[Football] Gary Lineker to step back from presenting MOTD

[Titanic]

Gary Lineker to step back from presenting MOTD

Gary Lineker to step back from presenting Match of the Day until agreement reached on social media use - BBC statement

www.bbc.co.uk

Gary Lineker is to step back from presenting Match of the Day until an agreement is reached on his social media use - BBC statement.
It follows an impartiality row over comments he made criticising the government's new asylum policy.
In a tweet, the presenter had compared the language used by the government to set out its plan to "that used by Germany in the 30s".

 

[Triggaaar]

This is from bbc guidelines.

"There are also others who are not journalists or involved in factual programming who nevertheless have an additional responsibility to the BBC because of their profile on the BBC. We expect these individuals to avoid taking sides on party political issues or political controversies and to take care when addressing public policy matters."

The plot thickens.

But it still seems wrong to sensor him whilst allowing so many others on the BBC to post what they like.

 

[rogersix]

I don’t necessarily disagree.

that we've created a banana republic?

 

[Berty23]

Have all those people who say they hate the chat on motd and better without it, appeared to say they prefer listening to radio commentary without commentators ruining it yet? I was looking forward to listening to us vs Leeds later. Oh well.

 

[BadFish]

As usual spot on!

Every word

 

[Jim in the West]

 

[Pevenseagull]

That particular whataboutism might not immediately fall flat on its face if it were not for the evidence that only one type of free speech is actually under threat. Nobody has pulled up other BBC stars not working in current affairs for their spouting of unquestionably party political messages on Twitter, because nobody from the government whined about it, no newspapers whose editors have their fingers crossed that Boris will get them the peerage this time have splashed the story all over their front pages all week. No Labour activists have been parachuted into management jobs at a supposedly apolitical broadcaster.

Lineker has effectively been told that if he continues to speak, he will not be employed.

Not about free speech? The mental gymnastics required to reach that conclusion are so impressive that you'd almost think that they'd been done deliberately to try to muddy the water....

......On my, Stato's caught hold that one and it's gone sailing down over long on and all the way into the car park



Sorry, wrong sport, just practicing for it I'm needed at some point.



Anyway, Corbyn, lefties etc.

 

[Triggaaar]

Few of us? I’m mixed race, do a relatively low paid job in the arts sector and in my mid thirties.

Typical gammon

 

[Berty23]

This is a funny take.

“All these sticklers for BBC rules who are considerably less concerned about the government breaking international law.”

 

[Jim in the West]

Apparently, if it's Andrew Neil, you are allowed to say what you like - the rules only apply to "his responsibilities for the BBC".

 

[jcdenton08]

Typical gammon

well in fairness I am cooking a (hopefully) delicious honey glazed ham for dinner. Doesn’t get much more gammony than that!

 

[Papa Lazarou]

Bloody Huguenots coming over here from medieval France, religious heretics doubting transubstantiation

Bloody Beaker folk. Coming over here, rowing up the Tagus Estuary from the Iberian Peninsula in improvised rafts. Coming here with their drinking vessels. What's wrong with just cupping up the water in your hands and licking it up like a cat?

Copyright Stewart Lee

 

[ukpolska]

I was waiting for this and he hasn't let us down.

 

[Triggaaar]

well in fairness I am cooking a (hopefully) delicious honey glazed ham for dinner. Doesn’t get much more gammony than that!

So you're role playing at eating the gammons! You're a monster!

 

[HalfaSeatOn]

If you hate the Tories and want them out, you love ‘Gary’. Unfortunately, it’s a pseudo civil war. And that comes from a yellow.

 

[Billy in Bristol]

Currently showing on BBC sounds.

Though I suspect they will change it.

 

[Guinness Boy]

Really? Is that how it works?

Given that Boris has proposed a knighthood for his DAD. Yes. Yes it is.

 

[Machiavelli]

Whether you agree with Lineker or not in my honest opinion is completely irrelevant.

It's the rules on impartiality that need looking at and it those rules that have got everyone in a pickle.

And when you aren't applying them to journalists and are applying them to MOTD presenters, something clearly isn't working.

Impartiality is very very difficult in the modern age, especially when impartiality itself is somewhat arbitrarily defined.

Impartiality by very it's very definition often involves not saying something. Impartiality is supposed to mean apolitical.

The problem with not saying something in today's world is that then often gets defined as "support", impartiality itself perceived as political.

This leaves broadcasters in a very difficult situation, getting attacked equally from the left and the right. Let the journalist deal with that, they get the training.

As for the others, just don't apply it. Allow presenters to express their views. Just make it clear to them that they don't use their social media channels to promote their programmes or their employer.

I think I largely agree with you on this.
Dyke made the clear distinction between news presenters and those covering wider, cultural output (which would include Lineker and Sugar), and that needs to be applied.
Then, in terms of news/politics/current affairs broadcasters, the notion of impartiality has to be qualified quite clearly. It's the loose application of the term that is generating much of the problem IMHO, because it's ultimately unachievable. What is sought from what I can understand is party political impartiality. Achieving that is not the easiest thing, especially when we have an electoral system which over-emphasises three parties in terms of parliamentary seats (Con, Lab, SNP) and under-emphasises others (Lib Dems, Greens and, potentially, Reform) -- but potentially the rules followed during a GE campaign could provide a starting-guide.
The Attenborough issue would complicate this. I'm more irritated by Attenborough than Lineker at present -- he's been with them for 7 decades and has been sidelined, presumably for having the temerity to indicate that we're living through the sixth mass extinction (around which the science is coalescing), although I'll await to see the content of the show to confirm what it is about the programme that prompted its special treatment. The BBC's explanation is highly unconvincing, and Attenborough's silence (so far) is speaking volumes.

To return to an earlier issue in which I upset you: what's going on in the public response to the BBC is populism in action. The people are mobilising against the establishment, and it's a beautiful thing. It'd be even better if they could extend that mobilisation so we can begin to address the deep mire we're in.

 

[Triggaaar]

Would have been interesting if Lineker's political stripes were of a different colour and he'd tweeted in support of Sunak's plans and had got dropped as a result. Doubt we'd have seen the scores of presenters dropping out in defence of his right to free speech.

This has little to do with the concept of free speech and rather what kinds of free speech are acceptable. Indeed, we'd probably have seen Wrighty, Shearer and Scott all vying to jump in his grave if he'd espoused pro-government views and was dropped.

You are probably right.

I guess we can only support/condemn what's in front of us, and it feels that the BBC were wrong to drop Gary, so that's what I'll react to, rather than what could have been.

 

[Stato]

View attachment 158184

And Neill was working for the News / Current Affairs department where the requirements are much clearer.

The issue here is that those in power are using their positions to defend and promote their own agendas. They have appointed fellow travelers to run the BBC and they will not brook any criticism. It's corrupt use of power.

 

[Machiavelli]

My sole point is that if you work for a company that requires you to to sign up to not expressing political opinions you shouldn’t. If you choose to, you live with the consequences. I kind of hope Lineker doesn’t back down but I think he might.

My sole point is that you and @Weststander and one or two others are getting all uppity about Lineker and that, if all this uppitiness is to have any credence whatsoever, you'll need to point us to some posts where you've got all uppity about Alan Sugar expressing political opinions or, what is even worse, the way that -- to take just one example -- the BBC indulged Andrew Neil when presenting news on the BBC.

An extra point is that the media ecosystem in this country is entirely loaded towards the right and the establishment. If you deny that, you're simply delusional -- it's firmly established in the academic literature.