WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN?

As they did with the EU and the NHS, metropolitan progressives refuse to listen to criticisms of the BBC.

The British public aren't expected to clap or dance for the BBC just yet, like they did for the NHS during the first COVID lockdown, but you get the impression that its most ardent supporters would like to see that enforced...if not by law then by social approval or disapproval. With the news that the government intends to scrap the television licence fee by 2027 the BBC faithful...which seems to be made up almost entirely of current BBC staff, especially those who get paid six or seven figure sums to work there...are taking to social media to a) bemoan how terrible the government are for doing this and b) what good value for money the BBC is.

More than ever before in its history, that narrative is being challenged by the public. There are many, legitimate, questions to ask the BBC, government and opposition. Is the Licence Fee fit for purpose? Is it right to prosecute people for not paying it when they don't watch or listen to BBC output? Should a state broadcaster cater for all sections of society instead of just one part of it and, here's the question they really don't want to answer, reflect the majority demographic and social attitudes of the country? You can question should the BBC exist? How should it exist in a multi-channel media environment and if it is to continue what funding model should it follow and what should it produce? People outside of the BBC have been pondering those questions for years now. People inside it refuse to countenance such talk.

There are more people who'd like to see a reformed, slimmed down BBC continue than those who want it disbanded entirely but the BBC defenders won't tolerate any criticism of it. We've been here before with other institutions that people ran out of patience with: Namely the European Union and the National Health Service. I've long maintained that Brexit was a 30 year process beginning in or around 1989. That was when it was announced that the Common Market or European Economic Community or just European Community would change to being the European Union with its own parliament, proposed flag, anthem and system of government that would supersede individual national ones. It was the first time I'd heard the plan to transform the community of sovereign states into a European super state. I wasn't the only one; others heard that plan as well and witnessed the events of 1992 with grave suspicion: The seeds of Brexit were planted. Then, over the course of the next two decades until 2016, there were other moments that drove a wedge between those in favour of the EU and its goals and those who were becoming more Eurosceptic. The term "Eurosceptic" is revealing, providing you pay close attention to its meaning: It means sceptical about the European Project for full unification. It did not mean Europhobic. It meant that the trading, common market side of the EU was still looked on as being useful for the country, maybe stick with the less red tape in getting around the place, but the overarching, top down style of government where a national parliament played second fiddle to the European one, whose workings were opaque and unresponsive to the electorate, with the goal of creating one country out of 28 was opposed. Euroscepticism was about setting red lines that could not be crossed whilst continuing to remain in the EU. At any stage between 1989 and 2016 Brexit could have been nipped in the bud if only the EU and its steadfast defenders had listened to people's concerns about it. Had the Danish not re-run the Maastricht Treaty referendum because the rejection of it by the Danes was "not the right result", had the Irish, French and Dutch governments not done similar things with the Lisbon Treaty in order to force it on their citizens, had Prime Minister David Cameron not failed to re-negotiate the UK's membership of the EU in the face of a dismissive and smug EU President, Jean-Claude Juncker, then the referendum result might have gone the other way...maybe there wouldn't have been a referendum at all. In short, had the concerns of British voters been heeded and addressed then the EU wouldn't have lost a member.

Likewise the goodwill towards the NHS, the UK's modern secular religion, has taken serious hits since the COVID crisis but in reality it had been taking hits for years over its incompetence at managerial level and increasing demands for yet more money to be given to it. As patients don't get the non-COVID treatment they desperately need or even manage to get to see or speak to a GP, the feelings many have towards the NHS is turning to resentment and anger. People speak up, wanting to be heard, only to be shouted down, ignored or told to dance and clap.

Now it's the turn of the BBC to feel that public resentment towards it and, once more, they're not listening or paying attention. The common theme is the deliberate deafness and contempt for the people all three of those organisations were meant to serve. Those in charge and their supporters will not listen to complaints or criticisms, will not brook opposition and will not compromise one single bit. They're right, you're wrong and that's all there is to it.

This all stems from what the American philosopher, Thomas Sowell, calls "The Vision Of The Anointed". A generation of politicians, civil servants and administrators all believe that only they have the answer to the world's problems. It's not co-incidental that they all basically share the same political outlook as well for the modern day progressive Left consider themselves as to be the only ones fit to rule. Where once matters were addressed through Dialectics; the points of thesis-antithesis-synthesis, they became decided through Didactics. Clinton's "Third Way", Blairism, Obama's "wrong side of history". They were always right and if you disagree then you'll be bypassed and told you're confined to the dustbin of history. This smug know-it-all homogenised attitude trickled down through all layers of government right down to civil servants and administrators and, in the case of the BBC, the "talent"...the ones that are desperate to keep the funding model so it pays them their wages, and large ones they are as well.

The result of this is that the intransigence of the progressive Left creates rifts and breaks in society as an agreement can never be reached...unless you agree with them, of course. The BBC have been warned time and time again over many years that they've allowed their news to become biased and skewered towards a Left-Liberal perspective, that their programmes are forcing ideologies on people, especially children and that they hate the hand, society and culture that feeds them. For example, when plans were mooted to drop the patriotic songs from the 2020 Last Night of the Proms; a tradition that reaches back a century and more, there was an outcry and then the BBC denied it was ever considering dropping them (a lie, as attempts to "tone down" that section have been going since around 2005) but instead...as a form of punishment towards those that spoke up against the plans...an atonal deconstruction of Rule Britannia was sung which was met with widespread condemnation. The BBC were unmoved. The corporation also has complaints procedures and even radio shows where the viewers and listeners can air their grievances about various programmes but the pattern is always the same: A show's producer will be told the criticisms and they always just brush it off with a slew of corporate speak.

As with the EU, the BBC has pursued the unmovable agenda and things are, predictably, moving towards the general public giving them a big thumbs down. The response from those working at the BBC and their die hard supporters...people cut from the same cloth as FBPE and "Clap for the NHS"...is that the public are uneducated, probably racist, deplorables and they need to be forced to swallow the medicine the enlightened provide. Years ago the BBC's senior political commentator and interviewer, Andrew Marr, said that it is the job of government to drag the public, kicking and screaming and against their will if needs be, to where they want them to be. It's an attitude of extreme arrogance from a man whose background is Scottish Presbyterian, Maoist, BBC corporate man and who is not above taking out a super injunction to protect his grubby personal life; a measure he would not support others doing unless they were on his side.

One wonders how many more drubbings and losses the metropolitan Left can take before the penny finally drops? How many more viewers and listeners will turn off before they start to listen to them and try to win them back. How much more mileage is left in Project Fear or the need to hurl abuse at those who disagree with them? At the moment I would guess that they'll keep on going with these failed, idiotic strategies which rely on more layers of lies and falsehoods to prop up. There doesn't seem to be anyone with the intelligence or empathy among the ranks of the influential metropolitan Left capable of reaching out and taking time to listen to the growing disenchantment of the public. If only one of them could break ranks and try...but I won't hold my breath.