Thread: A Question of Question Time

The BBC made a big mistake here - not by letting Nick Griffin appear, but in its ham-fisted attempt at ambushing him. It really would have been much better if they had kept to the usual QT format and debated the issues of the day. Nothing exposes a single issue party - extremist or not - quicker and more effectively than engaging them in debate on the full range of issues. It's why the BNP, the Greens and all the fringe parties will never govern; they can only see things through the prism of their particular conceit and they appear trivial and silly. By planting a load of questions about race and immigration and so on, the BBC have not only allowed the BNP to cry "foul", but they also allowed Griffin to play to his strengths (such as they are). The BBC should also have got someone more effective than Jack Straw on - he really was hysterical and useless. He was a left-wing extremist when he was an undergraduate at Leeds University, so it's all a bit hypocritical really.

The more the mainstream political parties and media vilify Griffin and the BNP, the more he is lionised in the eyes of the BNP electorate (and there most definitely is one). The government would do better to identify the issues that are making BNP supporters feel marginalised and address them properly rather than high-handedly refusing to engage the BNP in debate. The media should also drop all this ad hominem stuff about Griffin. His views are eminently "targetable"; there really is no need to attack him personally. It undermines the argument.

Incidentally, I thought only Bonnie Greer and David Dimbleby acquitted themselves at all well. The others need to look up "debate" in a dictionary.

Originally Posted by jaspery

Here's a comment from the Daily Mail.

I was in the QT audience last night. Before we went into the studio for filming we were held in a holding room. (I was in there for over two hours) I was on my own and was never aware you could get multiple tickets. I arrived early and it became very obvious that groups of people were arriving who new each other. I spoke to three different people who worked for an agency who supplied audience people for the BBC.

Before the show the Chairman of the panel came into the holding room and encouraged us to boo and shout if we did not agree with certain things that were said by the panel. He said as we had Griffin on the show, we don't want to miss an opportunity.

This was an organised stitch up by the BBC.

- Peter, Oxford, Oxfordshire, 23/10/2009 10:56

Last week QT was at Hull. There were no holding rooms and the audience was mainly made up of people from Hull, some of whom knew each other but all had applied separately. Apparently there were a few who had travelled because they are QT Groupies (I know, go figure).
I assume (but I don't know) that the BBC would try to separate those from the two counts to try and avoid audience confrontation before the show. There was certainly one gentleman (with glasses) who directed a stream of hatred towards Griffin, I doubt if he would have kept his counsel if he had been cooped up for two hours next to a BNP supporter.
The UAF with there thuggery made sure that it wasn't a normal QT so perhaps that is why the format wasn't quite the norm.
The BBC are incredibly PC but they value their neutrality more than life itself. They would not have orchestrated a stitch up they merely did the best they could given the depths of feeling Nick Griffin rouses. I also feel that a similar QT would have evolved had Anjem Choudary been on the panel.

Originally Posted by vaeviso

The government would do better to identify the issues that are making BNP supporters feel marginalised and address them properly rather than high-handedly refusing to engage the BNP in debate.

The government only take action against British nationals who pay taxes. Anyone else they bumlick around.

Originally Posted by vaeviso

The BBC made a big mistake here - not by letting Nick Griffin appear, but in its ham-fisted attempt at ambushing him. It really would have been much better if they had kept to the usual QT format and debated the issues of the day. Nothing exposes a single issue party - extremist or not - quicker and more effectively than engaging them in debate on the full range of issues. It's why the BNP, the Greens and all the fringe parties will never govern; they can only see things through the prism of their particular conceit and they appear trivial and silly. By planting a load of questions about race and immigration and so on, the BBC have not only allowed the BNP to cry "foul", but they also allowed Griffin to play to his strengths (such as they are). The BBC should also have got someone more effective than Jack Straw on - he really was hysterical and useless. He was a left-wing extremist when he was an undergraduate at Leeds University, so it's all a bit hypocritical really.

The more the mainstream political parties and media vilify Griffin and the BNP, the more he is lionised in the eyes of the BNP electorate (and there most definitely is one). The government would do better to identify the issues that are making BNP supporters feel marginalised and address them properly rather than high-handedly refusing to engage the BNP in debate. The media should also drop all this ad hominem stuff about Griffin. His views are eminently "targetable"; there really is no need to attack him personally. It undermines the argument.

Incidentally, I thought only Bonnie Greer and David Dimbleby acquitted themselves at all well. The others need to look up "debate" in a dictionary.

You lay all the blame at the feet of the BBC, in my view unfairly. The QT format has always been the same: The audience submit the questions not the BBC. Yes the BBC choose who will ask their question but if there are a hundred questions and 75 of them ask the same question, albeit in different ways, then they have no option other than to go with that question. The audience apply to be the audience, they do not have to state their demographics or their political views although obviously, the style of their question can give a clue (they submit their question with their application).
Similarly the Beeb don't choose who the panel will be, they invite the three main parties to submit their choice and choose three panellists to try to create a balance of views. Labour put forward Straw who does come with quite a formidable reputation (probably slightly tarnished after last night's debacle).
Given the BBC had invited Griffin (quite rightly too) it was probably inevitable that there wouldn't be a balance of panellists and the BNP obviously didn't decide to flood the BBC with applications or couldn't muster the support, either way the vocal few stole the day. The BBC merely recorded the battle.

Having watched the programme last night and having kept up with current affairs in regards to other aspects, I think the BNP will now start to pose a serious threat.

We are living in a country were people find Jordan and Peter and X factor more important than troops dying and pensioners being abused.

How many people in working class areas leave school with less than 5 GCSE's grade C these days?

I will tell you why the BNP will do well now, because Nick Griffin was the only person on the whole of that programme who the masses within the working class can relate too. Even the audience were all middle class.

That is my opinion of how I saw things last night and when i look at the bigger picture in general.

I AM IN NO WAY A SUPPORTER OF THE BNP. However I havent got a clue who I will vote for in the next election, however I will vote as people before me fought for us to live in a democracy.

QT appeared to have been engineered to humiliate Griffin. That is my considered opinion, but it made him out to be a victim and the English have a habit of supporting the underdog.

Originally Posted by Monty417

QT appeared to have been engineered to humiliate Griffin. That is my considered opinion, but it made him out to be a victim and the English have a habit of supporting the underdog.

Not quite as I would have put it 'Monty', but spot on nevertheless.

The British, including the English of course :D , do NOT like being told what to do - hence our dislike of the European National Socialist Soviet Union.

The British enjoy being led - led by someone or something they respect.

For over a thousand years, or 57 years short thereof, we have refused to be 'told what to do'.

Sadly, we now have such a disorientated and deceiving and dysfunctional government that is driving us - the tax-paying public - into a corner where we will have to obey our masters residing in Brussels.

I await with quivering anticipation the British finally wakening up to their loss of sovereignty and independence - should be quite a show to watch.

I think that the main reason that the BNP will go from strength-to-strength and become a mainstream party, is because they’re quite rightly moving away from the frankly ludicrous ‘skin colour’ debate, and are focusing on the following very troubling issue:
How on earth are we going to integrate Islam, with all of its backward and unpleasant practices, into a modern, multicultural and diverse (God I hate that word but it fits my point!) society?

When we’re all agreed that we need to combat racism and victimisation of minorities, what are we to do when the biggest and most offensive perpetrator of such practices is Islam? The vast and decent majority of British people have got no problems with hard-working Poles, Hindus, Sikhs or Afro-Caribbeans, but they do have a genuine and legitimate fear of Islam. And perhaps with just cause.

In virtually every single conflict in the world the one common denominator is Islam:

Muslims fighting Sikhs

Muslims fighting Hindus

Muslims fighting Christians

Muslims fighting Atheists

Muslims fighting Jews

Muslims fighting Muslims (the biggest killer of Muslims is Muslims)

Muslims fighting all other groups I’ve not mentioned

Indeed, if Aliens landed from outer-space tomorrow who do you think they’d probably end up fighting longest, hardest and first? I don’t even need to answer that do I – which is really sad. There’s no doubt that if you put some of the more vocal Islamists in a locked bathroom they’d even start arguing with their own reflection in the mirror…

To many people Islam seems like a racist and religiously intolerant creed:

Can Muslims marry non-Muslims without fear of violence?

Can Muslims convert to other religions without fear of violence?

Can Muslims be homosexual without fear of violence?

Can Muslims renounce Islam without fear of violence?

Can Muslim women live free and modern lives without fear of violence?

What Nick Griffin has touched on, is that the rise of far-right politics is NOTHING TO DO WITH SKIN COLOUR OR RACE – BUT ABOUT A TOXIC AND POISONOUS RELIGION THAT THREATENS US ALL – Jews, Hindus, Christians and non-believers alike.

I think that in the coming decades you’ll see a ‘rainbow coalition’ of different races, religions and cultures, all coming together to stand up to Islamic Fascism and Islamic racism against all other belief systems.

IT’S NOT ABOUT RACE; IT’S ABOUT RELIGION.

Originally Posted by lsquared

Originally Posted by Monty417

QT appeared to have been engineered to humiliate Griffin. That is my considered opinion, but it made him out to be a victim and the English have a habit of supporting the underdog.

Not quite as I would have put it 'Monty', but spot on nevertheless.

The British, including the English of course :D , do NOT like being told what to do - hence our dislike of the European National Socialist Soviet Union.

The British enjoy being led - led by someone or something they respect.

For over a thousand years, or 57 years short thereof, we have refused to be 'told what to do'.

Sadly, we now have such a disorientated and deceiving and dysfunctional government that is driving us - the tax-paying public - into a corner where we will have to obey our masters residing in Brussels.

I await with quivering anticipation the British finally wakening up to their loss of sovereignty and independence - should be quite a show to watch.

I'm happy to be corrected, I just didn't want a Welshman or Scot telling me to speak for myself.

Originally Posted by Steven_McLaughlin

What Nick Griffin has touched on, is that the rise of far-right politics is NOTHING TO DO WITH SKIN COLOUR OR RACE – BUT ABOUT A TOXIC AND POISONOUS RELIGION THAT THREATENS US ALL – Jews, Hindus, Christians and non-believers alike.

I think that in the coming decades you’ll see a ‘rainbow coalition’ of different races, religions and cultures, all coming together to stand up to Islamic Fascism and Islamic racism against all other belief systems.

IT’S NOT ABOUT RACE; IT’S ABOUT RELIGION.

That is probably the key question that the QT panel failed to answer, even though Griffin raised it.

I tend to think that things are much much better on the ground than the media would have us believe. Based both on anecdotal evidence and recent work by researchers, it seems that there has been a sea-change within a lot of the Muslim community during the last five or ten years - and especially since 7/7.

7/7 was a massive wake-up call for British Muslims. In the past, a lot of Muslims - not all, but a lot - fudged on the issue of terrorism. It got conflated with ideas of 'righteous' jihads in Bosnia, Kashmir and Soviet-era Afghanistan. The insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq were - and to an extent still are - seen as justifiable resistance to foreign occupation. This created an environment where the 'crazies' - people spouting off about Sheikh Osama, Global Jihad and The Jew - would at least be tolerated or ignored.

But when terrorists struck London - and remember 2 Muslims were killed, and one of the bombs was at Edgware Road - the reality hit home for many, many people. THere has been a lot of soul-searching within the community and the kind of rhetoric heard in the 1990s - in some mosques and community centres - is much rarer nowadays. Some former extremists actually did a somersault and started working with the Home Office. Although there is a lot of suspicion of the PREVENT strategy, there was no shortage of volunteers to take up the funding and work with imaginative projects to try and keep young people away from the crazies.

It is a shame (but not surprising) that this has not been extensively covered in the media, so the British public hasn't seen these positive changes.

Originally Posted by Markintime

Originally Posted by vaeviso

The BBC made a big mistake here - not by letting Nick Griffin appear, but in its ham-fisted attempt at ambushing him. It really would have been much better if they had kept to the usual QT format and debated the issues of the day. Nothing exposes a single issue party - extremist or not - quicker and more effectively than engaging them in debate on the full range of issues. It's why the BNP, the Greens and all the fringe parties will never govern; they can only see things through the prism of their particular conceit and they appear trivial and silly. By planting a load of questions about race and immigration and so on, the BBC have not only allowed the BNP to cry "foul", but they also allowed Griffin to play to his strengths (such as they are). The BBC should also have got someone more effective than Jack Straw on - he really was hysterical and useless. He was a left-wing extremist when he was an undergraduate at Leeds University, so it's all a bit hypocritical really.

The more the mainstream political parties and media vilify Griffin and the BNP, the more he is lionised in the eyes of the BNP electorate (and there most definitely is one). The government would do better to identify the issues that are making BNP supporters feel marginalised and address them properly rather than high-handedly refusing to engage the BNP in debate. The media should also drop all this ad hominem stuff about Griffin. His views are eminently "targetable"; there really is no need to attack him personally. It undermines the argument.

Incidentally, I thought only Bonnie Greer and David Dimbleby acquitted themselves at all well. The others need to look up "debate" in a dictionary.

You lay all the blame at the feet of the BBC, in my view unfairly. The QT format has always been the same: The audience submit the questions not the BBC. Yes the BBC choose who will ask their question but if there are a hundred questions and 75 of them ask the same question, albeit in different ways, then they have no option other than to go with that question. The audience apply to be the audience, they do not have to state their demographics or their political views although obviously, the style of their question can give a clue (they submit their question with their application).
Similarly the Beeb don't choose who the panel will be, they invite the three main parties to submit their choice and choose three panellists to try to create a balance of views. Labour put forward Straw who does come with quite a formidable reputation (probably slightly tarnished after last night's debacle).
Given the BBC had invited Griffin (quite rightly too) it was probably inevitable that there wouldn't be a balance of panellists and the BNP obviously didn't decide to flood the BBC with applications or couldn't muster the support, either way the vocal few stole the day. The BBC merely recorded the battle.

I have to say, I think they do bear the majority of the blame. The BBC production team may have no control over the audience or the questions but they do have editorial control overall. We'll never know what questions didn't make the cut but it was fairly clear that the vast majority of questions were designed to put Griffin on the spot and I have to say, even the normally equitable Mr Dimbleby seemed to be enjoying the opportunity to prolong Griffin's agony. The BBC will claim it was all fair and above board, I have no doubt. However, when the three main party leaders go head to head before the general election, will all the questions focus in on one particular controversial or failed element of Labour policy for example? (I doubt it - there are so many to choose from). I do concede however that the BBC did not invite Jack Straw. It's perhaps indicative that he was the best that the Government have to offer.

Don't get me wrong, I carry no torch for Nick Griffin. I find the BNP's policies small minded, bigoted and pretty much representative of everything that's wrong with the UK at the moment - much like the people who vote for them I imagine. However, the BBC is so ferociously PC, "neutral" and "right-on" these days that I find it hard to believe that they would pass up an opportunity to humiliate someone like Griffin.

Originally Posted by Steven_McLaughlin

I think that the main reason that the BNP will go from strength-to-strength and become a mainstream party, is because they’re quite rightly moving away from the frankly ludicrous ‘skin colour’ debate, and are focusing on the following very troubling issue:
How on earth are we going to integrate Islam, with all of its backward and unpleasant practices, into a modern, multicultural and diverse (God I hate that word but it fits my point!) society?

When we’re all agreed that we need to combat racism and victimisation of minorities, what are we to do when the biggest and most offensive perpetrator of such practices is Islam? The vast and decent majority of British people have got no problems with hard-working Poles, Hindus, Sikhs or Afro-Caribbeans, but they do have a genuine and legitimate fear of Islam. And perhaps with just cause.

In virtually every single conflict in the world the one common denominator is Islam:

Muslims fighting Sikhs

Muslims fighting Hindus

Muslims fighting Christians

Muslims fighting Atheists

Muslims fighting Jews

Muslims fighting Muslims (the biggest killer of Muslims is Muslims)

Muslims fighting all other groups I’ve not mentioned

Indeed, if Aliens landed from outer-space tomorrow who do you think they’d probably end up fighting longest, hardest and first? I don’t even need to answer that do I – which is really sad. There’s no doubt that if you put some of the more vocal Islamists in a locked bathroom they’d even start arguing with their own reflection in the mirror…

To many people Islam seems like a racist and religiously intolerant creed:

Can Muslims marry non-Muslims without fear of violence?

Can Muslims convert to other religions without fear of violence?

Can Muslims be homosexual without fear of violence?

Can Muslims renounce Islam without fear of violence?

Can Muslim women live free and modern lives without fear of violence?

What Nick Griffin has touched on, is that the rise of far-right politics is NOTHING TO DO WITH SKIN COLOUR OR RACE – BUT ABOUT A TOXIC AND POISONOUS RELIGION THAT THREATENS US ALL – Jews, Hindus, Christians and non-believers alike.

I think that in the coming decades you’ll see a ‘rainbow coalition’ of different races, religions and cultures, all coming together to stand up to Islamic Fascism and Islamic racism against all other belief systems.

IT’S NOT ABOUT RACE; IT’S ABOUT RELIGION.

Totally off the point...how come you get a 'full rack' after 29 posts 'n' joining in sep. 09...will you be Charles III at some point..???

The more I think about this it is becoming apparent that any political or intellectual shortcomings of the BNP will be moderated by Civil Service inertia and financial constraints, (should they make Government).
However, a new focus on "Indigenous" Brits and less foreign aid to better off countries may prove just what the UK needs.

The BNP proposals on Law & Order etc will definitely set us off in the right direction.

Bear in mind what the "Experts" have achieved in the last 12 years!

Yellow Devil, I hope you’re right my friend, I really do, otherwise this beautiful country of ours isn’t going to be a particularly pleasant place to live in, in the years to come. I work in Preston and spend a lot of time in Blackburn, and I can tell you there’s a lot of fear and anxiety on the streets. One of my colleagues is a British born Hindu and another an immigrant Pole, and even they are wary and nervous about the hostility. Barry, my Hindu buddy, lives in fear that his beautiful teenage daughter will fall for a Muslim lad, because then she’ll have to convert and he won’t be seeing much of her again. And Zenon, my exuberant Polish pal, has just about given up on even attempting to get close to a Muslim after countless rebuffs and insults.

We work as ESOL teachers so we see it from all angles. The funny thing is the Turkish immigrant lads are very cheeky and full of fun, desperate to fit in and learn the British ways, but the resident born and bred local Muslims are often rude and downright hostile to anybody but one of their own.

I don’t know what the hell the answer is, but Jesus Christ man it worries me – it really does. There’s something incredibly powerful and potent about Islam that makes all other lifestyles seem puny, pathetic and weak. I’ve got a lot of sympathy for young Muslims because I can see how the religion can grab you for life – like a drug almost. One of my all-time hero’s is Richard Dawkins (a GIANT!) and he’s said in many interviews, that as a scientist and humanitarian, the only thing that gives him sleepless nights is the spread of Islam.

It’s a powerful, powerful thing, but what are we to do about it? How can we bring them round to reason? God I hope we can find a way…

Hi Bludanubewalt,

It’s because I made a small financial donation to support the site, as I use it a lot and know it doesn’t run on hot air – unlike me and my big mouth! Seriously though, it’s a great resource and I know that a hell of a lot of time and hard work goes in to maintaining it by the moderators and sponsors etc, so we’ve got to dig in and keep it going. There aren’t many places like this around where we can come and enjoy uncensored debates like this one, posting all kinds of ‘strongly worded’ stuff. I’m sure the ‘New Labour’ crowd would dearly love to shut us down for dissent and might even attempt to if they get in again – so dig deep and let’s enjoy it while we can!

Cheers