A Place to Stand

  Well after 8 days the BBC have replied to my letter objecting to the episode of Scotland's Changing Climate being devoted entirely to the global warming scare story & the BBC's refusal to allow any programme giving the opposite view or even to allow broadcasting of any debate on the subject. My original is here.

    Here is their response & my reply:
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Dear Neil – further to Iain Stewart’s reply. Firstly, we categorically did not spend a whole hour alleging catastrophic climate change. Two-thirds of it was about how Scotland's economy became dependent on carbon-based fuels like coal and oil during the late 18th and 19th centuries. We used the word 'catastrophic' once and in the context of humanity making no attempts to combat global warming. Re impartiality and balance. We are obliged under the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines to give ‘due impartiality’ when discussing controversial subjects. This does not necessarily require the range of perspectives or opinions to be covered in equal proportions either across the output as a whole, or within a single programme. We seek to achieve due weight which means that minority views should not necessarily be given equal weight to the prevailing consensus. As Iain pointed out in his reply, there is an overwhelming agreement among geoscientists and climate scientists that human activity is a significant contributing factor. Therefore it is unnecessary for the BBC to either apologise or show an additional ‘balancing’ programme as this would give equal weight to what is clearly a minority view.




As for the experiment, I strongly reject your suggestion that one of the bottles was "allegedly filled with C02"; it contained C02. Secondly, its purpose was not to show "actual increase" as you suggest, but to demonstrate John Tyndall’s experiment and the discovery that some gases warm more than others.

Richard Downes

Series Producer, BBC Factual

Zone 2.21-2.26, BBC Scotland, 40 Pacific Quay, Glasgow G51 1DA
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Dear Richard,
                      I note your contention that the programme did not promote the contention of catastrophic global warming because you only once said "Unchecked, climate change could be catastrophic". In the same way my letter only used the term "global warming" once but it would be equally foolish for you to say that it was not about the BBC reporting of alleged global warming. In \Orwell's 1984 there may have been posters containing nothing but the words "Big Brother is watching" but most propaganda aims for something slightly more subtle. Perhaps you could point me to some occasion when a BBC representative has said that the production of some foreign company could not possibly be described as propaganda because in an hour's broadcast it contained more than 1 word. Indeed if you are sincere in your claim you certainly must be easily able to & I ask you to within the next 48 hours.

     I note your claim that the BBC, if not wholly, completely & totally corrupt, adheres to your guidelines to show "due impartiality". As an organisation which, undeniably, lies & continuously censors reporting of racial massacres for the deliberate purpose of assisting (ex-)Nazis  in the practice of racial genocide, I do not think anybody in the BBC can claim the guidelines are treated honestly in the political sphere. In what is alleged to be the scientific sphere I note that the BBC has collectively broadcast many tens of thousands of hours of material promoting the warming scare. If your claim to "due" balance is true then, if you can point to 1 single programme where the BBC has given unfettered time to the sceptical view the balance of scientific opinion must run at least 10.000 to 1 for alarmism. Can you name one such BBC programme? Since 31,000 scientists have signed a petition denying alarmism can you name at least 310,000,000 scientists who support alarmism. Can you? Indeed can you even, as Professor Stewart has been unable to, name 2 scientists, from among the large majority not paid by government, who support alarmism? If the BBC claims to be even 0.0000001% honest you will certainly be able to. Again I think it reasonable for you to do so within 48 hours.
     
     I must ask you how the term giving  "due weight" to "minority" views is specifically interpreted since your answer has been that in this case & therefore presumably in all others "due weight" means "almost total censorship of"? Unless you have information to the contrary that must be the default assumption. Of course that definition is politically compatible with, indeed almost the definition of, fascism.

    If the BBC wish to claim that their definition of "due weight" means anything other than total censorship you will be able to say, within48 hours, when the decision not to broadcast formal debates on "global warming" (or indeed any other subject of public interest) or even report the results of such debates was rescinded?

   As regards the 2 points which I raised as being wholly & deliberately factually untrue:

1)  The reason I used "allegedly" was because the programme was unspecific about the bottle being purely CO2 though I made that assumption I also used the qualifier. I am pleased you have confirmed that the bottle was indeed 100% CO2. In that case you will be happy to publicly agree that, by your experiment, the amount of warming to be expected by current changes is of the order of 0.00025 C. I thank you for the confirmation.

2) I note that you make no retraction, either here or on air, of the claim that the law of gravity is  more doubted than the global warming scare & that this remains an example of the very highest standard of honesty to which any employee of the BBC ever, under any circumstances, aspires.. Looking out of the window you may note snow lying on the ground. This clearly supports the gravity theory since otherwise it would not lie. I would also say its presence is at least strong negative evidence for the theory that we are experiencing dangerous warming

If you wish to dispute the accuracy of my conclusions from your letter I await your response within 48 hours.

UPDATE The BBC officially acknowledge that none of the evidence I asked for which would disprove the apparent lying of the BBC or prove that the BBC is less than 99.9999999% corrupt can be produced & that the basis of discussion must be that they are.
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Labels: eco-fascism, global warming, Media