Ridiculous Journalism
Discussion
Currently number 2 in the BBC News most popular stories.
UK swine flu death toll hits 14
Fourteen patients are now thought to have died in the UK after contracting swine flu, the government has said.
Not all of those had died as a direct result of swine flu, but many had had the virus, England's chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson said.Let's analyse that. Headline says "swine flu death toll hits 14" - in other words, 14 people have died of swine flu.
But then...
"Not all of those had died as a direct result of swine flu" - so this immediately nullifies the headline.
And then...
"but many had had the virus" - so not all the the 14 had actually had swine flu?
Terrible, sensationalist journalism.
BBC News said:
UK swine flu death toll hits 14
Fourteen patients are now thought to have died in the UK after contracting swine flu, the government has said.
Not all of those had died as a direct result of swine flu, but many had had the virus, England's chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson said.
But then...
"Not all of those had died as a direct result of swine flu" - so this immediately nullifies the headline.
And then...
"but many had had the virus" - so not all the the 14 had actually had swine flu?
Terrible, sensationalist journalism.
evenflow said:
"but many had had the virus" - so not all the the 14 had actually had swine flu?
He means that lots of people have had the virus who haven't died.All the reports about this have been sensationalist though - just the use of "pandemic" as though it means millions are dying all over the world is bad enough!
I am getting really fed up with reporting at the moment, across the board, I tend to read a number of news sites, to get a feel for different view points, but always thought of the BBC of being a pretty un biased source. These days though they can be as bad as the Daily Wail for sensationalist reporting.
Really it needs to be stopped, its not useful and is simply scaremongering.
Really it needs to be stopped, its not useful and is simply scaremongering.
R4 today said that 14 people had died with swine flu. They didn't say that 14 people had died from swine flu.
I find it astonishing that they can take so much time and trouble to use the correct word, to be telling the truth, yet to also enable them to be such a sensationalist lying deceitful duplicitous misleading bunch of
s at one and the same time.
So how many people have actually died from swine flu, rather than just happened to have it at the same time as they died from something else? Is there no media source of any sort that can just tell us the simple truth or ask the direct question "How many people have died from swine flu?" when they are interviewing the medical officers about this, as they are not being given full opportunity to be straight about it either. Everyone is going around speaking with forked tongues.
I find it astonishing that they can take so much time and trouble to use the correct word, to be telling the truth, yet to also enable them to be such a sensationalist lying deceitful duplicitous misleading bunch of
s at one and the same time.So how many people have actually died from swine flu, rather than just happened to have it at the same time as they died from something else? Is there no media source of any sort that can just tell us the simple truth or ask the direct question "How many people have died from swine flu?" when they are interviewing the medical officers about this, as they are not being given full opportunity to be straight about it either. Everyone is going around speaking with forked tongues.
Right now BBC 24 are doing a piece about the Guardian allegations, their journalists have obviously spent all day putting together the item since the story broke this morning, and have got all sorts of people in to interview, all in the Green room and ready to go.
The very clear and concise Police statement issued this afternoon has already negated the story, but the beeb are carrying on with their news schedule anyway, regardless.
Story breaks, story is disproved, but lets carry on reporting it anyway.
The very clear and concise Police statement issued this afternoon has already negated the story, but the beeb are carrying on with their news schedule anyway, regardless.
Story breaks, story is disproved, but lets carry on reporting it anyway.
I can tell you the exact moment when I finally lost all respect for BBC journalism.
I was out driving, and had the radio on. They were reporting on the (mis)fortunes of Northern Rock, around the time people started withdrawing great scads of cash from the stricken bank.
They'd interviewed a couple of doom-mongering talking heads who'd gone on about not very much in particular, apart from a few generic doom-laden soundbites.
"And now, for some analysis," said the announcer...
Oh good, I thought. A man from the FSA is going to tell us about savings guarantees. A senior company spokesman is going to counterbalance the hysteria with some facts. Perhaps we'll get someone in to explain how a loan can aid cashflow.
...the announcer continued, "we're going live to some members of the public who are in the queue to withdraw all their money from a branch of Northern Rock."
Wonderful.
How did you arrive at that?
Seriously?
Did your producers build a gigantic list of all the places they could obtained unbiased, detailed and competent analysis, rank them all in order from best to worst... and then pick the one at the very bottom of the list?
Idiots. Clowns. But worst, idiotic clowns in the very place where they can do gigantic, sweeping amounts of damage.
Funnily enough, while the Beeb are keen to point fingers at a nebulous and anonymous mass of "bankers" or "The City", they're not quite so keen to analyse their own role in things, by trying to behave like a sensationalist tabloid right at the point when everyone needed a calm, trustworthy news source.
Really, why? They don't have to fight to sell enough copies to break even each day. They don't have to keep people watching long enough to screen some adverts. So why aren't they, as the one organisation that can eschew interesting presentation in favour of editorial balance, providing a solid, factual news service?
I was out driving, and had the radio on. They were reporting on the (mis)fortunes of Northern Rock, around the time people started withdrawing great scads of cash from the stricken bank.
They'd interviewed a couple of doom-mongering talking heads who'd gone on about not very much in particular, apart from a few generic doom-laden soundbites.
"And now, for some analysis," said the announcer...
Oh good, I thought. A man from the FSA is going to tell us about savings guarantees. A senior company spokesman is going to counterbalance the hysteria with some facts. Perhaps we'll get someone in to explain how a loan can aid cashflow.
...the announcer continued, "we're going live to some members of the public who are in the queue to withdraw all their money from a branch of Northern Rock."
Wonderful.
How did you arrive at that?
Seriously?
Did your producers build a gigantic list of all the places they could obtained unbiased, detailed and competent analysis, rank them all in order from best to worst... and then pick the one at the very bottom of the list?
Idiots. Clowns. But worst, idiotic clowns in the very place where they can do gigantic, sweeping amounts of damage.
Funnily enough, while the Beeb are keen to point fingers at a nebulous and anonymous mass of "bankers" or "The City", they're not quite so keen to analyse their own role in things, by trying to behave like a sensationalist tabloid right at the point when everyone needed a calm, trustworthy news source.
Really, why? They don't have to fight to sell enough copies to break even each day. They don't have to keep people watching long enough to screen some adverts. So why aren't they, as the one organisation that can eschew interesting presentation in favour of editorial balance, providing a solid, factual news service?
It is for this reason, that the only source of my news these days is www.ft.com.
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