Thursday, August 18, 2011

Even the Guardian has noticed

I woke this morning to hear a story on the Today programme about a few thousand protestors complaining about the Pope`s visit to Spain. Nothing much was said about the 1.5 milllion young people who had turned up to welcome the Pope.

Andrew Brown on his Guardian blog has this to say:

If I were a Catholic, I would be feeling rather pissed off with the BBC. The news bulletin in this morning's Today programme carried a report of the pope's visit to Madrid that concentrated entirely on the "thousands" of protestors against the visit. It did not once mention World Youth Day, the extraordinary global Catholic gathering that the pope is also visiting. That has brought something like 1.5 million young people from around the world to the Spanish capital to greet him. Whether or not you approve of this, it is important and – above all – newsworthy simply because it is unexpected and goes against the grain of what the media tell us. So why is it not reported?

You can read the rest here.

UPDATE 19.08.11 Today has just had a feature on WYD again. It did mention `hundreds of thousands` of young people being there and interviewed pilgrims as well as the protestors.

UPDATE. Ex Expecto suggests complaints can be left at www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/

5 comments:

Ben Trovato said...

'Why is it not reported?' Because it doesn't fit the BBC's agenda or world view. This is not deliberate by the BBC, incidentally. They just see the world a particular way, and do not notice that it is prejudicial (two of my oldest friends work for the Beeb and this is literally true).

Oliver said...

There's no great mystery here. The British Establishment, of which the BBC is an integral part, doesn't like the Catholic Church and hasn't for four hundred years. QED!

Anonymous said...

The actual number of protesters was, apparently 150! Yet the minority get all the headlines. How typical!

Terry

1569 Rising said...

But surely everyone realises that the BBC is merely the vocal version of the Guardian. Has been for years, and some of us have been banging on about it for ages.

I remember several years ago coming downstairs in the morning to find the paper lad had pushed a copy of the Guardian through my letterbox instead of the Telegraph. I had to put on gloves to pick it up, and consigned it immediately to the bin. I have not got over the shock.

So, I am surprised that a Guardian writer has said something mildly generous to the Catholic Church. I bet he won't survive long.

By the way, has anyone heard from Polly Toynbee recently? Is she, perhaps, spending the summer in her Tuscan 4th home?

I stopped listening to the Today programme a long time ago - I found the Lefty presenters curdled the milk in my Weetabix.

Et Expecto said...

Father,

would you be goiod enough to make a further post encouraging people to make a complaint about the bbc coverage of World Youth Day?

It can be done at

www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/