'Road Rage: Cars v Bikes': BBC's Panorama episode receives mixed reception (+ statistics questioned); Newly crowned hill climb champ Illi Gardner smashes Sa Calobra QOM; Cyclists warned of runaway oversized baubles; Close pass flag + more on the live blog

I'm thinking about an invention that could project a hollographic image of a car around me 

I was thinking about something like this but then realised when it comes to road safety no-one can see the brontosaurus in the room.

Dicklexic wrote:

I am not a number, I AM A FREE MAN!*

* I say 'free', I of course accept that I am shackled by modern society, by the moral boundaries that encirlce us all, forcing (most) of us to comply with 'societal norms' that visibly or invisibly limit our choices and restirct our behaviours! 

Dennis Redmond wrote:

The most direct critique [in the TV series The Prisoner] of what might be called the politics-industry of late capitalism, however, is undoubtedly [the episode] “Free for All”, both the funeral dirge for the national mass party and the unofficial founding charter of the New Left. In many ways, “Free for All” is the logical complement to the visual innovations and luminous mediatic strategies of “A., B. & C.”; whereas the latter identifies the space of the editing room as a new kind of cultural zone, and thus transforms a certain visual recursion into a protomorphic video library of images, the former concentrates not on the image per se but on the messages and texts transmitted by such—or what Derrida would identify as the thematic of a dissemination which is never quite identical with what is being disseminated. But where deconstruction and post-structuralism promptly sealed off this potentially explosive insight behind the specialized ghettos of linguistics or ontological philosophy, and thus unwittingly perpetuated precisely the authoritarian monopoly over theory authorized by the ontologies in the first place, the most insightful intellectuals of the New Left (most notably, Adorno and Sartre) would insist on the necessarily mediated nature of this dissemination, i.e. the fact that the narrative-industries of late capitalism are hardly innocent bystanders in the business of accumulation, but play an indispensable role in creating new markets, restructuring old ones, and ceaselessly legitimating, transacting and regulating the sway of the commodity form over society as a whole.

I hate to go all swdlxer, but shouldn't that be

Quote:

I am not a number: I am a free man.

?

Be seeing you...

Is it good though ? If the result is people who've seen it still say its framing the debate wrong, quoting dubious statistics and uses "experts" (as motormouths?) like Rod Liddle.

All it does is give an air of legitimacy to a claim that the producers can cite that they made sure it was balanced.

I'd have steered well clear, like Boardman does with these media requests to get involved, as you cant shift the narrative or get the reality of a cycling view point across in the edit.

Remember this Panorama episode isnt about really tackling the issue, exposing the problem, like it might have done 30 years ago when it was about serious investigative journalism, it's about producing content filler to the schedules that attracts an audience.

Awavey wrote:

Is it good though ?

I didn't think it was good - I spent more time wincing than nodding sagely!

What I thought was interesting, is how they showed the presenter being subjected to close passes himself.

Now, if they did a follow-up programme, where they submit close pass reports to the various police forces and show the difficulty in getting any meaningful action, that would be useful investigative journalism!

HoarseMann wrote:

 

Letting Rod Liddle mouth off unchallenged

I haven't watched it yet but this was to be expected. It's what passes for "balanced" journalism at the BBC.

To involve Rod Liddle is bizarre and shows how poor BBC journalism is these days.  Liddle lives in Florida and has no expertise in road safety.

How someone like him gets an invite onto what is supposed to be a serious  reporting program is beyond me.

Are you sure about the Florida bit or confusing him with the other bastionard of Right Wing columnists and approrpriately monickerd Littlejohn. 

Ah yes, I think you are right.  I was mixing up Littlejohn and Liddle.  Both out of the same mould.

We all make mistakes (20 months pregnant doh).

As for why invite him on to comment, anyone who "jokes" about hanging a wire at neck height to behead cyclists is a totally balanced view. I suspect Panorama didn't mention that when introducing him. 

Panorama should justify why someone like Liddle is qualified to be invited onto the programme.  His track record in abuse and offensive comments is pretty comprehensive.  Hardly a beacon of reason.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rod_Liddle#Allegations_of_misogyny_and_racism

sean1 wrote:

Panorama should justify why someone like Liddle is qualified to be invited onto the programme.  

I'm afraid it's all part of the BBC's desperate attempt to appear balanced after so many attacks from the right accusing them of bias: if you run an article about racism, you have to invite a racist, if you run an article about the planet being round, you have to invite a flat earther. It doesn't seem to matter how ridiculous someone's stance is, or how little they are qualified to comment on a subject, as long as they can tick the "balance" box they're happy.

I bet you don't see many pro-vaxxers or communists or even just 'vaguely left wingers' on Talk TV and GB News etc, though...  You know: for balance.

I found something which suggests that Liddle lives (or at least a few years ago lived) in the otherwise pleasant North Yorkshire seaside town of Saltburn-by-the-Sea.

sean1 wrote:

To involve Rod Liddle is bizarre and shows how poor BBC journalism is these days.  Liddle lives in Florida and has no expertise in road safety.

How someone like him gets an invite onto what is supposed to be a serious  reporting program is beyond me.

programme

Ooops.  That is why I am not a journalist of the calibre of Liddle.

IanMK wrote:

HoarseMann wrote:

Letting Rod Liddle mouth off unchallenged

I haven't watched it yet but this was to be expected. It's what passes for "balanced" journalism at the BBC.

They seem to think that "balanced" means giving equal time to crazy swivel-eyed loons and logical examination of the facts. However, we know that the BBC seems to have a secret policy against cycling whilst relentlessly pushing electric cars as the solution to everything.

hawkinspeter wrote:

They seem to think that "balanced" means giving equal time to crazy swivel-eyed loons and logical examination of the facts.

To be fair he was on his best behaviour, and unlike his newspaper and media columns, he made his completely irrelevant, misinformed bilge sound almost logical.

I know exactly what you mean, when I heard he was on I feared the worst, he was still talking tripe but without the usual dollop of maliciousness.

I've always thought the word "whore" was inappropriately negative when applied to prostitutes. After all, where all things are equal, prostitution supplies a service for a price and no one else gets hurt.

Whereas the word whore used in a derogatory way with the likes of Liddle would be much more appropriate. Pursuing a faithless and unworthy desire, for monetary gain, to spew bile at many for the entertainment of scum.

I won't be giving credence to a program that includes the worthless thoughts of that scumbag. He has nothing worthy to offer on the subject.

JustTryingToGetFromAtoB wrote:

I've always thought the word "whore" was inappropriately negative when applied to prostitutes. After all, where all things are equal, prostitution supplies a service for a price and no one else gets hurt. Whereas the word whore used in a derogatory way with the likes of Liddle would be much more appropriate. Pursuing a faithless and unworthy desire, for monetary gain, to spew bile at many for the entertainment of scum. I won't be giving credence to a program that includes the worthless thoughts of that scumbag. He has nothing worthy to offer on the subject.

Liddle is closer to the Middle English hore, meaning "filth, slime, moral corruption". As it happens I know people who (to their regret) know him, apparently he is every bit as nasty in real life as his public persona would suggest.

Rendel Harris wrote:

JustTryingToGetFromAtoB wrote:

I've always thought the word "whore" was inappropriately negative when applied to prostitutes. After all, where all things are equal, prostitution supplies a service for a price and no one else gets hurt. Whereas the word whore used in a derogatory way with the likes of Liddle would be much more appropriate. Pursuing a faithless and unworthy desire, for monetary gain, to spew bile at many for the entertainment of scum. I won't be giving credence to a program that includes the worthless thoughts of that scumbag. He has nothing worthy to offer on the subject.

Liddle is closer to the Middle English hore, meaning "filth, slime, moral corruption". As it happens I know people who (to their regret) know him, apparently he is every bit as nasty in real life as his public persona would suggest.

I'm shocked I tells you, shocked. Though I reckon good advice is that when people show you the type of person they are, believe them. Also, cheers for the addition to the word bank.

NickSprink wrote:

I tought The Prisoner was supposed to be fiction...

That's what they want you to believe....

essexian wrote:

NickSprink wrote:

I tought The Prisoner was supposed to be fiction...

That's what they want you to believe....

Sir, we are 'They'

NickSprink wrote:

I tought The Prisoner was supposed to be fiction...

So who is Number 1...?