Bbc : Biased Broadcasting Corporation

[Chekhov]

3 hours ago, Tyke02 said:

I found the Tim Harford programme is still online here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0bk8lmz

 

I've summarised the key points of the conversation below:

 

The piece starts around three minutes in on the link above and is a conversation with Emma Monk (he also credits a named actuary and a named health economist with contributions).  First they establish that the 17,000 number comes from death certificate data and it's the number of people who had only covid on their death certificate.

 

03:15 he mentions a relative (so it's not always an uncle) who got diabetes in 1992, and still runs 5ks (not marathons) in his late seventies.  He asks Monk whether, if he died having got covid, the cause of death would be diabetes.  Monk answers that that would make no sense, then illustrates examples where some the comorbidities could actually have been as a result of covid infection.

 

- no long pause, leaving it hanging, with the implication you suggested, but a clear question and answer -

 

05:12 Harford asks about people with covid who actually died because of their comorbidities. Monk refers him to death certificate date through the pandemic up to then that shows 80-90% had covid as the underlying cause.

 

- so no claim that it was all of them, but an evidence based comment about what proportion it was -

 

Monk goes on to comment that if people have their doubts about death certificate data, this is also supported by counting excess deaths.

 

- it seems I was right to question the accuracy of your remembered scraps of stuff off the radio-

 

>>so no claim that it was all of them<<

 

I never said he said it was all of them.

I said he underplayed the co-morbidities which he did by bringing up his relative (probably his uncle, it always is....).

Quite apart from anything else he is supposed to be taking the part of a statistician, not personalising stuff to tug at the heart strings, but it was typical of his pro suppression agenda.

As for death certificate data I am very cynical about that. As I have mentioned before, when my father in law died they just listed everything that was wrong with him.

 

That programme used to come on when I was driving to swimming (when I was ****ing allowed to that is) so I heard it a lot. The whole tenor of Harford was obviously in favour of suppression. I'll bet Harford doesn't swim 3 or 4 times a week, and that is relevant because people's attitude to the suppression of society very much depended on how it affected them, or didn't in the case of some people who liked working from home and/or being sat on their arses getting 80% of their salary, esp if they had no kids losing out on their education

Edited December 2, 2022 by Chekhov

[RJRB]

9 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

My recounted story of the BBC interviewer and the French politician is not hear say, it happened, in fact I am pretty sure I'd have commented on it on here somewhere.

 

>>If you have a link for the story you mentioned I'll be happy to read it and comment.<<

 

This story is arguably evidence of bias on its own, but what makes it certain is it was on the main news Home page at the time.

 

Finlay MacNab: The footballer living with long Covid

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-london-59039726

Look on the main BBC news site any day of the week and there will be stories of a comparatively minor nature compared to world affairs.

It takes a particular mindset to then use a particular editorial decision to confirm BBC bias.

On another day there will be other items that represent your priorities.

 

[Tyke02]

8 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

This story is arguably evidence of bias on its own, but what makes it certain is it was on the main news Home page at the time.

 

Finlay MacNab: The footballer living with long Covid

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-london-59039726

That's wierd, because on November 6, 2021 the wayback machine has it in the same place as it is now, the London regional page: https://web.archive.org/web/20211106004126/https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-england-london-59039726

Are you saying the BBC had it posted in two different places?

 

It looks like a human interest story about long term issues that have interrupted someone's life following infection for over  year.  Given that there are more than a million people in that situation in this country this year a number of news outlets have reported on the issue, e.g. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/06/more-than-1m-people-report-long-covid-in-uk-a-year-after-infection

or https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/10/06/record-one-28-people-now-believe-have-long-covid/

 

One from each end of the political spectrum, and one from the middle.  Where's the bias?

25 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

My recounted story of the BBC interviewer and the French politician is not hear say, it happened, in fact I am pretty sure I'd have commented on it on here somewhere.

hearsay

 

noun

1. information received from other people which cannot be substantiated

[Tyke02]

23 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

I know what  heard, or rather did not hear, from Harford.

Apparently not in this case. It was about death statistics, not lockdown.

24 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

That programme consistently had questions and answers promoting the "fact" suppression was the correct course. It very rarely had anything on in the other direction, like my question to them "why has Scotland had worse Covid stats than England when they kept their mask mandate and we did not ?". 

It isn't bias to examine statistical evidence and arrive at logical conclusions.  Perhaps, unlike you, he understood why the England/Scotland stuff proves nothing.  Failing to platform something for which there is not good evidence is also not bias.

28 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

In fact I can remember them having Spiegelhalter on, who is a statistician not a politician or a virologist, yet he was effectively espousing the suppression strategy with some of his answers.

I can't be bothered to track down another unreferenced claim, I've seen enough.

[Tyke02]

29 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

I said he underplayed the co-morbidities which he did by bringing up his relative (probably his uncle, it always is....).

Quite apart from anything else he is supposed to be taking the part of a statistician, not personalising stuff to tug at the heart strings, but it was typical of his pro suppression agenda.

The programme said that 80-90% of deaths had been classified as covid being the underlying cause of death.  As I said, if you don't trust the doctors you can compare those figures for the figures on excess deaths and find they are closely correlated.

 

Solid data sources and logical analysis do not in themselves constitute an agenda.

 

29 minutes ago, Chekhov said:

The whole tenor of Harford was obviously in favour of suppression

...or it might have been based on data and logic, because that's where the evidence led him.  

Edited December 2, 2022 by Tyke02

[trastrick]

3 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

Someone needs to remember that they said "...gullible great unwashed audience...".

You added "...gullible..." for a reason. 

 

In your country, what would the reaction from a stranger be when you tell them that they are a members of  the 'great unwashed'?

In your country, what would the reaction from a stranger be when you tell them that they are 'gullible'?

In your country, what would be the reaction from a stranger be when you tell them that they are a members of  the "...gullible great unwashed..."?

 

 

 

 

I don't go around opening a conversation with strangers with those topics!

 

Who does?

 

Do you?

 

What a crazy concept!

 

 

 

 

Edited December 2, 2022 by trastrick

[Magilla]

23 minutes ago, trastrick said:

I don't go around opening a conversation with strangers with those topics!

Except on a public forum, literally filled with strangers!

 

Probably the reason the responses contain the same incredulity as they would if you did it in person.

[Annie Bynnol]

21 minutes ago, trastrick said:

I don't go around opening a conversation with strangers with those topics!

Who does?

Do you?

They are not 'topics' they are words you used to describe a significant section of the British public.

 

People anywhere know that to refer to others as the "...gullible great unwashed...." is an insult.

For a foreigner in a foreign country thousands of miles away, who has only recently has been able to access more than a tiny fraction of BBC output, to formulate an opinion that BBC viewers, readers and listeners are a "...gullible great unwashed audience...." is an insult.

[Dromedary]

1 hour ago, Annie Bynnol said:

....

People anywhere know that to refer to others as the "...gullible great unwashed...." is an insult.

So was referring to those who voted leave in the referendum as uneducated, thick racists but that didn't stop those who were better educated from saying that either!

 

[top4718]

It's no surprise that those who think (or pretend, to save face) that the BBC is some bastion of truth were the same dimwits who believe the biggest racket foisted on the human race (covid) to be true, no surprise at all. They're welcome to it.