A Failure of Balance


The article, if you want to take a look at it, is about Lawson talking on the radio, lying about climate change. There’s of course been an uproar, quite rightly. And some moron at the BBC has said this:


What the absolute fuck? How on earth can a sane rational, and hopefully, educated person come out with that sort of shit? And look at him/herself in the mirror afterwards. It shows not only a basic lack of understanding about journalism, it indicates a complete failure to understand how reality works.

This is not balance:


OK that’s not entirely accurate, because there is nothing on the other side. You can only have two sides of a debate when there are two sides. When there is only one side, then to present both as equivalent is not impartial, it is highly biased towards the side which has no argument. If you want a balanced debate about climate change, have two scientists, SCIENTISTS, not has-been politicians, arguing about whether the increase is 1 degree or 2 degrees, not nobodies banging on about the latest stuff they’ve made up.

It is highly irresponsible to pass on fiction as fact. Not including lies is not being partisan, it is being a responsible member of society. Not giving them a platform is not censorship, (I’m not contradicting my previous post), because no-one’s rights are infringed by it. There is no right to pass on misinformation as truth.

And people have explained this to BBC journalists before. How do they still not get this very basic simple fact? That’s not a rhetorical question. I really don’t understand how they cannot learn how to do their jobs properly.