The 12 guiding principles in the BBC impartiality report

The BBC report From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel contains 12 guiding principles to inform the corporation’s approach to impartiality in the face of rapid technological and social change.

Published together with extensive research on audience expectations and perceptions of impartiality, the report is the result of a project first commissioned by the BBC board of governors in conjunction with BBC management in November 2005.

It aims to identify the challenges and risks to impartiality and has been fully endorsed by the BBC Trust, the BBC executive board and the BBC journalism board.

The 12 guiding principles are complementary to the BBC’s editorial guidelines on impartiality and do not replace them.

1. Impartiality is and should remain the hallmark of the BBC as the leading provider of information and entertainment in the United Kingdom, and as a pre-eminent broadcaster internationally. It is a legal requirement, but it should also be a source of pride.

2. Impartiality is an essential part of the BBC’s contract with its audience, which owns and funds the BBC. Because of that, the audience itself will often be a factor in determining impartiality.

3. Impartiality must continue to be applied to matters of party political or industrial controversy. But in today’s more diverse political, social and cultural landscape, it requires a wider and deeper application.

4. Impartiality involves breadth of view, and can be breached by omission. It is not necessarily to be found on the centre ground.

5. Impartiality is no excuse for insipid programming. It allows room for fair-minded, evidence-based judgments by senior journalists and documentary makers, and for controversial, passionate and polemical arguments by contributors and writers.

6. Impartiality applies across all BBC platforms and all types of programme. No genre is exempt. But the way it is applied and assessed will vary in different genres.

7. Impartiality is most obviously at risk in areas of sharp public controversy. But there is a less visible risk, demanding particular vigilance, when programmes purport to reflect a consensus for “the common good”, or become involved with campaigns.

8. Impartiality is often not easy. There is no template of wisdom which will eliminate fierce internal debate over difficult dilemmas. But the BBC’s journalistic expertise is an invaluable resource for all departments to draw on.

9. Impartiality can often be affected by the stance and experience of programme makers, who need constantly to examine and challenge their own assumptions.

10. Impartiality requires the BBC to examine its own institutional values, and to assess the effect they have on its audiences.

11. Impartiality is a process, about which the BBC should be honest and transparent with its audience: this should permit greater boldness in its programming decisions. But impartiality can never be fully achieved to everyone’s satisfaction: the BBC should not be defensive about this but ready to acknowledge and correct significant breaches as and when they occur.

12. Impartiality is required of everyone involved in output. It applies as much to the most junior researcher as it does to the director general. But editors and executive producers must give a strong lead to their teams. They must ensure that the impartiality process begins at the conception of a programme and lasts throughout production: if left until the approval stage, it is usually too late.

Taken from Media Guardian.  A little old, but still applicable.

Now let’s factor in O’Reilly

I touched briefly upon Bill O’Reilly in a previous post, including the now-infamous clip of Mr O’Reilly with Jeremy Glick. Now I’d like to take a singular look at the man who characterises himself as a ‘traditionalist’.

As all good journalists realise, personal politics and opinions should (generally) be left at the door before going on air. Common sense dictates is your job to maintain impartiality and objectivity with the subject matter. Sadly, this is not the case with Bill O’Reilly, who often lets his own opinions and prejudices merge with the actual stories and removing all aspirations of objectivity. I’d like to use the case of George Tiller as an example. Mr Tiller worked as a medical director at an abortion clinic in Wichita, Kansas. Abortion in the USA is a massive issue, with anti-abortion campaigners often resorting to violence against medical workers. Sadly, Mr Tiller was a victim of this violence, shot through the eye whilst attending church by Scott Roeder, an anti-abortion campaigner.

This would not have anything to do with Bill O’Reilly had it not been for the fact that he habitually referenced Mr Tiller during his broadcasts, most notably his “The Radio Factor” show, a spin-off from the “O’Reilly Factor” segment on Fox News. O’Reilly often referred to Mr Tiller as “Tiller the Baby-killer “, quite an inflammatory nickname. Letting his personal opinions, as well as rumour and scandal, be broadcast is just not ethical or in any way impartial. Have a listen to this…

To keep things “Fair & Balanced”, as Fox News would encourage us to do, I have also included O’Reilly’s response.

Now, I don’t want to defame or mock the audience of Fox in any way, but I think it’s fair to say that some of their ranks are not the most media-savvy or too clued up on the effects of semantics or subversive reasoning. O’Reilly’s constant references to “subversive media”, i.e. everyone who doesn’t agree with him or his paymasters, are bound to have an effect on the thought-process of some of those viewers.

Fair and Balanced?

Fox News – Fair and Balanced?

“Fair and Balanced” is not something easily associated with Fox News, but how does the US broadcaster live up to its self-imposed motto?

As is the case with all outlets under the News Corporation umbrella, Fox’s editorial direction is guided by the aging yet firm hand of Rupert Murdoch.

“In evidence to a House of Lords select committee in 2007, Murdoch even said that he acted like “a traditional proprietor” in regard to the Sun and the News of the World by “exercising control on major issues, such as which party to back in a general election or policy on Europe.”

This guidance also applies in the US, with Fox appearing to be a staunchly Republican channel. The attitude Fox took towards Barack Obama during his campaign for the US Presidency, as well as throughout his first year in the White House, only serves to highlight this:

Oh, and this…

By taking sides, this completely negates journalistic objectivity and neutrality and converts their output into a form of propaganda. This does not seem to bother Fox, who staff their studios with right-wing presenters, including Bill O’Reilly, Glenn Beck, and long-time contributor Ann Coulter. It could be argued that it would amount to censorship if Fox didn’t let their non-journalistic contributors state their opinions. However, a counter-argument is that they chose their guests specifically to cater for their own point of view. Any guests that do offer a counter-argument end up as a recipient of aggression and anger,  as this clip of Bill O’Reilly shows.