Astonishing support for authoritarian state

_{Denyse O'Leary

March 20, 2015

Media, News}

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The person has actually written

You are obsessed with whether things are tax-funded or not. I think your reference to tax-funded TV must refer back to your item on the BBC. It is not tax-funded. It is funded by a license fee which is an important distinction. It’s optional (if you don’t have a TV you don’t have to pay it) and it goes straight to the BBC which gives the BBC its independence.

So, commenter, lemme get this straight: If I were a Brit, I’d have to fund the Beeb just in order to even have a working TV and get the channels I want?

And the money goes straight to the BBC? – which could be using it for any purpose? Oh yeah, independence.

And the commenter does not think there is anything the matter with that? Hold that thought, people.

So it’s really like this: If I were a Jew, I’d have the right to go to shul—as long as I also contribute to the Church of England?

The Beeb could be supporting anti-Semitism and the Jewish person wouldn’t have the right to do a thing about it? Unless she could persuade some utter stupe Brit toff that anti-Semitism is a problem for her?

Meantime, she’d still have to pay if she wanted communications at all?

So … a forbidden thought from Canada: Why can’t the Jewish person just use all her media-directed money for what she thinks is worthwhile?

Look, we have similar ripoffs in Canada. There is now a big move to defund the Ceeb (Canadian version of the BBC).

And kick its fat [horse] onto the sidewalk (but you didn’t hear that from News, right?).

Skinny: In an age when even homeless people have cells, no one needs “public broadcasting” anyway. It is a relic of a former age, and now just a platform for authoritarian-directed views, and supported by people who think that way.

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Comments

News@35: "But why should anyone pay for a public broadcasting service that is not re basic issues like weather (cd be a big issue in Canada) or public safety?" Now, that is a reasonable question that can be debated. I think that arm's length public broadcasters and privately funded broadcasters each have their own strengths and weaknesses.not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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But why should anyone pay for a public broadcasting service that is not re basic issues like weather (cd be a big issue in Canada) or public safety?News_{March 20, 2015
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#33 drc466 The BBC provides two public goods: entertainment/culture and news/current affairs etc. Although they overlap in some programmes and services the two goods can be considered separately. The UK (and many other countries) have a long tradition of publically subsidised culture – theatre, opera, ballet, music, museums etc. The cultural side of the BBC is essentially no different from this. We can argue about whether it is a good idea – but it is not an argument about freedom of news and information. The news/current affairs side is rather different. It is not just a question of providing people with what they want. Otherwise you end up with commercial stations feeding untruths and distortions to the politically faithful to keep their confirmation biases satisfied because that is what pays or because the owner can afford to put out the message he/she wants people to hear. The free market doesn’t work well for news (just look at the Daily Mail) although I don’t deny the value of having commercial free press as well as non-commercial free press. If people are to hear the truth they also need a source which is as free of influence as possible. The difficult question is how best to provide it. A solution is a non-profit public service organisation with a charter to provide impartial coverage. It is far from perfect but it has proven to be a good option. Then comes the question of funding. Until recently a license fee seemed like a good approach. However, it may be necessary to look for other ways in the near future. The BBC already makes a lot of money (about 25% of its revenue I think) from selling its stuff abroad and commercial products such as box sets. Maybe that can be expanded. Personally I would absolutely hate to see advertising. It really spoils my enjoyment of anything I am watching. But if it comes to that then I can accept it politically as long as the BBC remains a non-profit public service organisation with a charter.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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MF, I must admit to being surprised to find you on the pro-license side of the argument. Freedom dies one step at a time - every choice you cede to the government is one less freedom you retain to yourself. The obvious alternative to funding the BBC via a forced license is...not funding the BBC via a forced fee. Make them compete in the open marketplace just like every other broadcaster out there. If they are, indeed, better and more watched than their competitors, then they'll certainly be able to fund themselves, right? And if they actually had to rely on viewership and popularity instead of having an open checkbook enforced by the government, then they have increased incentive to provide the people what the people want, rather than what some employee or group of employees within the BBC wants. If you, and some of your pro-public-eat-your-vegetables broadcasting friends think it is important that unpopular good-for-you programs be made, then YOU should have to fund them, not get to steal my 40p/month for it. When the government picks the winners and losers, the outcome is always sub-par.drc466_{March 20, 2015
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Florabama, you obviously have no experience with the government mandated broadcasters such as the BBC or the CBC. You may disagree with the editorial slant of them but you would have to be deaf and blind to think that they are a propoganda arm of the government. Debating whether or not these mandates should be retained is reasonable. But basing the argument on the false claim that they are not independent of the government is a non starter.not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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Florabama I have spent most of the afternoon explaining that I do not favour government funded news for the good reasons you give. Nor do I favour exclusively commercial funded news because, as you say, who controls the purse controls the message. That is why I like the BBC approach which is neither. The people of the UK fund the BBC directly according to its charter via the license fee. It is not dependent on tax revenue or government policy (at least not until its charter next runs out). It is part of a tradition of independent public bodies such as the Bank of England and the Office of National Statistics. This arrangement was implemented in the 1920s for radio and has prove extremely effective - especially during the second world war where countries on both sides turned to the BBC as the most trusted source. As Humble points out there is an ongoing dispute about alternatives to the license fee which may well have been outmoded by technology. I hope it doesn't result in either advertising or government funding.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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Mark Frank and others, why do you favor government funded news? Doesn't that smack of favoring propaganda? Whoever controls the purse controls the message, right? What if there were government funded creationism programing or right wing propaganda -- would that be acceptable to you as well? Do you approve of other governments controlling the news like say the way the former Soviet Union did and Russia still does to great degree or North Korea does or Islamic states do? Of course not because you only defend government funded news because you agree with your specific government's message of secularism and more government. People of principle disagree with government sponsored news -- no matter the message -- because it is by definition propaganda. I don't care what TV you want to consume but don't force me to pay for your propaganda message. Is that really too hard to understand for you?Florabama_{March 20, 2015
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Insulted News?! BAN HIM! BAN HIM! BAN HIM!Curly Howard_{March 20, 2015
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#27 News Clearly there was no insult in #20 (which was what I meant by light-hearted chatter). So presumably you were referring to #4 for which I already apologised and tried to explain. It is a comment friends frequently make about me (and vice versa) and I don't stop to think about it for a moment. When you keep up this incessant stream of accusations of Darwinist trolls and the like you must expect the opposition to snap back occasionally - albeit in a trivial way.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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Mark Frank at 23, it was not light-hearted chatter. It was an insult, accepted and treated as such. But unlike Europe, much of North America is NOT currently plagued with a bad outbreak of "diversity officers" (like a bad outbreak of fleas, but much harder to just fix). So in many places, like the one I live in, people ignore the insult, and pursue the problem. Your mother sounds like an excellent person.News_{March 20, 2015
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I am 61. None of my family has lived longer than 60, so if I don't finish this sent...not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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#22 SA It is standard for all providers to block material to other countries for financial reasons - they want to sell it. It is one way of replacing the license fee! I don't think you will find the BBC news is blocked - only programmes.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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Barry @16 "Perhaps in the la la land in which you live the essence of government is not coercion. Out here in the real world it is. That is why they call it government." I wasn't commenting about your coercion claim. I was commenting about your threat of physical violence claim. Unless, of course, you have examples of threats of physical violence being made against people who don't pay the licence fee.not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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News #21 I was trying to defuse the situation with light-hearted chatter about our respective situations. I can see now how you might have interpreted it as some kind of dig at you. I am sorry if it was misinterpreted. Everything I said about my Mum is completely true. It wasn't meant to be getting at you. I am very proud of her.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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humbled
I pulled my TV aerial out and sent the BBC gestapo packing when he came to my house to check.
I find that amazing that they came to your house to check up on you. i notice that the BBC blocks a number of shows to US providers -- that always suggested to me a very tight control and financial interest. It might be the same in the US without me noticing it, but i think in general we have more freedom. I think our public TV is tax funded also but perhaps to a much smaller extent. All of that said, the BBC produces some very high quality TV dramas and comedies (for my tastes) and it's easy to get addicted to it. I wish "The IT Crowd" stayed alive forever. Hilarious.Silver Asiatic_{March 20, 2015
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So Mark Frank at 20 made such stupid remarks about age instead of keeping to the issues because ... ?News_{March 20, 2015
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And I am 63. For what is worth - my Mum is 93. She lives by herself in a large crumbling house - runs a small business - and continues to drive herself most places. So I also hope to be around for a bit.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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#14 Humbled
Mf now I know you are just arguing for the sake of arguing. There is ZERO chance the BBC is independent of the government, come on, you must surely know this? Either that or you are truly ignorant.
Well I have put forward an argument (it is funded independently) and evidence (the frequent complaints by the government about the BBC being biased against it). You have produced neither.
Secondly, there are huge amounts (51% in some surveys) of Brits who want the tv license scrapped and for good reason.
There is an active debate about the best form of funding the BBC – which is healthy. No one is suggesting scrapping the BBC itself. Most of the polls do not specify what the alternative funding arrangements should be. I just hope it is not advertising which would be fatal.
Crimewatch’s Nick Ross calls on BBC to scrap TV licencehttp://www.express.co.uk/news/.....st-viewers
Well the BBC is certainly an improvement on the Daily Express which seems to have given up journalism altogether.
Campaign to abolish the television licencehttp://www.spiderbomb.com/tv/index.html
Did you read this link? It says: The CAL is no longer active and this site is for information only. For the latest news on our campaign please see our other web site at Abolish TV Licence. When you click on the link it goes to a site in Chinese (I think)
TV LICENCE RESISTANCEhttp://www.tvlicenceresistance.info/forum/
The existence of a chat site is not proof of anything much. There is a similar site for every opinion under the sun.
This propaganda machine will get NOTHING from me. I pulled my TV aerial out and sent the BBC gestapo packing when he came to my house to check. Been TV license free for 2 years now. I have a Netflix and Amazon Prime subscription, don’t need their nonsense in my house. If you are not receiving a live broadcast you a NOT required to pay for a TV license.
How very clever of you.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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Don't know it matters, but I am proud to be 65 this year. Most ancestors lived to be late eighties, early nineties. One grandma lived to be 101. My dad will be 96 this year. Hey, when my mom turned 90 last year, we had a big party, free stuff for everybody!, at the retirement home. Look, I realize no one cares, but if someone wanted to make a cheap crack about it all ... don't expect to be rid of me so soon.News_{March 20, 2015
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#11 BA
Mark, you don’t seem to understand some very basic issues here. The BBC might not technically be the “government,” but the government forces everyone (under threat of physical violence and coercion) to pay a fee to the BBC. The BBC is unaccountable to the people who pay the fee. The BBC can do whatever it damn well pleases with the people’s money. It can put out awful programs (and there have been plenty) without penalty? Why? Because it gets the same money whether it is meeting demand or not.
Are you saying the BBC is independent or not? If it can “do whatever it damn well pleases with the people’s money” then it is independent. As it happens this is not the case. It is independent of the government but it is accountable to the people of the UK both formally and informally. Formally via its charter. Informally via the immense scrutiny it gets from other media.
You ask if there is a better system? Yes. Obviously there is. That you don’t seem to understand what it is makes it clear that you are blinkered in your outlook.
Obviously? Well tell me what it is. Just so long as it isn’t the stream of commercial rubbish that I see whenever I am in the States. (And yes there are some very good programmes in between the rubbish and the commercials – just as there are very poor programmes on the BBC)
One more thing. You have been a long-time opposition commenter here and we hope you are able to continue. But your crack about Ms. O’Leary’s age is way past the line. Walk it back and apologize or you will be gone.
I apologise. It is a quite a common light-hearted phrase over here which I often use to my friends when they have said something confusing. I don’t imagine she took it to heart, much as I don’t take it to heart when she refers to us Profs and Toffs and Darwinist Trolls. I believe I am almost the identical age to Denyse.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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not_querius @ 13. Perhaps in the la la land in which you live the essence of government is not coercion. Out here in the real world it is. That is why they call it government.Barry Arrington_{March 20, 2015
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Denyse at #8 Mark Frank at 7: There is nothing confused or confusing about what I am saying.
You confused your independence with the broadcaster’s independence the medium with the information provider the license fee with a tax government news with news from an independent publically funded source

Throughout the following you refer to “government TV”. I don’t know about CEEB but the BBC is clearly and demonstrably not government TV. It is independent of the government (although bound by its charter). It doesn’t matter how many times you refer to it as government TV that won’t make it true.
I will not vote for tax dollars to pay for a service (government TV) that people don’t value and can easily replace if they did.
You may not value the service. The vast majority of the UK population (and a good portion of other countries) value the BBC a lot. I don’t know about the CEEB. I am not sure how you replace either.
It doesn’t matter what complex formula you claim citizens can use to complain to ‘crats about government TV.
Is it so very complex to say it has broken the terms of its charter? I think you can manage to understand that. (Do you really think the UK is still run by aristocrats? You are about 150 years behind the times).
If we must all pay for it regardless, it is NOT independent.
For a writer you are having a surprising amount of trouble with the word independent. If you have to pay then in a sense you are not independent. That is nothing to do with whether the broadcaster is independent. See (1) above.
You cannot understand that we just want it GONE? That tells us a key fact about Darwin’s followers in general.
You have made it abundantly clear that you want CEEB gone. I have no idea how many Canadians agree with you. If it is a non-commercial publically funded broadcaster which is independent of the government then you will lose something rather precious (never mind – you will still be able to access the BBC as countries all round the world regularly do). You seem to be unable, or unwilling, to move beyond that to a rational discussion of the role of the BBC. In fact you can’t (or won’t) even make the elementary distinctions I listed above. All you can do is rant about Toffs and Profs and ‘crats (I am none of these). That confirms some key facts about you.
Your Honour, the Defence rests.
Expires is more accurate.
Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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"the whole point is the BBC is independent of the government" haha ok... Mf now I know you are just arguing for the sake of arguing. There is ZERO chance the BBC is independent of the government, come on, you must surely know this? Either that or you are truly ignorant. Secondly, there are huge amounts (51% in some surveys) of Brits who want the tv license scrapped and for good reason. Crimewatch's Nick Ross calls on BBC to scrap TV licence http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/487432/Scrap-TV-licence-fee-insist-viewers Campaign to abolish the television licence http://www.spiderbomb.com/tv/index.html TV LICENCE RESISTANCE http://www.tvlicenceresistance.info/forum/ This propaganda machine will get NOTHING from me. I pulled my TV aerial out and sent the BBC gestapo packing when he came to my house to check. Been TV license free for 2 years now. I have a Netflix and Amazon Prime subscription, don't need their nonsense in my house. If you are not receiving a live broadcast you a NOT required to pay for a TV license.humbled_{March 20, 2015
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Barry: "The BBC might not technically be the “government,” but the government forces everyone (under threat of physical violence and coercion) to pay a fee to the BBC." Using false inflammatory claims (eg. "Threat of physical violence") removes all credibility from your point.not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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Mark Frank, One more thing. You have been a long-time opposition commenter here and we hope you are able to continue. But your crack about Ms. O'Leary's age is way past the line. Walk it back and apologize or you will be gone.Barry Arrington_{March 20, 2015
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Mark, you don't seem to understand some very basic issues here. The BBC might not technically be the "government," but the government forces everyone (under threat of physical violence and coercion) to pay a fee to the BBC. The BBC is unaccountable to the people who pay the fee. The BBC can do whatever it damn well pleases with the people's money. It can put out awful programs (and there have been plenty) without penalty. Why? Because it gets the same money whether it is meeting demand or not. You ask if there is a better system? Yes. Obviously there is. That you don't seem to understand what it is makes it clear that you are blinkered in your outlook.Barry Arrington_{March 20, 2015
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What is ISIS opinion on this important matter?Me_Think_{March 20, 2015
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"You cannot understand that we just want it GONE? That tells us a key fact about Darwin’s followers in general." I must have missed the memo that stated that you speak for all of us Canadians. And I must have also missed the research that demonstrates a correlation between people who think that the modern evolutionary theory is the best explanation of biological diversity, and people who support a tax payer funded broadcaster.not_querius_{March 20, 2015
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Mark Frank at 7: There is nothing confused or confusing about what I am saying. I will not vote for tax dollars to pay for a service (government TV) that people don't value and can easily replace if they did. It doesn't matter what complex formula you claim citizens can use to complain to 'crats about government TV. What if we just want it all GONE from our lives? If we must all pay for it regardless, it is NOT independent. And not GONE. You cannot understand that we just want it GONE? That tells us a key fact about Darwin's followers in general. Your Honour, the Defence rests.News_{March 20, 2015
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Denyse – you grow more and more wild and confused (and confusing)
Mark Frank at 4: How can you possibly expect me to believe your scandalous “independence” nonsense around government news claims?
The whole point is the BBC is independent of the government. It is not “government news”. If you don’t believe me just look at the complaints the government makes about how biased the BBC is against it.
If I MUST pay, it is not “independent.” Any more than I can choose whether to fill out a tax return.
Again you are muddling your independence (whether you choose to pay or not) with the news provider’s independence. I don’t think you are really that dim – but you are making a very good impression of it.
I do not wish to pay for the government-independents’ “non-bias” news.
All societies involve sometimes paying for things you don’t want.
If I am forced to pay, I am forced to pay for government news because, like most people with actual lives, I do not have the time to lar-di-diddle with toffs about bias problems with the news. It is that simple.
I don’t understand that sentence – but I suggest you drop the “I am a plain-speaking country girl” act. Your opponents come from all sorts of backgrounds and by most people’s standards you are very much part of the chattering classes.
Doesn’t matter whether the bias is left or right or in the middle or whatever. I do not wish to pay a cent for government news.
I know – you wrote that several times already. So I will repeat – the BBC is not government news.
You wouldn’t know this, of course, but in Canada, that train left the station a while back. The government news people here are playing for time.
Maybe. We will see.Mark Frank_{March 20, 2015
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