the possibility that the country’s most powerful broadcaster isn’t fulfilling its purpose of informing its viewers and listeners.

A big reason for this, I suspect, is a policy of “due impartiality” which gives us “he says, he says” reporting, and hence “balance” between truth and lies, and a failure to report what the experts' consensus is. Paul Krugman has called this “views differ on shape of the planet reporting.” Even within the BBC, there is disquiet at this. Norman Smith, the BBC’s assistant political editor, has said:

There is an instinctive bias within the BBC towards impartiality to the exclusion sometimes of making judgment calls that we can and should make. We are very very cautious about saying something is factually wrong and I think as an organization we could be more muscular about it….I suspect we, we hold back from making those sort of calls, and I do think that, potentially, is a disservice to the listener and viewer.

This has been echoed by a report commissioned by the BBC Trust, which says (pdf):

The BBC frequently presents different sets of statistics put forward by those on either side of an argument. Audience research, and our own discussions, showed considerable frustration with this way of presenting statistics and effectively leaving the audience to make up its own mind. The BBC needs to get better and braver in interpreting and explaining rival statistics and guiding the audience. (Emphasis in original)

 

This can contribute to ignorance. Years ago, Alexander Cockburn complained that such balance meant that “since everything can be contradicted, nothing may be worth remembering.”

This isn’t just a disservice to the viewer*. It’s a disservice to democracy.

Yes, the BBC can point to Reality Check and More or Less as counter-examples of what I mean. But these don’t have anything like the prominence of its main news programmes.

The general problem here is to pay too much attention to talk – especially Westminster-based talk – and not enough to ground truth. It's this that also gives us mindless speak your branes shows like Question Time or Sunday Morning Live. I don’t care what some random guy thinks. What I want to know is the truth, or at least facts. Of course, there’s a place for values, but these should be the considered opinions of philosophers, not of rentagobs.

I suspect this is why the BBC appeared biased against Corbyn. It’s not that its reporters were consciously anti-Corbyn, but that their attitudes to him were coloured by his unpopularity among MPs – and this led them to under-estimate his popularity among Labour’s grassroots and his ability to campaign outside Westminster. Equally - and just as misleadingly - George Osborne was spoken of as a believer in devolution because he spoke about the “Northern Powerhouse” but in fact the ground truth was that his cuts to local government meant he in effect centralized power.

This prioritizing of talk over ground truth has leads to at least two distortions.

One is that it tends to select politicians for fluency, (over)-confidence and the appearance of matiness, which can lead to a downgrading of other virtues such as grasp of policy, good decision-making or managerial ability. This bias is especially great given that interviewers seem to regard it as their job to make a fool of politicians, rather than to elicit information about policy and values.

The other is that it leads to a bias against emergence. Issues that politicians talk about - and which they give the (misleading) impression of controlling – get more attention than more important outcomes of emergent processes. Our biggest economic problem is stagnant productivity, not the “nation’s finances” – but you’d never have inferred this from the BBC’s coverage.

What I’m saying here shouldn’t be surprising. Every profession – yes, including economists – has its own perspective on the world which can be distorting as well as illuminating: it’s called deformation professionelle. Political journalists are no more immune to these than anybody else.

Now, I don’t intend this to be general BBC-bashing. A lot that the BBC does is brilliant. But this doesn’t include its political and economic reporting.

It’s said that the purpose of a liberal education to teach people the best that has been thought or said, or is being thought and said. Whilst this is true for at least some of the BBC’s output, it is not true of it political journalism.

* The problem here isn’t confined to political reporting. Ben Goldacre says that uncritical reporting of Andrew Wakefield’s claims about a link between the MMR vaccine and autism contributed to a decline in vaccinations in the early 00s.

Comments

[Ralph Musgrave]

A nice example of BBC bias done via FAILING to mention relevance facts: it's a report on acid attacks which fails to mention that this one of the delightful practices introduced to the UK thanks to Islam.

[Dipper]

oh come on Ralph.

The problem for the BBC and others is the short period of time they have to cover individual news items. when organisations get the chance to cover subjects in more details they produce analysis like this https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/11/acid-attacks-victorian-britain

I think that effectively neutralises your comment Ralph.

[e]

A great block post, very true. A better BBC, and support for all sorts of ill-advised ventures, such as referendums, could not be so easily manufactured. What, other than culture in the broadest sense, can guard against a majority tyranny?

[Dipper]

I think the problem is 24 hour news. The need to fill it with instant reactions, instant punditry. Instant analysis. Instant accusations. No time to stop and think about anything. No in-depth analysis.

From Your Own Correspondent is much better at exploring the depth behind the stories. They can do it when they get the chance.

[Luke]

Ralph."...acid attacks...one of the delightful practices introduced to the UK thanks to Islam."
Unlikely. Acid attacks (or throwing "any corrosive fluid") is an offence specifically provided for in section 29 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. They seem to have been a concern for some time.

[Ralph Musgrave]

Dipper, Far from "neutralising" my point, that Guardian article CONFIRMS my point. The Guardian, as is entirely predictable, tries to argue that acid attacks are an inherently British vice by citing attacks that took place in Victorian times. Presumably you and The Guardian also think that having children work down coal-mines is a British vice in 2017.

The reality, as you'll be well aware, though you're probably too dishonest to admit it, is that acid attacks were unheard of for several decades after WWII. Then Muslims arrived with their various delightful cultural practices (female genital mutilation, murdering cartoonists, etc etc)and acid attacks took off.

[Dipper]

still not agreeing Ralph.

"delightful cultural practices". FGM is a cultural practice that has a long history that predates the religion of Islam. It is no more islamic than family organised criminal syndicates, kidnapping, extortion and vendettas are a feature of Roman Catholicism.

People from different regions will have tendencies to do different crimes. That isn't a feature of a particular religion, and neither should an associated religion be used as an excuse.

[e]

@ RM
Where are you going with this: there's a very bad idea/trend, those that copy must be stopped or had you something else in mind?

[gastro george]

"The general problem here is to pay too much attention to talk"

On the money. And in two ways. The first is the obsession with Westminster tittle tattle - he said, she said. The second is an obsession with uncritically reporting what is said - which allows concepts like the "Northern Powerhouse" to be presented free from any analysis as to whether it reflects reality or not.

Finally - whatever because of documentaries? I remember when Panorama was a flagship investigative program. Does proper journalism cost too much money (whereas opinion is cheap)?

[gastro george]

"... whatever became of documentaries ..."

[Rawliberal]

RalphM: "acid attacks were unheard of for several decades after WWII."

Clearly you have never read Brighton Rock. *Shocking* ignorance of British culture.

[Ralph Musgrave]

Dipper,

I’m fascinated by your claim that FGM is “a cultural practice that has a long history that predates the religion of Islam.” Can you quote any sources to back that up? I’ve never come across any mention of FGM in Ancient Rome, Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt, etc. But I’m not the world’s expert. I look forward to seeing your evidence.

I agree that FGM is not a strictly Islamic practice: as I understand it, some Hindus go in for it as well. Thus my above description of FGM as a “delightful practice introduced to the UK by Islam” (and being pedantic) could be re-worded as “delightful practice introduced to the UK by Muslims and Hindus”.

As for the fact that acid attacks took place in Victorian Britain, are we supposed to believe that white yobbos who have recently taken to doing acid attacks are all keen students of Victorian social history and decided to adopt this practice as a result? I suggest it’s a thousand times more likely that the yobbos saw stories in tabloid newspapers about Muslims doing acid attacks and decided to do likewise.

Rawliberal,

“Brighton Rock” is a novel. The fact that an acid attack takes place in the novel is not brilliant evidence that acid attacks were common in the relevant country at the relevant time. I’m sure there are loads of novels in which people travel to Mars. Far as I know, no one has yet travelled to Mars.

[David]

@Ralph
A builder I knew boasted of knocking on debtors front doors wearing rubber gloves and carrying a bottle of Hydrochloric acid...... in the 1970's.
Well before the press picked up once more on these horrific acts.
It has long been the preferred method of intimidation, as the perpetrator will not be charged with attempted murder, as they would be if carrying a knife.
You might argue that Muslims returning to Pakistan from Britain took these foul ideas with them, and the Christians are responsible?

[Philip]

The BBC is currently reviewing/rewriting its Editorial Guidelines, including the one that requires "due impartiality" (www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/guidelines/impartiality). There will probably be a public consultation on them towards the end of the year. If you have ideas for improvements, please submit them.

[TheBirmingham6]

Why would anybody bother debating let alone arguing with BNP Ralph ?

[Heim]

Media bias often is even more subtle than directly skewing facts. From where I watch television news it comes from Birmingham and recently there have been stories of local government service lapses without mentioning the £650 million cut in revenue or the cutting of the more than by half of city employees or the privatizing of city services. The question not asked is there cause and effect between cuts and service lapses?

[Ralph Musgrave]

TheBirmingham6,

So what's wrong with the British National Party? If you're one of those leftie thickos who thinks the BNP is racist, how do you square that with the fact that Labour + Tories helped kill a million Muslims in Iraq for no good reason, while the BNP (like UKIP) opposed the war from day one?

According to my calculations, that makes the Labour Party about a million times as racist as the BNP, though I'll settle for a hundred thoussand times or even ten thousand times, out of the kindness of my heart.

You clearly have no grip on reality.