The BBC needs to look to history if it wishes to regain the nation’s adulation
For so long, the BBC was considered an institution. Its celebrated presenters numbered such giants as Richard Dimbleby and Alan Whicker and its programming was lauded throughout the world. Sadly today, this license payer funded broadcaster has sunk into the mire and is instead dominated by a self-obsessed clique that has not learnt from the lessons of the disgrace that the likes of Rolf Harris and Jimmy Savile piled upon it.
Whilst one cannot doubt the stature of the likes of David Attenborough and Jeremy Paxman, few other presenters working for an organisation that was once so favourable referred to as ‘Auntie’ are of any note. Programming is dominated by reality shows, lowbrow dramas and weak news coverage and in spite of the vast sums spent, much of what is put on air is frankly unwatchable.
With a 2008 conviction for assaulting, imprisoning and threatening a Norwegian with a sex toy, Boy George personifies where this public service broadcaster gets it so wrong. Paid a rumoured £300,000 salary to present The Voice by ‘The Club’, this man cannot be described as a good role model and should not have been selected as the replacement for the legendary Sir Tom Jones. If Boy George truly is what the corporation considers ‘right’, what can one expect next? Will the Beeb welcome back the recently released child abuser Stuart Hall with open arms next? He, after all, like Boy George, has served his time and Jonathan King also, on that basis, could be given another chance.
‘Auntie’, however, could take a different and correct path redeem herself: She could reel out some fresh talent and she also could urge her presenters to look to history. As Libby Purves pointed out in a serenade to the late Cliff Michelmore in today’s Daily Mail: “[He was] a trouper who used the medium not as an ego trip or a shortcut to wealth and fame, but as a shared window on everything there is to see and know”. It is time the BBC returned to just that and it is time it put down the egomaniacs.
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You’ll eat your words when Rolf Harris is FREE from jail. You make me sick you bastard Matthew Steeples. Do you not know how upsetting this is to Rolf, Alwen and Bindi? Rolf did NOTHING, he was NOT there and the women are just dirty woodworms. Boy George did NOTHING and the prostitute got what he was there for and then cried rape to make money from a modern day genius. ROLF HARRIS IS INNOCENT and BOY GEORGE WAS FRAMED. F**k you all.
Jerk!
Harris has got 7 more charges to answer. I doubt he will get bail even if he gets to his relase date. Thanks for the news from the Harris front and his fellow travellers including you. I an delighted he is upset but that’s what getting prison for convictions of child abuse means. I believe he will turn his toes up in prison and leave in a casket. Roll on the day when that abuser departs this world. I would hardly call O’Dowd a genius. Here is a quote from his Wiki.
“On 23 December 2009, George had his request to appear on the final series of Celebrity Big Brother (to be broadcast on Channel 4) turned down by the Probation Service. Richard Clayton QC, representing the Probation Service, said George’s participation would pose “a high level of risk” to the service’s reputation. Clayton argued that if he used the show to promote his status as a celebrity and earn “a lucrative sum of money” it could undermine public confidence in the criminal justice system.[37].
The BBC fail to listen.
Here is another quote.
“In January 2009, George was sentenced to 15 months in prison for falsely imprisoning a male escort (Auden Carlsen) by handcuffing him to a wall and beating him with a metal chain.”
Hardly a genius but a thoroughly despicable individual.
The BBC fail to listen.
I once watched a wonderful documentary about Alan Whicker’s wartime experiences as a war reporter often operating well behind enemy lines. On one occasion he rounded a sharp corner on a mountain road in his Jeep to find himself facing an entire Italian armoured division. Faced with a choice of selecting his revolver or his camera he jumped out of the Jeep with his Leica in hand and started to take pictures. True to form the Italians dropped their guns and started combing their hair to pose for the photoshoot. After a friendly exchange and some expressos brewed in one of the tanks, they offered to surrender to him and he led them back to the British lines like Dick Whittington. What a man. Matthew is so right, the BBC used to employ larger than life characters like Whicker as presenters and now we have scumbags like Boy George. Makes me weep for this country and how we must be viewed abroad.
Sadly, we are viewed with amused disdain. How the mighty have fallen
I remember as a ten year old having supper at the Hyde Park Hotel, Buttery Bar.
How wonderful the Hyde Park was in those days. The vile Forte family had not managed to get it and it still had all the original period furniture(Forte flogged it all off in dubious circs)
It makes me nostalgic thinking of London in those days. The only foreigners were elegant and educated.
Anyway, Wayde meanders…
Of course, it was de rigeur to look elegant and well dressed and Cliff Mitchemore was the embodiment of elegance.
My aunt told me I could go and politely ask Mr Mitchelmore for his autograph, which I did with great trepidation.
He could not have been more charming. A great man and a loss to broadcasting.
Matthew, what concerns me I have some R Harris art work, how does that leave me? Sadly this is not signed and hope for a visit with a pen!
There are two reason to ban the Rolf Harris man. First his comments about the victims are unpleasant. Second, beyond his King Charles’s Head, he has nothing to say.
Well, THIS has been quite the collection of comments, hasn’t it? As my mother used to opine, it would be a boring old world if we were all the same.
To the point of my comment… I absolutely LOVE the heading of the article, Matthew. “Upping the Auntie”. A play on the double meaning of “up” (I upped my income. Up yours) and the play on ante/Auntie. All done in three words. Very amusing, thanks.
Is it true to be able to work for the BBC you must belong to the Kiddy Fiddlers club first?
Obviously time for a new broom at The Beeb…….(Who ARE the morons responsible for the latest and ridiculous idiocy, the Boy George contract….?)
Well Rolf Harris is Innocent, you are doing your client no favours with your crazy rantings, I suppose the latest 7 new charges against this pervert are all made up as well?
As for Boy George, well just look at the evidence that was presented against him, and he did plead guilty to get a lesser sentence. So if you want to plead your case against both these Pervs, please try and say something sensible instead of going off like an Atlas rocket.