BBC’s Disgusting Response to Olympic Complaints
July 24, 2012 13:51 by Simon Plosker
At HonestReporting, we recognize and credit our readership for taking action against the media when they are sufficiently motivated to do so. While it is our job to encourage activism, we know that our readers are not automatons who will write letters to editors or complain to the media at our say so.
While we can alert the public to the issues, it is ultimately an exercise in free choice and independent and informed thought as to whether or not someone will take action. Unfortunately the BBC evidently believes the opposite.
Many people who complained to the BBC about its failure to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital on its Olympic country website profile were answered with the following included in a canned response:
We have received a range of feedback about the errors on the BBC Sport Olympics page and we feel it is worth explaining that a considerable number of those have been generated by online lobby activity.
What exactly is the inference of referring to “online lobby activity?”
Does the BBC consider your individual complaints less worthy simply because the information was passed on to the complainant by way of HonestReporting or any number of other organizations?
Not to mention the particularly insidious connotation behind referring to a “lobby” when it comes to an issue associated with Jews or Israel. Is the BBC insinuating that the issue is being driven by dark forces behind the scenes and that the complaints are insincere?
This is simply a cheap and nasty way of diverting attention from the real issue.
When people take the time and effort to complain, it is irrelevant how they came to be notified or encouraged to do so. Every individual complaint deserves the full attention of the BBC without prejudice as to whether or not the complainant happens to be a reader of HonestReporting or any other organization.
For the BBC to say otherwise is disrespectful and the accusation of some form of deceitful lobbying is utterly disgusting.
R. Cross
5:45 pm
Jul 24, 2012
Making Tel Aviv the capitol of Israel is like making Manchester the capitol of England. The limey’s must get real and face the world out there. They are more to be pitied than scorned. After all, most of them do not know geopgraphy or where their own roots are. How does anyone expect anything else from them, let alone what the sovereign State of Israel is and it’s magnificent history. I often ask myself if they read their Bibles or even go to church? If they did, maybe their ignorance would not be so apparent.
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Frederick
7:42 pm
Jul 24, 2012
Judging by your use of the word limey and your misspelling of capital (the capitol is in Washington, D.C.) you must be American.
If you want to slam the Beeb and other media for bias and dishonesting reporting, that’s fine with me. I think, however, that you should refrain from making such sweeping, insulting, and unjustified statements about the British people as a whole.
Stay on track and remember that HR is there to combat ant-Israel bias, not to give you a platform to spout off! Quite a high proportion of us Brits are not only well educated and well informed, many of us, whether Jewish or not, are pro Israel and perfectly capable of critical assessment of our media.
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Ruth
1:01 am
Jul 26, 2012
I, as a Brit feel ashamed that the BBC are so biased against Israel and also that they are either gullible or poorly educated on the history and current events taking place in Israel. I agree with Frederick that many Brits do know their Bible and support Israel and the Jewish people in general. It seems to me that our country is under a horrible sway of absolute hatred from large organizations like the BBC. British people are good at speaking with their feet – i.e. changing their allegiance to news sources such as the BBC and finding better ones. I have – I just can’t trust them anymore. There are more reliable agencies.
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Lyone
6:12 pm
Jul 24, 2012
We need to publish maps of England that call London the “seat of government”–and then label some other city as its capital. Personally, I vote for Liverpool, home of the Beatles.
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clivel
6:42 pm
Jul 24, 2012
Why is there not a concerted campaign to boycott the BBC?
Isn’t it about time that the bigots who run what amounts to the world’s most effective anti-Israel propaganda machine learn what”lobbying” really is?
Without a doubt, with it’s wide ranging influence, the BBC is the single largest promoter of an anti-Israel agenda throughout the Western world. Until the BBC is forced into taking an object view of the Middle East there is little hope that worldwide sentiment could turn favourably towards Israel.
Those of us outside the UK should be calling our cable companies to drop the BBC or boycotting advertisers that support the BBC.
It’s time to stop the lies, it’s time to stop the BBC!
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Ruth
1:04 am
Jul 26, 2012
Right Clive – I’m with you on that – in fact already done it!
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Mike lampard
10:22 pm
Jul 24, 2012
BBC’s reply utterly disgusts me. So what if the response is a result of ‘online lobbying’. What is their problem about that? Their response shows how utterly corrupt, dishonest liars, and utter filth that they are. I hope that this comment hits them right in the face and contiues to hit them until they see sense (which no doubt will be never!)
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Nushuktan
11:11 pm
Jul 24, 2012
Surely that response is worthy of a complaint to the UK Press Complaints Commission, even though that organization is probably worse than the BBC. Either way, I wasn’t even provided with a response to my complaint to BBC.
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faboutlaws
11:47 pm
Jul 24, 2012
Israel’s foreign ministry and immigration authorities could declare all BBC personell to be persona non grata and asked to leave. The failure to recognize Israel’s capitol is sufficient reason. Furthermore, don’t let them use Ben Gurion to get to the West Bank. Make them use the Allenby bridge. Let the BBC report on Israel from Jordan or Damascus. They’re not that powerful, not that important and they hate you anyway. I’d threaten to put them on Israel’s terrorist list if they didn’t shape up.
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Chris
12:35 am
Jul 25, 2012
I support Nushuktan’s comments. Isn’t it time that a formal complaint was raised against the BBC and any other media that consistently misrepresent the facts? I would have thought that if all misrepresentations of any one of the major offenders were lined up in a list, that list would surely be embarrassingly long and make it impossible to defend.
From a horrified New Zealander.
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Die schäbige Antwort der BBC auf Beschwerden zu ihrer Olympia-Webseite « Medien BackSpin
1:04 am
Jul 25, 2012
[...] HonestReporting Media BackSpin, 24. Juli 2012 [...]
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John Ryan
10:38 am
Jul 25, 2012
“online lobby activity?”
Is Israel’s Prime Minister’s office now an online lobby?
After all, they complained too.
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Heather Roque
11:29 am
Jul 25, 2012
Being the public broadcaster in Britain, the BBC are responsible for misinforming the British public. This is either an unintentional act of ignorance or a deliberate attempt at delegitimizing the the State of Israel. Sadly. Either way, the BBC are bringing the integrity of the British people into disrepute and whilst I am an opponent of swooping generalizations, it remains the responsibility of the British people to bring its very own public broadcaster to book on issues where they are being lied to. Joseph Goebles the Nazi propagana minister said “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” Brits, you’re being duped! Time to take action.
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MazalUK
11:55 am
Jul 25, 2012
Complaining about the BBC is like pissing against the wind. They always manage to come up with some vague justification for their actions then stand back and laugh as you bash your head on their immovable arrogance.
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Asher Garber
2:01 pm
Jul 25, 2012
As opposed to BBC’s policy being generated by the all too real Oil Lobby. Or the We Will Terrorize You Next Lobby. Or the Brain Dead Jew Haters Inspired by the ’30s Lobby.
So many Lobbies, but it’s the Joo Lobby that controls it all.
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Anna
2:52 pm
Jul 25, 2012
I have been unable to find the apology you reference.
The apology I found is http://www.bbc.co.uk/search/?q=complaints%20jerusalem
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Wednesday Links | Blogs about Israel aggregation
10:07 pm
Jul 25, 2012
[...] Reporting BBC’s Disgusting Response to Olympic Complaints “Many people who complained to the BBC about its failure to recognize Jerusalem as [...]
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Martineke
10:35 pm
Jul 25, 2012
BBC = Biggest Bias Company
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Ruth
2:51 am
Jul 26, 2012
Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. The BBC is not obliged to like this or even agree with it, but even a pretense of impartial reporting requires them to state that the capital of a sovereign nation is where that country says it is.
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Philip Arlington
3:16 pm
Jul 26, 2012
I came here for random reasons, and my natural assumption was that this site was concerned with honest reporting in general. I see it has a very different agenda. As you have chosen not to give your organisation a name that is honest about its actual purposes, using the word “honest” in that name just stinks.
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jonathan Klineberg
3:24 pm
Jul 26, 2012
The BBC is like the Guardian, no-one takes it seriously anymore. It’s Left wing bias is so crudely obvious, it’s really not an issue in the UK these days. When the BBC neglects to include Jerusalem it makes itself into a laughing stock – just as the Guardian does all the time, The way the British public see them is the last refuges of the politically ‘intellectual Left’.
Nobody reads the Guardian anymore and the only reason the BBC is watched is that they’re no commercials and they do sport better than anyone else in the world. Can you imagine watching a Superbowl Final with no commercials at all from beginning to end?
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clivel
6:51 pm
Jul 26, 2012
Unfortunately the BBC is still the most trusted source of news for more UK residents than any other source, whether print, radio, television or web.
The constant barrage of anti-Israel messages by the BBC, some on an almost subliminal level, do influence people on a sub-concious level. Even those who would dismiss the BBC as leftist drivel are slowly having their perceptions changed. Ordinary people in the street who have no more than a minimal interest in the Middle East are becoming predisposed to think negatively of Israel thanks to the BBC and its co-spewer of anti-Israel propaganda The Guardian.
Is it any wonder that the BBC fought so hard to have the Balen report suppressed.
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Larry Schecker
3:26 pm
Jul 26, 2012
You are so right in what you say here. Has anyone pointed out to BBC that even the United Nations’ own website shows Jerusalem as Israel’s capital? http://data.un.org/CountryProfile.aspx?crName=Israel.
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Robert John Bennett
3:28 pm
Jul 26, 2012
Disgusting? You can say that again, So according to the BBC I am an “online lobbyist.” What in the world is that supposed to mean? I’m part of some nefarious conspiracy? If so, then it’s great that the BBC let me know about my membership in this mysterious group. Otherwise I would never have known. Once it was a great, even heroic institution, and now look at what the BBC has become: a petty, biased, puny dwarf of its former self, unwilling to admit its errors. I hope someone at Honest Reporting forwards all of these comments to the BBC. (Incidentally, one of my fellow Americans has referred to it rather crudely as the Bulls–t Broadcasting Corporation.)
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