Why I no longer trust the BBC
As a Brit, I grew up watching the BBC (it comprised 2 of the 4 terrestrial TV channels available for most of my youth), and the BBC News was generally considered to be trustworthy. We pay a license fee for it so it should be, right? Although I haven't watched BBC TV News in years, I still check in on the BBC news website, and this conflict has finally disabused me of the notion that it is trustworthy or impartial. The following are some of the stories that they have published that I know to be false or misleading.
Snake Island
Here's the story the BBC published on February 25th 2022 about the Ukrainian soldiers on Snake Island, who were initially reported dead:
Snake Island: Ukraine says soldiers killed after refusing to surrender
Notable quotes from the article:
"On our Zmiinyi Island, defending it to the last, all the border guards died heroically," Mr Zelensky said …
The official Russian account of the incident differs dramatically. Moscow said the 82 Ukrainian soldiers on the island surrendered it to them voluntarily and made no mention of carrying out strikes or inflicting casualties.
Except those soldiers weren't killed. Here's the story the BBC published on February 28th:
Snake Island: Ukraine says troops who swore at Russian warship are alive
It's a confusing article, but it begins
Ukraine's navy says the 13 soldiers believed to have been killed defending Zmiinyi (Snake) Island on the first day of the Russian invasion are alive.
So the first story was reporting a lie. The BBC have not taken it down, amended it, or even added a link to the second story. The BBC's get-out would be, that they are not the ones lying: they are simply reporting what Ukraine told them. So Ukraine (and President Zelenskyy specifically) were lying, and Russia were telling the truth; this fact seems to go unnoticed by the BBC. It certainly hasn't stopped them reporting whatever Ukrainian sources have told them ever since then.
The second story even adds another Ukrainian accusation:
The Ukrainian navy also accused Russian forces of illegally detaining the crew of a civilian search and rescue ship that Ukraine sent to the island on a humanitarian mission after the attack, as well as two priests who were accompanying them.
No indication is given as to whether the source who made this accusation was the same one who made up the first one.
The BBC were by no means alone in reporting this, and CNN didn't fare much better. They did choose to amend the first story with an update and a link to the second one, but like the BBC, they are entirely uncritical of the Ukrainian sources who reported the original story as if it were the truth.
Attack on St. Michael’s Cathedral, Mariupol
This BBC article, titled In pictures: The Ukrainian religious sites ruined by fighting, leads with the statement that “Ukraine has accused Russia of damaging or destroying at least 59 religious sites across the country since its invasion began”. It acknowledges that “Russia denies targeting civilian infrastructure”, but then goes on to heavily imply that all the damage they mention was caused by Russia.
One of the damaged buildings they focus on is the Cathedral of St. Michael the Archangel in Mariupol. The article tells us that “after weeks of relentless Russian bombardment on the southern port city, the Orthodox cathedral's crowning dome is now a mangled heap of exposed steel and smashed brickwork”. That sounds like they’re saying that the Russian bombardment caused the damage - although they carefully phrase it in such a way that they’re not quite saying that. And why would they want to do that?
The following videos were made by Russian reporters, and I came across them on Telegram:
Caretaker of Cathedral of St. Michael the Archangel describes attack on church by Ukr troops
Mariupol priest describes attack on Cathedral of St. Michael the Archangel
Mariupol woman says Ukrainian tanks fired on church
The Odessa Trades Union House massacre
I wrote this post about the fire in the Odessa Trades Union House on May 2 2014, using the BBC’s reporting on it as an example of the way in which western media misrepresented events and blamed the victims. Of course the BBC weren’t alone in this, but theirs is the dishonesty that feels the most like a personal betrayal. Note that this pattern of misrepresentation was evident in 2014, long before the SMO began.
The BBC’s attitude towards video evidence vs storytelling
I wrote this entire post about the BBC’s approach to reporting things that don’t fit the story it wants to tell. Specifically, about their tactic of questioning whether inconvenient video evidence really proves anything, while simultaneously asking us to believe things that they assure us they were told, but for which they provide no evidence at all.
It takes time and effort to prove that what the BBC and other mainstream news sources are saying isn’t true, and it’s been made considerably harder since Russian news sources were blocked. A lot of people would probably dismiss the evidence I’m presenting as ‘Russian propaganda’ without watching or reading any of it because they still trust the BBC, but I think it’s important to show that an institution you grew up with can lie to you. If you know they’re lying about one thing, how can you trust them on anything else?
And let's not forget about Jimmy Savile, of course.
