Whitehouse drama round up

The drama Filth: The Mary Whitehouse story went out on Wednesday May 28th at 9pm. Here’s a round up of stuff related to it.

BEYER PAYS TRIBUTE

And uses the broadcast of Filth: The Mary Whitehouse story to
push his pressure group and it’s agenda.

From The Times:

Mary Whitehouse and the power of television
A fellow campaigner pays tribute to a fearless figurehead

John C. Beyer, director of mediawatch-UK

Having been in the unique position of working alongside Mary
Whitehouse for 18 years, I am often asked what she was like. The
truth is that she was really quite ordinary but obviously affected
by the pressures and tensions of the campaign. Mary had a very keen
sense of humour; she was kind, sensitive and good company and not a
bit like the stereotype created by certain image makers. Julie
Walters captures these qualities very well.

Mary enjoyed good television, which properly “educated, informed and
entertained” and it is a pity that Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story
does not reflect this. Mary certainly understood the power of
television and its ability to shape personal attitudes and behaviour
and set agendas for public debate and discussion. In the 1960s,
during the tenure of Sir Hugh Carleton Greene, the BBC rapidly
became a vehicle for launching the “permissive society” and gave
publicity to its numerous attention-seeking advocates.

In the early years Mary attracted a huge following and the film
shows well how the campaign took off and how Mary and Ernest had to
make life-changing and courageous decisions. Her primary motivation
was always bravely to safeguard the moral welfare of children so
that they could be brought up by their parents free of the sometimes
malign influence that television had become. She rapidly realised
that it was not enough simply to complain about programmes that
offended “good taste or decency”.

She devised a revolutionary scheme to establish an Independent
Broadcasting Council to provide an official channel through which
ordinary viewers and listeners could give voice to their very real
concerns. The Government took several more years to establish the
Broadcasting Standards Council.

The film has an authentic feel as it portrays life for the
Whitehouse family in the 1960s. Thankfully, it does not focus only
on the daily battles with the BBC and how this impacted on them, but
also on the tough negotiating with the Minister of Posts and
Telecommunications and meeting Sir Charles Curran at Broadcasting
House. This puts the campaign into a proper perspective.

In many ways the “Swinging Sixties” and the underlying liberal
approach to everything have proved to be a disastrous social
experiment. She would ask, “What have we done to the children?”

Today we read, almost daily, of fatal stabbings and shootings and of
the sexual health crisis among the young. She would have no
patience, and neither do I, with those who say nothing can be done
about the easy access to corrupting pornographic and violent imagery
on the internet. She would certainly demand effective regulation of
computer games and downloading TV programmes and she would expect
broadcasters to carry far more responsibility for what they transmit
into our homes.

One thing is certain: Mary Whitehouse raised important questions
about the role of the media in modern society. Integral it may now
be, but the questions about standards are as important today as they
were in the 1960s – and her legacy lives on in mediawatch-uk!

“Today we read, almost daily, of fatal stabbings and shootings and
of the sexual health crisis among the young.”

All of which Whitehouse would have blamed TV and the media for. She
would never have thought about the kind of nasty lives and abuse
many young people have to endure which leads them down the path of
violent crime and sexual diseases.

“and her legacy lives on in mediawatch-uk!”

Yep Mediawatch UK continue to try to impose their morals, beliefs
and views on everyone else just as Whitehouse did. Her legacy
certainly lives on.

If anything though John Beyer’s campaign is nastier than
Whitehouse’s ever was. Her campaign started of as a misguided
crusade against “filth” on TV. Under Beyer it has become an almost
pathological desire to see those who’s sexual habits he dissaproves
of locked away.

WHITEHOUSE DRAMA WATCHED BY 2.5 MILLION

It’s hardly anything but Mediawatch UK are making a song and dance
about it.

From Mediawatch UK:

Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story claimed an audience of 2.8m viewers
(11.6%). The one-off drama, fronted by Julie Walters, started off
with 2.7m (10.4%) and built to 3.1m in the last half hour from 10pm.
It is the third most popular drama to have aired on the channel so
far this year behind Heroes and Torchwood which both have gained
audiences of 3.7m.

The Mary Whitehouse Story was some way above the channel’s slot
average for last year of 1.9m (8.4%), while so far this year BBC2 has
averaged 2.2m (9.3%) at that time. The show was a big draw for
upmarket ABC1 viewers as that demographic made up 56.9% of the
audience. Younger viewers weren’t really interested at all though as
just 6.6% of the audience were aged between 16 and 34. The drama
largely mopped up the remaining viewers that weren’t drawn to the big
shows on either BBC1 or ITV1 which dominated viewing last night.
Broadcast 29/5/2008

Mediawatch UK are probably hoping those who watched the drama will be
inspired to donate some cash to their campaign fund. Fat chance!

Gordon Ramsey, a rabbit and veggie agendas

Whether it was neccessary for Gordon Ramsey to break an rabbit’s neck on TV is debatable but veggie animal rights groups like Viva have just exploited this for their own agendas.

From the Daily Mail courtesy of the Melon Farmers:

Animal lovers attack Gordon Ramsay for showing rabbit killing on TV show

By Paul Revoir Last updated at 9:01 AM on 22nd May 2008

Gordon Ramsay has come under fire for showing a rabbit having its neck broken on his Channel 4 show The F Word.

The chef was shown using ferrets to hunt for the creatures with his son before viewers saw the rabbit being killed.

Animal lovers have attacked the programme for showing footage of the death.

It comes less than a week after Ramsay claimed his eight-year-old son had accidentally pulled off a live rabbit’s head during the same expedition.

Those comments and Tuesday night’s show  -  which did not feature the incident involving his son  -  have provoked outrage at Ramsay’s behaviour.

The rabbit that was shown being killed on screen was put to death by one of the men who owned the ferrets. RSPCA officers have received calls from viewers expressing their concern about the episode. But the organisation said no laws had been broken.

A spokesman said: “We encourage people to let us know if they think an animal has been killed in an inhumane way. We will always investigate.

“If anyone is still upset by the programme’s content we recommend they contact the programme makers and Ofcom.”

Animal rights organisations have reacted with fury to Ramsay’s comments about the rabbit’s severed head.

Juliet Gellatley, director of Viva, said: “‘The message that he is giving to his own child and to everybody else is from a different, barbaric age.

“It has to be said that he uses these moments to up his own profile, because he knows it will create controversy. That is pretty despicable.”

A Channel 4 spokesman said: “As part of the current series of Gordon Ramsay’s F Word, Gordon features in a regular strand in which he sources and cooks new or unusual ingredients.

“Within this strand he explored the viability of finding, hunting and eating wild rabbit, historically a widely-consumed food but no longer part of a mainstream diet.

“The location of the shoot was private land where rabbits cause extensive damage. In this context Department for the Environment guidelines were being followed and control measures  -  including ferreting  -  legal and in place.”

The rabbit row echoes similar protests made after Jamie Oliver was shown slitting a lamb’s throat on one of his Channel 4 shows.

 

“Animal lovers have attacked the programme for showing footage of the death.”

No these are not animal lovers but animal rights veggie groups with their own agendas.

“Juliet Gellatley, director of Viva, said: “‘The message that he is giving to his own child and to everybody else is from a different, barbaric age.

“It has to be said that he uses these moments to up his own profile, because he knows it will create controversy. That is pretty despicable.”"

Viva are a vegan group who believe that eating meat is immoral and that everybody should become a vegetarian. They are simply using the controversy over Ramsey killing a rabbit on his TV show to promote their vegan, veggie anti-meat agenda!

Again the neccesity of Ramsey killing a rabbit on TV is questionable but this is more about the agendas of extreme veggie groups like Viva than taste and deceny.

Mum blames soap operas and video games for youth violence

It’s a shame that this woman who following the death of her son has devoted her life to helping young people stear clear of knife crime prefers to blame convinient scapegoats rather than tackle the route causes which lead young people into a life of crime and violence.

From the Birgmingham Post courtesy of the Melon Farmers:

Video games, soap operas and the glorification of crime
May 14 2008 By Shahid Naqvi

Video games that glorify gangs and soap operas with violent storylines are leading young people into a life of crime, says a mother whose son was stabbed to death.

Ann Oakes-Odger told a panel of experts in Birmingham led by former Prime Minister’s wife Cherie Blair that she believed over-exposure to such images meant many young people lived in a “twilight world” between reality and unreality.

The commission – visiting the five cities in Britain with the worst records for gun and knife crime – also heard of the heartache of West Midlands mother Barbara Sawyers, whose son Daniel Bogle, 19, was shot dead in Smethwick five years ago.

The Birmingham visit comes days after the death of 16-year-old Londoner Jimmy Mizen – the 13th teenager to be killed in the capital this year. Ms Oakes-Odger’s 27-year-old son Westley bled to death on a street in Colchester, Essex, after being stabbed in the neck while drawing money from a cashpoint.

Her criticism of video games came days after the launch of the 18-rated Grand Theft Auto IV, which features gangs, guns and street violence.

Last year broadcasting standards watchdog Ofcom rapped the BBC after an episode of EastEnders showed a violent gang attack on the Queen Vic pub involving hammers, bottles and glasses.

“If you look back when advertising first became a medium on TV, there used to be such things as subliminal shots which were banned,” said Ms Oakes-Odger. “It was banned because it was considered to be interrupting the natural psyche of one’s thinking. I believe video games and violent computer games have the same effect.”

Ms Oakes-Odger, who now works with young people highlighting the danger of knife crime, added: “I think many soaps should tone down some of the storylines because the young mind is very impressionable. It has been proven through studies that throughout our adult years our minds are still capable of being malleable to information.

“We have a responsibility as adults to protect our children and the information that is input into them. If

we can’t tone down the information they are receiving we must give them the balance of information. We can’t allow them to live in a twilight world of reality and non-reality.”

Ms Oakes-Odger claimed youngsters were most vulnerable of falling into gangs and violent activity after moving from primary to secondary school.

“In the first year of secondary school when they have so many things to think about like becoming an adult and going through puberty, children want to appear big and confident.

“This can often be something that fuels the possible carrying of weapons to protect themselves.”

Evidence-taking by the commission at Birmingham Town Hall will go towards a Channel 4 series – The Truth About Street Weapons – examining gun and knife crime in Britain. It will be broadcast this summer.

Ms Sawyers called for more discipline in schools and for teachers to understand why some children behave badly, instead of immediately expelling them.

She told the panel – including former West Midlands Chief Constable Lord Geoffrey Dear and which is visiting London, Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow – of her heartache at losing Daniel. “It’s something I would not wish on anyone. I take it a day at a time. It really saddens me now that it is still happening. Whatever the Government are doing it’s not enough.”

Keith Bristow, Chief Constable of Warwickshire Police and the Association of Chief Police Officers’ lead on violent crime, said statistics showed gun crime had decreased but many cases were not being reported to police. “We can only solve the problem if we know about the problem,” he said.
Mediasnoops maintains that it is this world where power hungry adults don’t give a shit about anyone but themselves that’s the cause of children getting themselves involved in violent crime and stabbing each other and other people to death and not video games and TV programmes.
It’s a pity that those who are working to help young people avoid getting involved in violent crime are not trying to help young people out of the worthless and meaningless lives many of them lead and instead sit around pointing the fingre at soap operas and video games.
All this sits very well with power hungry politicians who want to whip up fears of violent video games for their own political ends but it does fuck all to help the kids who are stuck in a life of crime and violence.

Ofcom defends watershed from attack by moral guardian MPs

The 9pm watershed is under attack by MPs who have a hidden agenda.
That agenda being to put pressure on Ofcom to bring in even more
restrictive legislation leading to the kind of sweeping censorship
that they wish to see imposed on broadcasting.

From Mediawatch UK:

Ofcom defends 9pm watershed

Ofcom has dismissed claims by a group of MPs that the 9pm watershed
is failing to protect young children because they can now access
television online. Giving evidence at a culture, media and sport
committee hearing today, the Ofcom chief executive, Ed Richards,
denied the regulator had put itself in an “impossible and absurd
position” by not doing more to regulate objectionable content on the
web.

Richards was responding to claims made by Nigel Evans, the Ribble
Valley conservative MP, who argued that Ofcom’s powers over
broadcasting should be more rigorously applied to internet
content. “It’s important to remember that the watershed isn’t
dead,” Richards said. “Despite the internet, television remains
remarkably resilient as a medium. The watershed is still a very
important and I think it will remain so for several years.”

The cross-party group of MPs raised concerns about services such as
the BBC iPlayer, which make it possible for anyone to view post-
watershed content at any time of the day. The Ofcom partner for
content and standards, Stuart Purvis, said a lot of the
responsibility rested with parents to make sure their children were
not watching inappropriate material.

“If you look at the iPlayer, it immediately asks you if you are over
16,” Purvis said. “The question that arises is: Are children going
to understand that or are they going to override it?” He added that
new technology had “in a sense disadvantaged parents” who might not
necessarily know how to use access locks to protect children from
post-watershed content.

Ofcom’s appearance before the culture, media and sport committee
comes after the publication of a report by Dr Tanya Byron in March
on how to protect children on the internet. Among the key
recommendations was the introduction of a national strategy for
child internet safety, which involves a self-regulatory approach to
internet content.

The Byron report also called for better provision of information to
families, after it concluded that there was a “generational digital
divide”, which meant parents did not feel equipped to protect their
children online.
MediaGuardian 13/5/2008

This attack on the watershed has come from a group of MPs and
pressure groups such as Mediawatch UK who have an axe to grind with
the BBC.
They hope by constantly winging that the watershed is “failing to
protect children” because of online TV the broadcasting regulators
will bring in ever more tighter regulation to online broadcasting
under the guise of “protecting children”. In turn this will bring in
yet more needless restrictions of adult freedom of choice.
But of course that’s what these MPs and pressure groups want.

The BBC has already made it clear that their iplayer provides parents with facilities to restrict their children’s acsess to inappropriate content. No doubt other iplayer and online broadcast providers have such facilities as well. But of course this isn’t enough for these MPs and pressure groups who do not trust parents to monitor their own children’s viewing behaviour and want an all powerful super regulator to do it for them.

Beyer and co exploit Ross f word “storm”

Ohhh high profile TV presenter says a rude words to an A list
Hollywood superstar! We can’t possibly miss this bandwagon!

From Mediawatch UK:

Ross Slammed for Lewd f-Word Show

Jonathan Ross has been rebuked for debasing broadcasting standards
by making a vulgar suggestion on national TV to Oscar-winning
actress Gwyneth Paltrow that he would like to have sex with her.
Britain’s highest-paid television entertainer said he wanted
to “****” married mother of two Ms Paltrow if his wife would give
him permission.

His liberal use of the f-word on his recorded BBC1 chat show Friday
Night With Jonathan Ross prompted gasps from the audience and the
interview tone left Ms Paltrow, 35, speechless and looking shocked
at times.

The astonishing language – thought to be the first time a major film
star has been spoken to in such a direct sexual way on television-
has been heavily criticised by watchdog Mediawatch UK and an MP on
the Commons culture and media select committee.

Tory MP Philip Davies said 47-year-old Ross’s undignified remarks
called into question the BBC’s role as a public service broadcaster,
particularly as he is reportedly paid £6million a year of licence
fee-payers’ money.

Mediawatch UK director John Beyer said: “Clearly the BBC is not
regulating this programme or monitoring the language being used,
which is unacceptable and unnecessary and degrading. With the
iPlayer system, the 9pm watershed is meaningless.”
Sunday Express 11/5/2008

“Clearly the BBC is not regulating this programme or monitoring the
language being used, which is unacceptable and unnecessary and
degrading. With the iPlayer system, the 9pm watershed is
meaningless.”

Notice how Beyer has to go on about the iPlayer. A totally unrelated
subject which has nothing to do with what Johnathon Ross said. But
hey it’s just another stick to beat the BBC with!

“Tory MP Philip Davies said 47-year-old Ross’s undignified remarks
called into question the BBC’s role as a public service broadcaster,
particularly as he is reportedly paid £6million a year of licence
fee-payers’ money.”

Oh that nasty BBC! Paying lots of money to filth ridden TV
presenters who fill our children’s ears with filth.

Maybe Ross should have shown a bit more decorum in front of Ms
Paltrow but this is just a storm in a teacup which has been pumped
up Tory MPs and John Beyer for their own ends.

Beyer “delighted” by violent porn ban

But it’s still not enough and he still wants viewers of ALL porn thrown in jail.

From Mediawatch UK:

MOTHER’S PORN LAW CAMPAIGN ENDS

A mother whose daughter was murdered by a man addicted to violent internet porn has completed her fight to have such images banned.  Jane Longhurst, 31, was strangled by Graham Coutts, 39, from Hove, Sussex. He was jailed for at least 26 years. 

Her mother Liz, from Berkshire, backed by Reading West MP Martin Salter, campaigned for three years to ban violent online porn.  The ban is part of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill.  Possession of sexually violent images will now be punishable by up to three years in jail. 

The bill had its final reading on Thursday where it received Royal Assent.  Under the new rules, criminal responsibility shifts from the producer – who is responsible under the 1959 Obscene Publications Act (OPA) – to the consumer.  Campaigners fear the new law risks criminalising thousands of people who use violent pornographic images as part of consensual sexual relationships. 

Mrs Longhurst, of Reading, said she was aware that libertarians saw her as “a horrible killjoy”.  “Sometimes the freedoms of like-minded, decent people have to be curtailed because of a few others.  “I know some would argue women choose to do this. But I believe a lot of women who have been trafficked are forced to be on these sites.”
BBC News online 8/5/2008

Speaking today, mediawatch-uk director, John Beyer, said:
“We are delighted that Mrs Longhurst has at last succeeded in her noble campaign, in memory of her beloved daughter Jane, to criminalise the possession of extreme pornography.  We hope that this will be a first step on the road to restoring decency and respect in our society.  We remain of the opinion that the scope of the new legislation is too narrow and we will continue to press for further strengthening of the Obscene Publications Act.”
Ministry of Justice Report
“We remain of the opinion that the scope of the new legislation is too narrow”

Yes yes Beyer. Because you and your cohorts believe that legislation should outlaw all sexual material and make it a criminal offence to be in posession of even consensual adults sexual entertainment.

“We will continue to press for further strengthening of the Obscene Publications Act.”

Yes. Until all that nasty grubby porn is banned and all the dirty little pervs who look at it in their filthy rooms are locked up in jail where they belong eh?

BBC iplayer letting kids see “filth” Daily Mail bollox

Mediawatchwatch suitably poke fun at the enginered moral panic from the Daily Mail about the BBC iplayer letting children have acsess to “adult material”.

From Mediawatchwatch:

03/May/2008
Where time stands still
Is there something in the water supply, or are all tabloid journos thick? It’s sloppy journalism time again, because the subeditor who wrote the headline for  this story seems to think that what’s on the Net should comply with the BBC’s 9 p.m. watershed if it’s from the BBC. Er, isn’t he or she missing something?

The row is over the BBC’s iPlayer, which allows you to see programmes again. But what upsets the Daily Mail, a Tory MP and Mediawatch-UK’s  John Beyer is that young people can have access to it.

The Mail’s headline screams, “How the BBC’s iPlayer is making a mockery of the 9pm watershed by making explicit material available 24 hours a day”, yet neither of its two interviewees makes any reference to the watershed, just to the availability generally of material to young people.

However, let’s put journalistic tidiness aside for a moment. The BBC iPlayer is available 24 hours a day because it’s on the Internet, and the Internet is available throughout the world, throughout all time zones. Is the Mail really suggesting that the BBC block access to the iPlayer until nine o’clock in the evening here in Blighty, denying its use to, say, New Yorkers from around 6 p.m. and those in Los Angeles from the middle of the afternoon?

To illustrate its story, the Daily Mail prints a picture of a leggy bit of female totty from the programme Glamour Girls, looking provocatively gorgeous in the sort of swimwear we feature in our earlier story about billboards in Brum. Oh, but of course, the paper has a childproof lock on it. How silly of us to forget that! Children can’t pick up the Daily Mail without their parents’ knowledge.

A Beeb spokesman brings some common sense to bear on the issue: “The BBC takes its responsibility to enable parents or guardians to protect younger viewers from unsuitable BBC content on its websites very seriously and provides a number of tools to do this.

“For example, BBC iPlayer clearly labels programmes which may be unsuitable for young audiences. A lock system allows parents or guardians to prevent younger viewers from watching guidance-rated programmes unless they have a password. Setting up these systems is optional but they can be easily activated at any time.”

All sorted, then.
Here’s the link to the story….
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=563621&in_page_id=1770

It’s all ususal right-wing Daily Mail/Mediawatch UK utter shit. Another excuse for Tory voting middle England to take potshots at “those lefty politically correct librels” at the BBC who are “allowing our children acsess to pornography”.

Beyer as usual never let’s the facts get in the way of a chance for a free rent-a-quote publicity opportunity.

GTA IV Watch: Banned in the UAE

Bet self appointed moral guardians in Western countries wished they lived in the United Arab Emirates.

From Game Politics courtesy of the Melon Farmers:

GTA IV Banned in UAE
The United Arab Emirates has banned Grand Theft Auto IV, according to a report in The National.

Some gamers, however, have found a way around the loophole by purchasing the game from the duty-free shop at Dubai Airport. The Abu Dhabi airport, however was not stocking the game.

The ban is not surprising, given that past GTA games have been banned in the UAE. And, as GamePolitics recently reported, Sony’s popular God of War has been banned as well.