3 Articles on Race And Relation

Nick Griffin to lodge formal complaint with BBC over Question Time

"BNP demands BBC give Nick Griffin second Question Time appearance, 'in correct format', outside multicultural London"

BNP leader Nick Griffin is to lodge a formal complaint and freedom of information request to the BBC over the way his appearance on Question Time was handled.

He will argue that the format of the show was skewed to focus almost solely on the BNP, not wider issues, that the makeup of the audience was primarily anti-BNP and that a broader range of questions were not fielded, a spokesman for the party said.

The BBC has fielded more than 400 calls and emails about Griffin's appearance on Question Time last night – with more than half complaining that the show was biased against the British National Party leader.

BBC online forums were flooded with support for Griffin and attacks on the BBC, the other panellists and the anti-fascist demonstrators outside Television Centre yesterday. However, there were also comments supporting the BBC for its decision to invite Griffin on to the Question Time panel.

Question Time attracted 7.9 million viewers, half the total TV audience for its 10.35pm slot – which is thought to be a record figure for the show.

The BNP spokesman said: "He was not treated the same as other elected politicians [who appear on the show]; it was a completely unfair showing.

"Question Time changed the whole format of the programme. The BNP will be putting in a freedom of information request to the BBC and programme makers to ask about the process of changing the format of the whole programme. [We want to know] why they felt they had to break with the usual format."

He said that the BNP wanted a second outing on Question Time to be "re-run in the correct format". "If people want to be critical, fair enough – they should not dominate the whole programme."

The spokesman added that Question Time had a history of moving locations and that London was too "multicultural" to be fair to the BNP and that perhaps a location like the northwest of England would be an option.

"It is logical: that is where he was elected and an audience would contain a representative cross-section of voters, some of whom may have voted for the BNP," he said. "It would make for a more balanced programme."

Griffin is also keen to challenge Jack Straw, the justice secretary, to a one-on-one debate over Labour policies.

Griffin himself said today he was planning to make a formal complaint to the BBC about last night's show, telling Sky News: "That was not a genuine Question Time; that was a lynch mob."

The media regulator, Ofcom, said it had received a "small number of complaints" about the show – understood to be less than 100 – and was considering whether to launch a formal investigation of whether Question Time breached its broadcast code.

BBC Information, the corporation's call centre, had fielded a total of 416 calls on the controversial show by about noon today. Of these, 243 were complaints of bias against Griffin.

Question Time was filmed late yesterday amid chaotic scenes outside BBC Television Centre as anti-fascist protesters clashed with police, and attracted a record audience of almost eight million viewers.

The BBC also received 114 complaints about Griffin being allowed to appear on the Question Time panel at all. There were a further 59 calls applauding the BBC's decision to have the BNP leader on the show.

Ofcom is understood to have received fewer than 100 complaints and will now make a decision on whether to investigate. The complaints fall under the broadcasting code section on harm and offence.

An Ofcom spokesman said: "Ofcom has received a small number of complaints which are currently being assessed against the broadcasting code."

Under the BBC's complaints procedure, the corporation will respond to the calls after the issues have been discussed with the Question Time programme team. Those who remain unsatisfied with the response can refer their complaint to the BBC's editorial complaints unit.

If they are still not happy with its decision, complainants can take their grievance to the editorial standards committee of the BBC Trust, the corporation's regulatory and governance body.

Joking aside, racism lives

"If overt prejudice as aired on 1970s TV now draws censure, its modern form often goes unchallenged"

What's the difference between good family entertainment and racism? The answer: time. The latest "race rows" (where white people argue over how offended they are by a bigot, with barely a black or Asian voice to be heard) have highlighted above all how attitudes change over the years.

American musician Harry Connick Jr slates a blacked-up white group performing a "tribute" to Michael Jackson on Australian TV, and explains how his own country has struggled to end the portrayal of black people as buffoons. Neither the programme producers nor the studio audience, it seems, had even considered this thought. They probably have now.

And in Britain, our own race controversy involves a white Strictly Come Dancing performer calling his partner a "Paki", with veteran entertainer Bruce Forsyth at first claiming that it's a shame people have lost their sense of humour. He later retracted, but still couldn't help making a dig at "political correctness".

Most British people watching these shows would be shocked to see the dancer utter those words, or the "Jackson Jive" promote that imagery. But turn the clock back three decades and the opposite would be true. On a Saturday night they'd be settling down to watch the peak-time Black and White Minstrel show. After that they might tune in to Till Death Us Do Part, to hear the racist rantings of Alf Garnett. Over on ITV they could be watching Mind Your Language, in which an English teacher struggles with his class of overseas students, filling every cultural stereotype from headswinging Sikhs to camera-obsessive Japanese, all "hilariously" failing to grasp the language. Or even tune in to the popular series The Comedians, starring that hero of the race equality struggle, Bernard Manning.

All of these shows were, at the time, good family fun. And if we could go back, Life on Mars-style, to any of those involved, they'd be sure to say they weren't being racist; it was only a bit of fun. And, of course, "Some of my best friends ..."

Brucie's formative years were, as we know, well before even this era, so it is maybe a bit harsh to blame him totally for carrying his views forward into this millennium.

Twenty years ago you couldn't go to a football game without hearing a mass of monkey chants whenever a black player kicked the ball. TV and radio match commentators would make no mention of it. It took a microphone malfunction by Ron Atkinson for the rest of us to realise that bigoted comments were also being voiced, and tolerated, within the commentary box itself. That was in 2004. Again, Atkinson denied he was a racist and called his comments an aberration.

So, many things have changed with the passage of time, but many others haven't. Now, as then, no one is racist, it seems. Not Prince Charles, who calls his friend "Sooty"; nor Prince Harry, who refers to his army chum as "Paki"; nor even Carol Thatcher, who dismissively refers to a tennis player on the TV as "golliwog". The remark was "in jest", she said. "I just happen to have the opinions of a normal person."

And I'm sure, if we asked them, the denials would come from the Spanish motor-racing fans who did their own black-up when goading Lewis Hamilton at the Formula One circuit in Barcelona; or the European football crowds which still abuse black players; or Australian singing doctors.

And in case anyone thinks that here, in the enlightened west, such attitudes and beliefs are now the preserve of a beyond-the-pale minority: what about the media, which gives out a daily dose of Muslims-as-terrorists propaganda (instead of giving the true picture, that al-Qaida is a crackpot group with a tiny number of fanatical followers and no base in the community)?

Yes, of course things have changed, and mostly for the better, since the 1970s. And I'd like to think that in another 30 years we could be looking back, for example, at today's xenophobic attitudes towards migrants with disbelief. Or in an era when "political correctness" is no longer a term of abuse against those who wish to treat minorities with respect.

But with the ongoing rise of the far right, and the infiltration of both casual and organised bigotry into the popular discourse, we might just as easily be living in a nation where the Black and White Minstrels are back in their old slot on Saturday night peak-time TV.

BBC fires presenter for turban remarks

The BBC has dismissed a local radio presenter in Bristol after she made "completely unacceptable comments" about Asian cab drivers.

Sam Mason, who hosted an afternoon show on BBC Radio Bristol, called a taxi for her 14-year-old daughter - while off-air - asking them not to send an Asian driver because "a guy with a turban might freak her out".

"I know this sounds really racist, but I'm not being - please, don't send anyone like, you know what I mean," said asked the operator. "An English person would be great, a female would be better."

The operator for the unnamed taxi firm, which later sent a recording of the call to the Sun, told Mason it could not penalise Asian drivers and that her request was racist.

"I work at the BBC. I'm far from racist and that uneducated woman has no right to call me one," said Mason when her call was transferred to a supervisor.

"I don't want her to turn up with a guy with a turban on, it's going to freak her out. She's not used to Asians. She's not racist - her godparents are black."

Mason, who joined the BBC in late September, was suspended and dismissed by the BBC 24 hours later.

"Although Sam Mason's remarks were not made on-air, her comments were completely unacceptable," said a spokesman.

"For that reason, she has been informed that she will no longer be working for the BBC with immediate effect."

BBC Article

A snail could crawl the entire length of the Great Wall of China in just slightly more time than the 200 years it will take for women to be equally represented in parliament. That was just one of a series of striking statistics from the Equality and Human Rights Commission in their Sex and Power report published last week.

It added that women hold just 11% of FTSE directorships, with the judiciary and others also strongly criticised. At the BBC, the figures are a bit better - almost 38% of all senior managers are women - but it does bring into sharp focus the challenge the whole media industry is facing to improve diversity among its workforce.

Tomorrow's Guardian Ethnic Media Summit is a chance to debate what is arguably our most pressing diversity issue - ensuring more talent from ethnic minority communities reaches the upper echelons of broadcasting. The growth particularly of young ethnic minority audiences, is soaring - way above the population average - making them a critical cultural and business challenge for everyone in our sector.

Things are definitely changing but still not quickly enough. The whole media industry needs to look afresh at what more can be done.

So why does a white, middle-aged bloke like me feel compelled to write about this? As the BBC's chief creative officer, overseeing our programme production made in-house, I believe passionately that only by drawing on the talents of every part of society can we best reflect the lives and concerns of our diverse audiences on screen.

We must do more and the BBC is certainly redoubling its efforts. And though ethnicity is very important, it is only one part of this story. We must also think in terms of age, disability, gender, social class and regional difference.

That is why I think the historic changes to move a significant proportion of BBC network production out of London to places such as Glasgow or North West England over the next decade might be key to all this.

We will transfer large numbers of staff from London but we will also recruit many new faces - a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to add something substantially new to our gene pool of talent, to change the BBC's DNA a little.

We seem to be moving in the right direction, increasing opportunities for people from ethnic minority backgrounds at most levels.

The proportion of our staff from ethnic minorities is 11.5% - again comparing very well with both public and private sector organisations including the civil service, health service and the police. But as the Edinburgh Television Festival heard, still not enough people make it into senior management roles, particularly as controllers and commissioners.

The BBC has looked closely at the barriers to progress and announced new schemes to tackle them - costing £3m over three years.

Firstly, we need to change the way we recruit. We are dramatically increasing the outreach work we do - in community groups, colleges, schools and through open sessions across the UK - to encourage under-represented groups to apply to the BBC. I recently worked with an energetic bunch of young students, mainly from ethnic minority backgrounds, who were introduced to the BBC by the University of Central Lancashire - from the former mill towns of Blackburn and Preston, not places we'd traditionally think to look for the next generation.

Then we need to be better at retaining talented individuals and supporting them in reaching their full potential and moving into senior roles. Our new mentoring and development programme, which offers greater one-to-one and intensive personalised support, is so important. In addition, our new trainee production scheme, which has just kicked off, and our journalism trainee schemes, have a strong diversity focus, so we are providing clearer pathways into all parts of the BBC.

On screen, we must constantly strive to reflect as accurately as possible the rich cultural mix of the UK.

Earlier this year BBC non-executive director Samir Shah criticised what he called "inauthentic representation" of ethnic minority communities, citing the Ferreira family in EastEnders.

It is unfair to highlight one five-year-old example from a drama series that remains the most popular programme on television among ethnic minority audiences. This example fails to reflect many other aspects of our work, particularly our in-house drama output. Our continuing drama series, including Holby City and Casualty, have led the way in casting diverse talent, in leading roles as well. Though we do not always get it right, overall we have much to be proud of.

The BBC set up the Writers' Academy, under John Yorke, four years ago, increasing the number of writers from diverse backgrounds working on our biggest programmes, including some of our continuing drama series.

In addition, programmes such as Criminal Justice, No1 Ladies Detective Agency, Life Is Not All Ha Ha Hee Hee, Shoot the Messenger, the entertainment series Last Choir Standing and a lot of our children's output have also been praised for the way they have represented diversity or addressed issues faced by communities from different backgrounds.

Part of this is ensuring we get closer to audiences when making programmes. For example, White Girl - part of BBC2's groundbreaking White Season - told the story of a white family relocating from Leeds to a predominantly Asian community in Bradford. Here the production team worked very closely with the community to ensure a sensitive and accurate portrayal.

In an increasingly globalised creative economy where competition will intensify, it is only by understanding our diverse consumers that we can stay relevant and survive. The BBC prides itself on keeping in touch with its audiences - to do so successfully we'll need to keep making changes, and fast.

On Screen Off Screen Representation

My critical investigation is based on to what extent is consumerism and materialism glamorised within music videos, with a particular focus on the Hip-Hop genre.

The on screen representation of the specific group of individuals which I will be looking at (people in the music videos – in particular the rappers and models associated with the videos) is that The rappers, usually males, tend to be the central figures whilst their luxuries surround them such as women, cars, money and mansions, therefore consumerism and materialism is being glamorised within their music videos.

The off screen representation of the specific group of individuals which I’ll be looking at is again the people who are a part of the music videos i.e. the rappers and the female models. Off screen in reality a lot of rappers do not actually have all these women, cars , cash and mansions, therefore the videos can be seen as representations of what the rapper’s wish their life was really like. Moreover, the women in these music videos most probably off screen are not sexual objects for their male counterparts, this again shows that the music videos they feature in are just fantasy and are most likely to be far away from reality.

Critical Investigation & Linked Production

My critical investigation will focus on "To what extent are teenage girls represented positively within the media?". I'll be looking at newspaper articles in particular as well as television news reports and internet news reports. As of recently teenage girls are being portrayed negatively in the media so I think that I'll be more likely to find negative representations rather than positive ones, however I'll try my best to look for positive and negative representations.

My linked production is a documentary in to the lives of young teenagers and the lives of teenagers who feel they are stereotyped with the rest and do not follow that stereotype.

MIGRAIN:

Media Language =
- How they communicate with one another in comparision to how they communicate with others.

- The music they listen to and if they conform to the representation of women shown in that particular genre such as "Hip-Hop".

Ideologies =
- If young females are looked at negatively in the media due to their recent high intake of drugs and alcohol consumption.
- If young females are looked at negatively in the media due to their obsession with models, actresses in the media and to what extent they aspire to be like them. e.g. being thin/ size zero.
- If young females are looked at negatively in the media due to the recent high teen pregnancy rate in the U.K. in recent times, whereas they are labelled more negatively than boys.

Genre=
- I can look at teen american movies and see to what extent British teenage girls conform to being like the actresses they see in these particular movies.

- Relate this back to the obsession of being thin / size zero.

- Look at the relationships these teenage girls have with the opposite sex and to what extent is it familiar to the relationships teenage girls have with boys in the U.K.

- Try and identify whether or not these particular teen american movies glamorise the use of intoxicants such as smoking and alcohol.

Representation=
- How young females are represented in the media and how they are stereotyped to be obsessed with their image, early pregnancies and a high intake of drugs and alcohol consumption.
- How young females are represented positevly in the media such as when they are complemented for achieving higher grades than their male counter parts in schools and exams.

Audience=
- The Linked production will attract a high audience as all teenagers both female and male will wish to watch it to know how they are being represented and to what exent are the representations they are given true.
- Parents as they will want to know to what children these days are getting up to and if there children have any similiarities with the children shown in the media.
- My primary target audience will be those of class C1, c2 and D grade aged 13+ as they are the type of teenagers who are usually focused on in the media. Also they are most likely to be attracted to the linked production as they are the ones who can relate to the issues which will be delt with in the documentary. Moreover, they fit the socio-economic group and are most likely to be living in the same conditions in which the teenagers in the documentary will be living.

Institution=
- BBC could be a potential institution as they are most likely to focus on issues going on in Britain today which is affecting the population.

- Channel 4 is a channel which I feel mis targeted at the youth so they can be seen as a potential institution. They also show many documentarys on a weekly basis. (3-4 approximatley).

Narrative=
- The narrative will be based upon how young teenagers are represented in the media and to what extent they are represented positevly and negatively in the media.

- Also I'll be looking at to what extent U.K. teenagers follow and copy American teenagers such in films, music ect.

- Lastly, how the narrative links to the news today and make a documentary not following the negative media but giving negative and positive representations allowing viewers to make their own minds up about how they view todays teenagers.

SHEP:

Social = The impact the deliquent or positive behaviour from the teenage girls is having on societey, and how societeys views may have changed on them.

Historical = This has been covered before in the media but in recent times the coverage of teenage girls has been increasing.

Ecenomic = This will be ecenomically good because the documentary can be distribued and funded with a low budget. Also, alot of money will be made from the documentary as it will attract a large number of consumers ranging from teenagers to parents of both sexes.

Political= This is in particular an issue delt with by the government as the tax payer has often complained about why it is they should have to pay for the benefits given to teenage girls with babies who don't work and have dropped out of school.

Issues and Debates= My critical investigation will be exploring most of the issues and debates related to this issue such as early pregnancies, high intake of drugs and alcohol consumption, image obsessioned and other positive representations I can find. The issues and debates will be as unbiased as I can make them and in the end I will be making my own judgement and siding with one representation out of a positive one and a negative one.

Media Theories=

Gender Theory= This relates to my critical investigation because I'll be focusing in particular on females and their positive and negative represenation. How they are portrayed in the eyes of public and how the media influences their opinions.

Audience Theory= This will relate to my critical investigation and linked production peice as I will need to identify how to appeal to my target audience which is social class C1, C2 and D males aged between 13 - 19 and my secondary which is all others who would be interested in this topic.