Dear Jenni,

 

In a recent broadcast you discussed the future of TV news. The perspective of your discussion struck me as being very narrow; understandably, I suppose, with you all being "media people".

 

I am not just being cynical when I suggest that most TV news is just "infotainment", the purpose of which is to get people's attention and ultimately make money out of them, or in the case of the BBC, to justify its own existence and taking the licence fee from us.

 

I remember going away on holiday once and being completely cut off for a couple of weeks from the continuous flow of media news and information. It was wonderfully refreshing and made me realise just how unimportant, if not completely irrelevant, most of it was to me.

 

And then there is this: “If it is happening it is happening here on BBC 24”, which, believe it or not, is a quote, not satire. 

 

Hard selling normal entertainment (especially when you have already paid for it up-front with the licence fee) is bad enough (more on "programme promos" in a moment), but doing it with “news” . . . . . I cannot think of the words to describe how depraved I find it. 

 

A very wrong turn was taken by commercial TV, providing  infotainment 24-hour and selling it to us as "what is going on in the world". But being commercially based, perhaps it was inevitable. And what does the publicly funded BBC do? It follows them chirpily down the same wrong road ! 

 

Allow it to sink in and you will realise just how frightening the quote is, implying that if something is not reported on BBC 24 it is not happening . . . I suppose we can always switch to SkyNews or CNN - but what if it is not reported there either . . . ? Best not to switch on any of them at all, I suggest, except perhaps for the occasional valuable piece of live coverage they provide - a parliamentary debate, for example.

 

I am disgusted with much of what has become of the BBC. Notwithstanding, of course, the excellent programmes that you and others there still produce. 

A large part of most people's perception of the world is conveyed to them by the electronic media (not just by the news, of course), but we fail to appreciate just how unique, profound, recent and ongoing these, and so many other developments, are. 

We need to remind ourselves that we have barely emerged from the animal kingdom, the planet's "Greatest Ape", and are still under the Hebrew God's curse for doing so (the story of Adam and Eve, which together with other Christian teachings and attitudes has had a profoundly inhibiting influence on our development: see An Atheist's and Agnostic's Guide to God). It is not yet 150 years since our ancient animal origins were made clear by Darwin, and for most people, including many scientists, the implications have yet to sink in. We are deeply in denial about them. 

It is our "more animal than human nature" which lies at the heart of our non-sustainable (and thus doomed), growth-dependent economy and grossly materialistic lifestyles. 

We could not live without the drives of our animal nature, of course, but if we don't want them to kill us, which, the way things are going, they certainly will, they have to be controlled and directed by our more enlightened, human nature. 

Now to yesterday's broadcast and your discussion of "programme promos". I agreed entirely with Chris Dunkley. 

I'm sorry to have to say it, but the BBC's "programme promos" just add to my contempt for an institution I was once proud of. I understand why commercial broadcasters do it, but not the BBC. I am perfectly capable of informing myself of what is on offer (not that I mind being "informed" about other broadcasts in the non-pushy fashion the BBC has always used in the past). The only viewers or listeners the programme promos might fail to irritate must be brain-dead and thus not worth bothering about anyway. According to Jane Clancey (your Director of Marketing) it is about 94%. That certainly does not apply to Radio 4 listeners. 

I suggest that Ms Clancey is just trying to justify her well-paid, high-status job; like the rest of us, who are dominated by our more animal than human nature, struggling to maintain, improve or find a better niche in the socio-economic environment, which, in our blindness and stupidity, we have substituted for the natural environment.