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Twitter: BBC objects to 'government funded media' label
I'm sorry, I don't really see the point of the complaints. Or rather: I see a point, but it's not interesting or flattering.
The BBC license it's mandated by the government.
The fact that artists and defenders of the BBC itself argue attempts to remove the 'fee' will harm programming or is a deliberate attempt to cow the BBC also militates towards the conclusion that the worries implied by "state-affiliated" or "state-funded" apply - though I grant that it is a more refined arrangement than direct payment.
So...the government not imposing a "fee" is an attack on an institution's functioning but we're supposed to act like it isn't a tax or the BBC isn't government funded?
So what reason does anyone (not benefiting from media branding) have to take any of this seriously? It seems to me that the real basis for complaint here is that BBC doesn't want to even theoretically be in the same bucket as Al Jazeera and RT. But it is precisely the media's fault that terms like "state media" are so badly received. Just as it is the media that marks certain dictators as "reformers" and others "strongmen" with "regimes" to aid its attempts to manufacture consent. They constructed this complex of Words That Hint At Things But Can't Be Called Out Cause They're Technically Correct.
So, because the media doesn't want to be marked by its own taboo-words and bad branding everyone is supposed to pretend that an entity funded by a government mandated license, whose supporters claim would fail without aforementioned government mandate everyone is supposed to ignore the correct labeling?
Is it the media's fault that terms like "state media" are badly received? Or is it the fact that a lot of state run media historically and observably tends to be biased towards the state and people can recognize that? The media doesn't have to tell me that a Ukraine government run news media organization and a Russian government run news media organization are likely to both need to be taken with a huge pinch of salt when reporting on the Ukraine war/special operation. Or that the news organization run by the Saudi or Iranian governments is unlikely to be taking stances the government does not like.
The media does not create authoritarian states. It certainly will (at least in the West) tend to downplay the authoritarian nature of states that are our allies and upsell the opposite. But that doesn't mean differences don't actually exist. The fact that a state run media arm should be regarded with suspicion (on reporting to do with anything to do with the government at least) is because historically that has been a problem. Our media didn't create that idea even if they over/undersell it depending on circumstance.
Having said that the Beeb is an interesting construct. Its funding mostly comes from the public by way of a government law for the License fee. However its existence is part of a Royal Charter which mandates its independence from the government itself. So is it accurate to say it is government funded? Kind of yes, kind of no. It doesn't get its money from the government but whether people have to pay it and how much IS determined by the government. In theory its supposed to be an independent reporter on the government and not biased towards either the government of the opposition.
In practice (and in my direct experience in interacting with the Beeb) it is kind of pro-establishment generally (which makes sense), with a slight social leftward lean and a slight conservative economic lean. Though it is I think slightly more positive towards whichever party happens to be in power at any given moment overall (which again makes sense from an incentive point of view). This is from dealing with the Beeb when working for both the Conservative and Labour parties.
If the point of the tag is to point out the level of possible bias then I don't think the BBC should get the same tag as a directly operated state organization. Though it's probably fine to get some sort of tag. I'll note Musk himself says he thinks the BBC is one of the least biased outlets for whatever that is worth. The BBC is big enough and important enough in the English speaking world that you could probably give it its own unique tag.
If the point of the tag is to "own the media" then sure keep it, it's just partisan sniping with little meaning in any case.
That's part of why it works; it's not untrue. No one can is going to die on the hill that Saddam doesn't have a "'regime". The words aren't necessarily wrong when it's used, the question is what's the impression given and why it's not used sometimes.
Even people defending the BBC often undermine the argument for its independence. Hell, the argument linked above is directly calling funding decisions (which the government has always been able to take) as direct partisan attacks.
IIRC the original tag that NPR complained about was something like "state affiliated media". If it was "state media" then I kind of get the charge.
"Government funded" though...I'm even less sympathetic. You can't complain that the government removing a funding mandate will crush either your programming or your reporting and also want to duck the tag.
If we agree with your take and we hate these terms for observable, rational reasons anyone can come to independently, not it being reinforced by media reminders every time a story from a hostile site comes up, then people can/will reach the same independent conclusion that Elon Musk did: that in a world of governments putting its fingers in the media pie the BBC surely counts as government funded but it represents a far more refined and civilized compromise than RT.
If not, as you say, there's literally no better placed, better branded organization to enforce a sense of nuance on any such tag just by existing.
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“State media” is often used by the media as a shorthand for “media that’s controlled by a hostile state”, much like “regime” is used to indicate that a given nation is not aligned with western interests. It is a boo-term quite often as it counts as state control the things that hostile governments do, but not things we do. NPR is funded directly by the government through a grant system. If a program wants the grants and access to the NPR radio stations, it must produce shows that our government likes. If they reported on the news from too “radical” (read: anti-establishment) perspective, it won’t get funding or airtime. It’s basically patronage — I pay you on the basis of liking what you’ve done so far and I expect you to keep making things I like; and keep in mind that your patronage is up for renewal every year.
In essence, the very definition of “state media” is as a propaganda term meant to engender suspicion of that media’s reportage. And as such, it’s useless in most contexts to say “state run media should be viewed with suspicion” often reduces to “media that narrative makers declare are to be viewed with suspicion are to be viewed with suspicion.” Not to say that in some places reporting the wrong news story can mean free striped pajamas for the entire staff, but that the term itself isn’t used neutrally, and that it’s often inserted in reporting on other countries as a way to cast doubt on the data from hostile government funded media. Other supposedly free media outlets are not necessarily more evenhanded or reliable. If the Congo Times gets no funding from the government, but is run by a political party, is that better than the “state run” Congo Tribune that is run by the government?
The proper conclusion from this is to be suspicious of NPR too. You're writing as if criticizing NPR for bias is outside the Overton window. Maybe it is for the left, but it certainly isn't among conservatives. (Maybe replacing "that our government likes" with "that the deep state likes".)
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Right, but that doesn't mean they are actually wrong. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'd trust the BBC more in general than a Chinese state run media service in general because I know roughly how much power the British government has over the BBC and I know roughly what level of influence can be exerted when and under what circumstances.
Don't trust any media is not the same thing as all media being equally untrustworthy.
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Yes? I mean, these are the same thing. State run media is media, their faults are media's faults. I think @bnfrmt hits closer to the mark with deep state run media, but the primary purpose of the label is to remind people to take what you learn from them with a grain of salt because they are beholden to interests other than the truth, and that they are propped up by the state - so I don't think it's inappropriate. Least biased is not not biased, and not biased is the only version we should tolerate. Anyone who claims otherwise is either brainwashed or bought.
It's not about 'owning the media' either, it is about reminding people that they are being lied to every single day by a bunch of clout chasing moral busybodies who would gladly sacrifice every prole on the planet for better standing in their incestuous community of mediocrities. That's all the BBC is these days, because that's what all journalism is these days.
But there was a time when it was just most journalism that was like that, and the only way we can get back there is by not letting the big hitters get away with anything. That includes stupid 'oh we jumbled things up, so this is no tax, even though we send enforcers around to harass you if we think you have watched television in the last week, and even though we gladly push a political agenda which protects certain interests of the state' excuses. Nope sorry, you are happy to accept the benefits of state backing, so you don't get to avoid the consequences.
To sum up, do not trust any media organisation bigger than your local newspaper. Ever.
Why would you trust your local newspaper?
I’m being a little facetious—you potentially have access to its journalists in a way you wouldn’t for national concerns. But what does that really buy you? How much time and effort do you spend on keeping the locals in check? You’re not going to rally your town to ostracize the editor, not without a truly spectacular bias.
There are fewer people pulling on the local news, which is not the same as less total pull. It’s a lot cheaper to buy glowing reviews or softball coverage from a local outlet than from the New York Times. The result is that local journalists and editors may not be biased by Big Pharma or a wannabe President, but by a local employer, a motivated city councilman, or that bitch Annette, I can’t believe she took the kids, you can’t trust her.
Scrutiny by opposing interests is higher for large outlets, too. I remember thinking it was odd for commenters to grill Miami’s local news the other week. How many people do they really reach? Anything smaller will be even less visible.
I think it’s awfully hard to start from an adversarial basis, from game theory or realpolitik, and come up with reasons to trust. The difference in local and national news is that you might give locals the benefit of the doubt.
Agreed entirely. The only reason I excluded local newspapers from my sweeping declaration is because in most places I have lived you can actually hold them accountable for dishonesty, although it's often a bit like pulling teeth. But they are usually small enough to respect reader complaints, and a lot of them are where the autistically truth-seeking oldheads ended up after society decided we were too smart to bother with the truth, because local beats are like punishment to clout chasers.
I think the two tools in a low trust environment we can use to build trust are objectivity and accountability. We can't perfect either and to err is human, but anyone who puts a sincere effort into trying to be objective and holding themselves accountable for their mistakes deserves tentative trust I reckon.
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That is a different point than I think he was making though. His point was that "our" media labels state run media of other powers as bad. Not all media is equally "bad" even if that is only because some places use a lighter touch. And that is the case whether "our" media is using it as propaganda or not.
Don't trust any media, local newspaper or not is my view. But that doesn't mean I should trust an openly state run Chinese media over the BBC.
Reversed stupidity is not intelligence in other words.
To point out when I worked in politics it was much easier to have a story pulled or altered with smaller local outlets in exchange for exclusives or better stories. So local being more trustworthy is not something I would rely on.
Oh, I had the impression his point was that it's the media who came up with the label, so they don't get to throw a fit when it is appropriately applied to them. If they don't like being called state run media they can stop doing the things that make them state run media. Or alternatively, they are in the exact right position to rehabilitate the image of state run media. They refuse to do either, so the shoe fits.
Otherwise yeah, nobody gets blind trust. But I know there are some local paper editors out there who are dedicated to the truth, some out of penance for sins in the big leagues, some vindictively, some just to try to hold onto the light any way they can. Similar to how you say we can trust the BBC over CCP funded media, I think you can trust local papers more than the big hitters.
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Just because you call it
ship moneya licence fee, doesn't mean it isn't a tax. The government impose it.More importantly the BBC is perfectly willing to attack the government. But by "government" here, I mean the democratically elected institutions of the state. The BBC does however loyally represent (and is part of) the permanent state institutional structure.
Yes, and every kind of yes.
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There should be a term for the opposite of 'Gellman Amnesia' : "You don't realize how blind you're to brainwashing in a hivemind, until you're outside the hivemind."
The BBC seems 'independent' because it is occasionally critical of the British govt and will often give a platform to those who wish death to the western civilizational consensus. But, there is a '50 Stalins' aspect to that criticism and there are certain 'sacred cows' which can never so much as be mentioned, let alone criticized or analyzed. Al Jazeera appears similarly liberal, critical and rational as long as they are talking about things that do not relate to Qatar.
The BBC appears independent, because we who live within the hivemind of the west do not notice the absence of a type of criticism that we do not know exists.
Care to give an actual example?
Rotherham is the only one I can think of off the top of my head that covered for the government, but Jimmy Saville and Martin Bashir's Lady Di interview were verboten topics for a long time at the BBC.
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That's a synonym for "tax". The BBC isn't just government-funded, but has a special tax created just to keep it in existence.
And the independence of the BBC has been a great comedic punchline for decades now:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog
Sure but its set up not to go to the government for disbursement so as to try to avoid the control issue.
Even when i worked for the governing party I could not just go to the BBC to squash stories.
Its fair to say there is some influence but in my sirect experience it isn't directly government controlled.
Would have made my life easier if it were.
Unless you were the Minister of Culture I don't know why you'd think you could. Of course the tea boy in 10 Downing Street doesn't get to boss people around as much as a cabinet minister would. YOUR failure to influence the Beeb doesn't mean everyone in the British government is similarly toothless.
No, but I would have known who could influence them, or my boss would.
There were ways to influence stories but the same way of influencing other outlets, build personal connections, offer a juicier story or exclusive etc.
But within government there is no standard path to control the Beeb's output.
Which isn't to say it doesn't have bias as mentioned above.
How certain are you that the status quo does not involve something analagous to The Twitter Files, with multiple govt agencies providing advisory concerns for subjects like pandemics, terrorism, mis/dis/malinformation, etc?
I think you have to agree these relationships must exist, indeed to control the Beeb’s output. But this happens for private media, too! I can’t prove, but strongly suspect, these relationships are stronger with the Beeb than Telegraph or Guardian.
I suspect the cynical explanation is that the British government doesn't have the same motive for putting its thumb on the scale like the American government would. They don't need to sell their people on any narrative in particular, because they don't really get themselves into wars (and pretty much most of the ones the UK has been in after WWII have been divisive at best) and they aren't tied up in global affairs like the US is.
So, I would say, yes, the BBC will probably be tilted in favor of the establishment, but there's no real pressure to be against said establishment.
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This is... not how I would describe them. When did the Beeb last express a preference for lower taxes?
I'd say the BBC is pro-establishment as opposed to pro-government; much like the New York Times, it sees itself as the voice of civil society. Witness for example the recent furore over Gary Lineker's tweets: despite comparing the current government to Nazis, BBC management weren't able to keep Lineker off-air, or even get a promise to stop tweeting about it.
So calling them state-funded media does seem a little unfair; they're obviously not beholden to the executive. Deep-state-funded media, perhaps? If only there was a Twitter flag for that.
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