I like a bit of controversy in my RSS feeds. I subscribe to feeds from the Daily Mail and the Sun – papers that are guaranteed to get my blood boiling. An occasional increase in blood pressure can be most invigorating.
But I’ve just removed an RSS feed from my list of subscriptions because there was a distinct danger that it was going to give me a heart attack. I’ve been reading Biased BBC for about a year (I’m pretty sure that it was Martin who first pointed it out to me).
The premise of the site is pretty uncontentious. They say that the BBC is staffed exclusively by left-leaning Londoners and that the opinions in its output don’t reflect the views of the general population of the country. Having worked at the BBC a couple of times, I have to agree that there is a large number of people working there with left of centre political views. However, I’ve only ever worked in the IT group so I can’t say whether the same applies to the editorial groups.
And whilst anyone can point to occasional lapses in editorial balance by any media outlet, accusations of an organised attempt to brainwash the country fall far wide of the mark. I pretty sure that most of the contributors to Biased BBC would continue accuse the BBC of bias unless it was broadcasting exactly their opinion all the time. They seem to be confusing “bias” with “failure to agree with me completely”.
But anyway, I found it an interesting read. Occasionally they’d point out some real example of BBC bias. More often it was an amusing way to read about a completely different view of the world.
All that changed a few months ago when Biased BBC introduced a new contributor called David Vance. Vance doesn’t see the BBC as a generally reasonable organisation which exhibits occasional lapses of judgement. He sees it as a tool of the devil and find examples of left wing (oh, and pro-islamic) bias in everything that the BBC broadcasts. He is posting several entries a day, each one a foaming-at-the-mouth rant about the BBC. It’s boring and depressing.
So that’s why I’ve decided to stop reading the site. It went beyond parody and just became a waste of time. The site takes comments, so I’ve been tempted to get involved in discussions there occasionally, but looking at the opinions held by most of the contributors there, it would be a waste of everyone’s time. They aren’t going to listen to reason. They are happy to sit there with the veins in their neck throbbing away bashing out conclusive proof that everyone in the BBC is a potential terrorist who wants to implement shariah law in the UK.
It used to be good fun, but now it’s just dull.
Can someone please let me know when it goes back to how it used to be?