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BBC World News has a similar purpose as Voice of America (VOA) and Russia Today (RT). The purpose is to deliver the viewpoint of the UK to other countries, suc

BBC World News has a similar purpose as Voice of America (VOA) and Russia Today (RT). The purpose is to deliver the viewpoint of the UK to other countries, such as Iran, Russia, China.

Zenst 7y ago
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/bbc/ https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/bbc/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/history/story/2007/02/070123_html_1990s.shtml http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/history/story/2007/02/0701...
- ArchieLeach 7y ago
  The BBC is quite subtle. It's not fake news and what they report is factual, but the choice of what facts to report makes it crystal clear that they do have an agenda. A current example: Hongkong. They have headline reporting every time there is a protest while other protests in other countries, and arguably much more significant protests, barely get a mention. This is not a coincidence. Edit: A lot of the replies to this comment try to rationalise. This is being willfully blind. Noam Chomsky has written a lot about the issue of raltive importance of reporting in order to manipulate public opinion. This is exactly what is happening because it should be obvious to everyone that there is a campaign against China ongoing.
  - Zenst 7y ago
    Hasn't the HongKong protests been going on for a while and with changing dynamics in protests and response. BBC reported many protests, is there one in particular that should of been more reported upon that springs to mind - for me, nope. https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=protests https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=protests Sure choice of facts and style can and does show a middle-left bias, but as for agenda. If it is that crystal clear, then what is it! I will say though, the trend of media outlets to report opinions of interviewers as news and for the populus to take those avenues of news and run with them as facts, has been something that plays out upon social media. This then as we have seen, is used by news outlets as sources of news (ala Tweets have becomes news sources now). This does create the potential for massive feedback loops. But then, no media outlet seems immune to that.
  - have_faith 7y ago
    Hong Kong is a very recent former British colony, the nature of the protests are unique and there's a large public interest in the Hong Kong protests specifically. This doesn't mean the BBC isn't biased, but the number of articles isn't an indication of bias in the way that people would normally use the term I think. How are you measuring the significance of protests against each other to figure out which deserve more or less attention?
    - blaser-waffle 7y ago
      Bingo. HK was a colony and there are a lot of British citizens who became that way via that colonial dominion. It's more relevant to the UK than, say, protests in Peru.
  - spoovy 7y ago
    They absolutely do lie. I found a few examples within a couple of weeks when I was really looking a few years ago. It was not long after Trump was elected and I found them all in about two weeks. I saw an article on the BBC news site reporting on the French National Front's plan to refuse school places to the children of illegal immigrants. The BBC changed "illegal immigrants" to "foreigners". Multiple times throughout the article (at every point in fact) this change was made; clearly not accidental and clearly designed to demonise the French NF by misreporting their policy. Another; I also saw an headline on the BBC news site along the lines of "Trump separates mother from child". On reading the article it was a sad case of illegal immigrants caught in the US. The problem being that Trump had literally nothing to do with it, he hadn't even been inaugurated at that point and the unfortunate mother and child were caught up in longstanding legislation. Trump featured again in one where he referenced some Mexican drug cartel -- known for decapitating their rivals -- as animals. The BBC reported it as "Trump refers to Mexicans as 'animals'". It pains me to say it but the BBC is certainly not above outright fake news to forward their agenda.
  - mschuster91 7y ago
    > A current example: Hongkong. They have headline reporting every time there is a protest while other protests in other countries, and arguably much more significant protests, barely get a mention. This is not a coincidence. Hong Kong is a former British colony with international importance, Chile is not.
  - joosters 7y ago
    Can you give a recent example of a significant protest that lacks a BBC news story?
    - ArchieLeach 7y ago
      I haven't said that they are not reported. It's the relative importance given that is obvious. 150+ people have died in Iraq over the last month during wide scale protests. There is an article on this on the BBC's website. On the other hand, there is almost live coverage with embedded journalists as headline news every time a protester throws something at the HK police, or every time the HK police throws a teargas canister at protesters.
      - SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
        Iraq is not a former British colony, so unfortunately it's of limited interest to British people.
        selimthegrim 7y ago
        You must be joking. Who ran things there before 1936-41? Who built the airbase at Habbaniyah and was gassing people way before Saddam?
  - ivankolev 7y ago
    Everyone has an agenda, news and comments are product of people and people are inherently subjective. Moreover, much of written history, as the adage go, is documented by the victors. And even if you try to take it on you to read from broader sources and rank them by some kind of elusive objective reputation, you are still biased in trying to reconsile them with your prior system of belief about how world works. I think it is still better to have access to the other point of view, and as one frenchman once said, even if you don't agree with a point of view, you should defend the right to be able to say it.
  - pomeabroad 7y ago
    Are any of the other countries with significant protests also colonies of the UK until recent decades? The HK-UK history clearly influences the significance of that event for the BBC’s audience. Do you have other examples?
  - GoblinSlayer 7y ago
    >raltive importance of reporting in order to manipulate public opinion. Well, state your bias? Why did you formulate it as "against China" and not "for people of Hongkong"?
bouncycastle 7y ago
No, you're thinking of Fox News & Daily Mail. Sure, there is some criticism of BBC news, but I don't think you could ever compare it to the junk filled propaganda machine that is RT.
- oarsinsync 7y ago
  They both speak for a particular segment of the population, but do not represent the country as a whole by any means, in either case. EDIT: for clarity, I wasn't suggesting the BBC did either.
- Synaesthesia 7y ago
  I read a lot of RT. Many of their articles are just international reports like AP news and stuff. Don’t really see a lot of propaganda.
  - bouncycastle 7y ago
    Yeah, of course they have to drop some real articles to look legit. The propaganda is what's in between Eg. Today's home page, first headline "Russia's 'secret weapon' for winning influence in Africa – and it's not what you might think". Then have a look at the op-ed pieces that are basically hit-pieces disguised as journalism. Also, there are things that they do not report (or omit) which is what you should be most concerned about.
    - Synaesthesia 7y ago
      This is in every kind of newspaper. You have to learn to discern propaganda from news and learn judgement.
- pnako 7y ago
  Sure, there is some criticism of RT, but I don't think you could ever compare it to the junk filled propaganda machine that is BBC news.
- ultraism 7y ago
isostatic 7y ago
World News TV that you get in international hotels is a commercial arm, it's purpose is like CNN international. World Service - mainly radio, but also TV, is to deliver a UK viewpoint to the world - traditionally "the colonies".
olivermarks 7y ago
Interesting this was down voted. Presumably HN readers don't think this is accurate? From what I know of the BBC I would say this is a fair comment and that TOR might be needed for people who want to get the UK gov viewpoint in places hostile to their policies, views and positions

BBC World News has a similar purpose as Voice of America (VOA) and Russia Today (RT). The purpose is to deliver the viewpoint of the UK to other countries, such as Iran, Russia, China.

Zenst 7y ago

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/bbc/ https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/bbc/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/history/story/2007/02/070123_html_1990s.shtml http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/history/story/2007/02/0701...

ArchieLeach 7y ago
The BBC is quite subtle. It's not fake news and what they report is factual, but the choice of what facts to report makes it crystal clear that they do have an agenda. A current example: Hongkong. They have headline reporting every time there is a protest while other protests in other countries, and arguably much more significant protests, barely get a mention. This is not a coincidence. Edit: A lot of the replies to this comment try to rationalise. This is being willfully blind. Noam Chomsky has written a lot about the issue of raltive importance of reporting in order to manipulate public opinion. This is exactly what is happening because it should be obvious to everyone that there is a campaign against China ongoing.
- Zenst 7y ago
  Hasn't the HongKong protests been going on for a while and with changing dynamics in protests and response. BBC reported many protests, is there one in particular that should of been more reported upon that springs to mind - for me, nope. https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=protests https://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=protests Sure choice of facts and style can and does show a middle-left bias, but as for agenda. If it is that crystal clear, then what is it! I will say though, the trend of media outlets to report opinions of interviewers as news and for the populus to take those avenues of news and run with them as facts, has been something that plays out upon social media. This then as we have seen, is used by news outlets as sources of news (ala Tweets have becomes news sources now). This does create the potential for massive feedback loops. But then, no media outlet seems immune to that.
- have_faith 7y ago
  Hong Kong is a very recent former British colony, the nature of the protests are unique and there's a large public interest in the Hong Kong protests specifically. This doesn't mean the BBC isn't biased, but the number of articles isn't an indication of bias in the way that people would normally use the term I think. How are you measuring the significance of protests against each other to figure out which deserve more or less attention?
  - blaser-waffle 7y ago
    Bingo. HK was a colony and there are a lot of British citizens who became that way via that colonial dominion. It's more relevant to the UK than, say, protests in Peru.
- spoovy 7y ago
  They absolutely do lie. I found a few examples within a couple of weeks when I was really looking a few years ago. It was not long after Trump was elected and I found them all in about two weeks. I saw an article on the BBC news site reporting on the French National Front's plan to refuse school places to the children of illegal immigrants. The BBC changed "illegal immigrants" to "foreigners". Multiple times throughout the article (at every point in fact) this change was made; clearly not accidental and clearly designed to demonise the French NF by misreporting their policy. Another; I also saw an headline on the BBC news site along the lines of "Trump separates mother from child". On reading the article it was a sad case of illegal immigrants caught in the US. The problem being that Trump had literally nothing to do with it, he hadn't even been inaugurated at that point and the unfortunate mother and child were caught up in longstanding legislation. Trump featured again in one where he referenced some Mexican drug cartel -- known for decapitating their rivals -- as animals. The BBC reported it as "Trump refers to Mexicans as 'animals'". It pains me to say it but the BBC is certainly not above outright fake news to forward their agenda.
- mschuster91 7y ago
  > A current example: Hongkong. They have headline reporting every time there is a protest while other protests in other countries, and arguably much more significant protests, barely get a mention. This is not a coincidence. Hong Kong is a former British colony with international importance, Chile is not.
- joosters 7y ago
  Can you give a recent example of a significant protest that lacks a BBC news story?
  - ArchieLeach 7y ago
    I haven't said that they are not reported. It's the relative importance given that is obvious. 150+ people have died in Iraq over the last month during wide scale protests. There is an article on this on the BBC's website. On the other hand, there is almost live coverage with embedded journalists as headline news every time a protester throws something at the HK police, or every time the HK police throws a teargas canister at protesters.
    - SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
      Iraq is not a former British colony, so unfortunately it's of limited interest to British people.
      - selimthegrim 7y ago
        You must be joking. Who ran things there before 1936-41? Who built the airbase at Habbaniyah and was gassing people way before Saddam?
- ivankolev 7y ago
  Everyone has an agenda, news and comments are product of people and people are inherently subjective. Moreover, much of written history, as the adage go, is documented by the victors. And even if you try to take it on you to read from broader sources and rank them by some kind of elusive objective reputation, you are still biased in trying to reconsile them with your prior system of belief about how world works. I think it is still better to have access to the other point of view, and as one frenchman once said, even if you don't agree with a point of view, you should defend the right to be able to say it.
- pomeabroad 7y ago
  Are any of the other countries with significant protests also colonies of the UK until recent decades? The HK-UK history clearly influences the significance of that event for the BBC’s audience. Do you have other examples?
- GoblinSlayer 7y ago
  >raltive importance of reporting in order to manipulate public opinion. Well, state your bias? Why did you formulate it as "against China" and not "for people of Hongkong"?

bouncycastle 7y ago

No, you're thinking of Fox News & Daily Mail. Sure, there is some criticism of BBC news, but I don't think you could ever compare it to the junk filled propaganda machine that is RT.

oarsinsync 7y ago
They both speak for a particular segment of the population, but do not represent the country as a whole by any means, in either case. EDIT: for clarity, I wasn't suggesting the BBC did either.
Synaesthesia 7y ago
I read a lot of RT. Many of their articles are just international reports like AP news and stuff. Don’t really see a lot of propaganda.
- bouncycastle 7y ago
  Yeah, of course they have to drop some real articles to look legit. The propaganda is what's in between Eg. Today's home page, first headline "Russia's 'secret weapon' for winning influence in Africa – and it's not what you might think". Then have a look at the op-ed pieces that are basically hit-pieces disguised as journalism. Also, there are things that they do not report (or omit) which is what you should be most concerned about.
  - Synaesthesia 7y ago
    This is in every kind of newspaper. You have to learn to discern propaganda from news and learn judgement.
pnako 7y ago
Sure, there is some criticism of RT, but I don't think you could ever compare it to the junk filled propaganda machine that is BBC news.
ultraism 7y ago

isostatic 7y ago

World News TV that you get in international hotels is a commercial arm, it's purpose is like CNN international. World Service - mainly radio, but also TV, is to deliver a UK viewpoint to the world - traditionally "the colonies".

olivermarks 7y ago

Interesting this was down voted. Presumably HN readers don't think this is accurate? From what I know of the BBC I would say this is a fair comment and that TOR might be needed for people who want to get the UK gov viewpoint in places hostile to their policies, views and positions