by Damian » 3rd Nov 08, 13:41
What they did was utterly wrong and they both should have had a suspension (I reckon four weeks), without pay. That would have done the trick.
What actually happened was that it played into the hands of those (generally to the right of the political spectrum) who somehow think that the BBC is solely there as a mouthpiece of leftist propaganda (this despite the political editor Nick Robinson being the former leader of the Young Conservatives). They used this as an excuse to attack the BBC as a whole (did you see the front pages of the Mail and Express last week? Not pretty reading.)
They interviewed a Labour and Tory politician last week - and this can all be seen on news sites - and the Labour MP said it was wrong whereas the Tory MP went further and started attacking the BBC again and saying more regulation was needed.
Bollocks. I love the BBC. I've seen so many good programmes on there, and gotten into so many good bands through the radio stations. What happened WAS wrong, but to say so now makes it sound as though you're siding with the reactionary idiots, whose sole aim is to make it clear that they drive the agenda. Only bloodshed at the BBC would do for them, so they could say it was a victory for common sense. I doubt that the majority of the organisations or individuals who used these events to attack the BBC give a flying one about the hurt feelings of Andrew Sachs - it was just an excuse to peddle their agenda. If anyone thinks otherwise, well... if they didn't want him hurt, wouldn't they have tried to keep it a bit lower key so that he could go back to his normal life a lot quicker?
