BBC is biased towards the left, finds study

[-:Undertaker:-]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/10235967/BBC-is-biased-toward-the-left-study-finds.html

BBC is biased toward the left, study finds

The BBC is twice as likely to cover left-wing policy proposals than those that are right-wing, a study has found.


http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01431/BBC_flag_1431736a.jpg
The research questions whether the BBC is truly impartial


The corporation has long been accused of left-wing bias, but now researchers claim to have found statistical evidence that challenges the broadcaster’s claim to fairness.

The BBC are more likely to cover left-wing think tank reports and to hail them as “independent” while giving right-wing research a “health warning” by pointing out its ideological position, the Centre for Policy Studies have found.

Oliver Latham, who compiled the Bias at the Beeb report, said: “Our results suggest the BBC exhibits a left-of-centre bias in both the amount of coverage it gives to different opinions and the way in which these voices are represented.”

The team compared the coverage given to think tanks on the BBC website with that given by the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph.

The BBC covered seven out of ten of the stories on the Guardian, but only mentioned three out of ten reports which had been covered by this newspaper over the set period.

Of reports on four left-of-centre think tanks only one received a health warning - defined as statement of a think tank’s views, ideological position, or connection to a political figure - more than 10 per cent of the time, and one never received a warning.

In comparison, the warning appeared on between 25 and 60 per cent of reports on five right-of-centre organisations.

“In other words, the BBC seems to treat right-of-centre views as being more "extreme" and in need of caveats than roughly equivalent left-of-centre views,” Mr Latham wrote in the Sunday Times.

A similar trend was discovered in the corporation’s tendency to reinforce the views of an organisation by describing them as “independent”.

Three of the left-of-centre organisations were described as independent, compared with just one of the right-wing think tanks.

“The implication seems to be that the BBC sees left-of-centre views as being more reliable than right-of-centre ones. Overall, the picture is that the existing accusations of bias at the BBC are supported by a more dispassionate, quantitative analysis,” Mr Latham said.

He said they could not answer where this slant came from, but added: “The results are consistent with both subconscious "group think" among BBC journalists or a more deliberate left-of-centre bias.”

Mr Latham called on the corporation to be more open to criticism and to respond to it, adding that it was in their “best interest” both because of its commitment to impartiality and because if a media organisation “loses its reputation for balanced reporting is also likely to lose its ability to influence and persuade the public”.

Previous research has also found evidence of a bias, for example on the Today programme roughly twice as much coverage was given to pro-EU voices as anti-EU.

But the research was all based upon specific case studies rather than a broad approach, the team claim.

Tim Knox, Director of the Centre for Policy Studies, itself a right-of-centre think tank, said: “This is the first statistical evidence of the bias.”

Despite heated debate over bias at the BBC it remains the most trusted news organisation in Britain, polls suggest.

In response to the research a corporation spokesperson said: “BBC News is required to provide impartial and independent coverage, reporting on a range of views.

"It is policed by the BBC Trust, its own editorial guidelines and its audiences. We have yet to see the report and it doesn't appear that the authors have contacted us about it, but will respond when it is published."

In other news, the Pope is a Catholic and pigs don't fly - tell me something I don't know. But you know, it's really time the gold plated reputation of the BBC was knifed because it's anything but on a variety of issues - and that's not just the CPS who say so, numerous BBC presenters and even BBC Chairman have admitted a bias in the past (and i'll provide the links if anyone requests).

All this said, I think Sky News are pretty much just as bad - especially when it comes to foreign policy positions: that's why I much prefer RT for foreign news because, although they're biased, at least it's less well done than the BBC/Sky.

Thoughts?

[Kardan]

Whilst I'm not disagreeing with the hypothesis, the 'statistics' do seem a bit confusing.

The BBC covered seven out of ten of the stories on the Guardian, but only mentioned three out of ten reports which had been covered by this newspaper over the set period.

So they just picked 10 stories on each website, and the BBC had 7 the same as the Guardian and 3 the same as the Telegraph. And that's it. That's all the testing they did? That's like me saying if I flip a coin 10 times and get 10 heads, it must be a 100% heads coin :P

[-:Undertaker:-]

Whilst I'm not disagreeing with the hypothesis, the 'statistics' do seem a bit confusing.

The BBC covered seven out of ten of the stories on the Guardian, but only mentioned three out of ten reports which had been covered by this newspaper over the set period.

So they just picked 10 stories on each website, and the BBC had 7 the same as the Guardian and 3 the same as the Telegraph. And that's it. That's all the testing they did? That's like me saying if I flip a coin 10 times and get 10 heads, it must be a 100% heads coin :P

Not sure they're referring to just the website, i'd suspect the actual programming - but you'd have to look into the methodology in the report by CPS which is probably on their website. I would say this though as it's reminded me - it was remarked by somebody within the BBC at one point that basically the editorial line for political programmes were virtually taken out of the latest edition of the Guardian newspaper and that's how it was done ... bare in mind that the Guardian is a very low circulation newspaper (it actually makes a yearly loss) and is firmly to the left of the political spectrum.

I know, whoever is interested in reading more, Mark Thompson (former Director General), Peter Sissons (former news presenter) and Andrew Marr are amongst the most prominent who have remarked on the bias the BBC has in its television/radio/news programmes.

[Chippiewill]

A far from scientific methodology. It basically says the BBC is more like the Guardian than it is like the Telegraph. To progress from that to asserting a left bias is unjustified.

[-:Undertaker:-]

A far from scientific methodology. It basically says the BBC is more like the Guardian than it is like the Telegraph. To progress from that to asserting a left bias is unjustified.

The Beeb admits it itself, check the names i've listed for you.

It's obvious to anybody who watches - unless you just read the Guardian and watch BBC.

[Chippiewill]

It's obvious to anybody who watches - unless you just read the Guardian and watch BBC.
People who consume right-leaning media will always view a centre organisation as left-leaning just as people who consume left-leaning media will always view a centre organisation as right leaning.

The Beeb admits it itself.

A small selection of people who worked for the BBC in the past is hardly compelling evidence.

[FlyingJesus]

Does it really matter anyway? Can't force or expect them to be totally in the middle since centrist is also a political position, it's impossible not to have a leaning of some sort unless they magically stop reporting on anything political

[-:Undertaker:-]

People who consume right-leaning media will always view a centre organisation as left-leaning just as people who consume left-leaning media will always view a centre organisation as right leaning.

I don't think there is such a thing as 'the centre' - as Peter Hitchens has remarked before, the opinions of the 'centre' or the 'centre right' are usually the same as those on the left. That said, your missing the point - political bias is only a tiny part of BBC bias as much of it is cultural and social and is linked in with its programmes rather than it's news channel. Look at the social, moral and cultural attitudes displayed in its programmes over the years towards subjects such as drugs, abortion, teenage pregnancies, homosexuality, adultary and so on. It's a lot more sutle than simply giving the Labour Party more coverage than say the Conservative Party.

I'll just give one example though of bias with the BBC that's away from the right/left debate (well, sort of) - foreign reporting. When the Arab Spring kicked off and there were protests everywhere, did you and do you still notice how the BBC refers to the Syrian Government as 'the regime' (often in a harsh vocal tone) and reported on it heavily - whereas in nearby Saudi Arabia (also a unelected government, some would argue that is much more harsh) virtually nothing was reported on and the Saudi Government to this day is still reported as 'the Saudi Government' rather than the 'regime' or 'dictator' as Assad is referred to?

In foreign policy the BBC is just as bad as most of the western papers and news channels in terms of pro-governent bias btw, but just thought this would be one good example to show how something that may seem unbiased actually is biased in what it doesn't say rather than what it does say. Watch RT foreign coverage (pro-Russian government thus pro-Assad stance taken) and you'll get what I mean.


A small selection of people who worked for the BBC in the past is hardly compelling evidence.

I think when the likes of Mark Thompson (former Director-General of the BBC), Andrew Marr (senior political reporter) and Peter Sissons (senior news correspondant for many years) comment on BBC bias it's pretty worthy of some thought.

From the horse's mouth as they say. :P


Does it really matter anyway? Can't force or expect them to be totally in the middle since centrist is also a political position, it's impossible not to have a leaning of some sort unless they magically stop reporting on anything political

Not at all, I welcome bias - it's pretty much impossible not to be.

The point is - the BBC isn't the great unbiased media organisation people think it is, and it should be privatised.

[Grig]

well, it is the media, no surprise there.

Take any media channel and I can tell you that they are biased one way or another. You never win. Here's an analysis I did last year of a couple of BBC articles for example:



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17703212
In this review I will write about how the BBC covered North Korea’s failed launch of a rocket missile in April this year (2012). The article itself focuses on the condemnation by the Unite Nations over the breach of two UNSC resolutions, 1718 and 1874. It gives the reader a sense of aggressive American rhetoric towards North Korea and it demonstrates the tensions on the Korean peninsula. The article echoes that this test was seen as a threat despite its failure. The story itself is based on rhetoric, which has been going on between the two sides (and America) for decades. This rhetoric is seen as powerful with strong language, particularly with words such as “deplore” and “threatening.” The reporter frames the story of the missile launch as being a threat eliciting punishment by such phrases as “The US has also cancelled a proposed food aid deal with Pyongyang.” The article gives us basic information on the occasion linking to why the rocket was launched. The reporter has split the article into four sections in order to give a more in-depth and clear-cut review of the story, as well as splitting the major themes of the story- reactions, repercussions (by America and its allies) and celebrations (in North Korea).

However, the story is riddled with bias throughout with opinions being extremely one-sided. More specifically, we are repeatedly bombarded with opinions from various American sources such as ‘US ambassador Susan Rice,’ ‘Washington,’ ‘A US National Security Council spokesman,’ ‘Washington’ (again), and the ‘White House spokesman Jay Carney. This clearly shows that BBC coverage of this story was slanting towards an attempt to villianize the DPRK, in line with the spin that they were doing of it being “deplorable”. The article also repeatedly quotes South Korean sources, which again follow the same stance as the US. The article does try to present a more scholarly and neutral view by including comments from Aiden Foster-Carter of Leeds University. However, his views too do have some traces of bias and subjective conclusions by phrases such as “painting themselves into” a corner and “they have made that harder again.” The Korea analyst merely mirrors some of the rhetoric in less direct language, rather than putting the situation into context. The article also goes on to say “Many outside the country saw the launch as an illegal test of long-range missile technology,” which is an extremely generalized proclamation and the reporter should be more specific over who these “many” people are. Also, this statement is not factual based, as it can be twisted the opposite way round, depending on who we define as the “many”.

Furthermore, the North Korean view is practically non-existent. Throughout the entire article, there are only a few extremely brief mentions of the particular incident from the North Korean side and that was the KCN’s (North Korean State News Agency’s) statement that it had failed. This is in line with statement that the KCN originally reported, which was uncharacteristically clear and concise, seeing as they couldn’t cover it up. There is a further North Korean perspective from Kim Yong-nam (North Korea’s Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly), which states that the people of North Korea should respect and protect the new leader. Such a remark suggests that there are continual efforts to solidify his power. The fact that this came from such a high ranking official echoes Pyongyang’s main concern of stability in the transition. However, this statement had practically been buried underneath all the American rhetoric and only appears towards the end of the article, being slightly bland. The report also fails to state the official North Korean reason for such as launch as seen in a KCNA article released a month earlier- http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2012/201203/news16/20120316-32ee.html. In general, there is no balance between the pro-DPRK and anti-DPRK statements. Moreover, China and Russia, North Korea’s two biggest allies are more or less discarded from the article. There is one calling for a resumption of talks that has been regurgitated from earlier statements and gives no new information. There are no explicit views from Pyongyang’s allies over the specific incident.

We are also not presented with any additional information and analysis towards the launch, in terms of what North Korea was aiming to achieve, apart from that it was to mark the celebrations to mark the “100th anniversary of the birth of the state's founder, Kim Il-sung.” The article only provides us with an out-right condemnation, rather than a more objective analysis. The subject itself does have potential to be explored in greater detail. For example, it could go into greater detail on whether Kim Jung-un has been taking a more aggressive stance since he rose into power and if there was any deeper reason for such a move on Kim’s behalf and why were they building up the hype over such a launch: whether it was part of the ‘*** for tat’ policy in reaction to South Korea’s build up or something else. The reporter does present us with some details that the consolidation of power for the young Kim is continuing, which is useful to know in the wider context, seeing as the move of the rocket test may have been linked to that, albeit there is no explicit information stating so in the article. We are also not given the Obama administration’s general policy towards North Korea and only an immediate reaction.

Overall, this story for the BBC in my view is far from their most balanced reporting. It is also interesting to note that the BBC solely uses such language for the this article because it is about North Korea, whilst if we search the BBC archives for articles about other missile launches, such as those by India and South Korea, the language is celebratory. This goes in line with the western view that North Korea is a rogue state and the western media, as witnessed in this article, follows that rhetoric. Interestingly, the BBC did try to bring in more balance with views from different newspapers a day later- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-17715020. Although one cannot claim that such an article is of no use to the reader, as it does give the reader the general details on the rocket launch, as well as a sense of American rhetoric towards North Korea and it demonstrates growing tension.

[myles]

so everyting i see on eastenders is left wing AHHHH

[FlyingJesus]

Yes if you watch Eastenders you're a communist

[Ardemax]

Yes if you watch Eastenders you're a communist

I guess that's another word for it.

[FlyingJesus]

All the necessary letters are there

[-:Undertaker:-]

Yes if you watch Eastenders you're a communist

Propaganda relating to the culture wars (in programmes such as Eastenders, Coronation Street etc) have much more of an effect than any party political propaganda that BBC News may put across. Think about it - most of the storylines in these programmes take culturally left positions on issues from abortion, drugs, homosexuality, marriage & divorce and so on. It's not rocket science.