I believe the producers/editors of the programne were on a frolic of their own, and should never work in that capacity again, yes
Impartiality is not six of one and half a dozen of the other, even for a public broadcaster, some things are so self evidently true that the BBC does not feel compelled to have a dissenting voice. We don't see flat earthers given air time on documentaries about the universe or Adam and Eve fundamentalists on documentaries about evolution. Some things are a little more contested, the BBC has a stance on global warming, it believes the science is compelling and for what it's worth I agree.
In other areas an impartial editorial line is more contentious and the BBC struggles to strike the right balance, as any public broadcaster would, this is not a problem for the likes of avowed partisan broadcasters like Fox, GB News, Talk TV, Novara Media, and print media like the Telegraph, the Mail, the Spectator, The New Statesman and the Guardian.
But the BBC does have an additional problem as a cultural institution, it believes it lies at the centre of British life, so when I was growing up the BBC struggled to adapt to the cultural changes of the 60s, it now struggles to find its centre of gravity in the 21st Century, compounded by a completely different media environment. They're not alone in this, remember Cameron's hug a hoodie, his acceptance of climate change, Theresa May embraced gender self ID and so on. In the UK, until very recently, we all witnessed both big C and small c conservative organisations all over the shop, as they attempted to position themselves in what they thought was the new norm, the new zeitgeist and clearly they took their cultural indicators from the up and coming generation of graduate millennials, a generation who embraced as a given stuff like critical race theory, critical social justice, intersectionality, gender ideology, multiculturalism and so on.
Notwithstanding one's position on any of this stuff, both the BBC and the Conservatives (though they're frantically back peddling now), having taken their cue from one particular section of society, badly misjudged the national mood both socially and politically. They thought they'd nailed which way the wind was blowing, they re-positioned to put themselves front and centre of the new zeitgeist and found themselves instead on its periphery, sidelined, ridiculed, unloved, increasingly friendless and surrounded by enemies.
What has this to do with Trump? Simple really, even in our little corner of the internet it is taken as read that Trump is a ****, MAGA are cunts, Reform supporters are cunts, I'm a TERF and therefore a ****, Tommy Robinson is a fascist **** and so is Nigel Farage, multiculturalism is a fact and an indisputable good and anyone who questions this is a racist ****, there is no indigenous population in this country and no dominant culture and anyone who thinks otherwise is a.....you get the picture.
I don't list these things in order to debate them, I list them simply to catalogue them as some of the prevailing "absolutes" beloved of a particular section of a particular generation, not exclusive to them, but defining of them, beliefs so entrenched, so unquestionably "correct" that it is very easy to imagine the editorial conversation around that Trump edit.....It didn't take place, at least not in the sense we might imagine.
Why? Coz everyone in that conversation that never happened knows Trump is a ****, everyone knows he was goading his cuntish supporters to storm Capital Hill, they spliced his speech as any good editor and producer would do to cut out the fat and ensure that message was delivered clearly, it was simply mechanics, a matter of good editing and it was waved through by all concerned without a moments thought coz everyone there knew that they and everyone they work with at the BBC knows Trump is a ****, and everyone watching knows Trump is a ****, or at least they should and if they don't they will now. This is groupthink 101, it doesn't matter what the organisation's written "principles" are, impartiality wouldn't have crossed anyone's mind in the editorial conversation that didn't happen.
This is what real institutional bias looks like, values? Mission statements?! It's window dressing, ask yourself why Robert Winston is no longer on the BBC?
But it would be wrong to see this as exclusively a malaise of the "progressive" liberal left. Look at the pervasive and persistent racism in the Met, look at why those girls in Rotherham weren't taken seriously, these are all examples of organisations infected with a prevailing mindset that's completely ingrained, untroubled by management bullshit, everyone knows yet doesn't know, it's not tackled inside the tent and certainly never acknowledged outside, it isn't discussed, it just is.
Even, sadly, as with this BBC disaster, it isn't even acknowledged after the fact.
