Well done, BBC

[airiefairie]

Watching the hero of the right Ben Shapiro, having a meltdown when BBC interviewer Andrew Neil holds him accountable for things he has said is priceless. Tough guys can't dance, and they can't stand the light of being exposed. Smug is not a very good look for Ben.

Enjoy Ben Shapiro Melting Down and Running Out of a BBC Interview

This was pretty comical the way he worked himself into a lather over literally nothing. Has he no control over his emotions? He later apologised for misunderstanding the interviewer’s intent, but the damage was already done.

Of course, the BBC is not as most US media - and ask questions that can be difficult to answer. I suspect this was the show Hardtalk, where some really seasoned journalists have done a good job, in asking prominent leaders, business, politicans, even heads of states difficult questions, and demanded answers - and where specially Shapiro fell flat by acting like he was in control, which he was not at all. I actually enjoy listening to the BBC interview politicians and others. They seem to actually ask hard questions and follow up with other questions. I never understood why Shapiro has the following he does. He is like that Tomi Lahren... Trolls who managed to make money of the fringes.

Why are American journalists incapable of holding these assholes' feet to the fire? Time and again I hear someone like Mick Mulvaney, Kellyanne Conway, or Steven Miller on the TV or radio spreading some absolute bullshit, and the journalist just allows them to talk without any kind of challenge or pushback.

Comments

[dewline]

And Andrew Neil is an ideological fellow-traveller to Shapiro. Talk about friendly fire!

[johnny9fingers]

They may have some similar political views, but Neil is a journalist, in a micro culture of journalists, and held to account by other journalists. He is a "clubbable" sort of chap. He can be a bonkers rightwing person if he wants to be, but he has to be a good journalist first; he has been editor of the Sunday Times and is currently editor of the Spectator.

Standards, old thing, standards.

Something which Shapiro doesn't get; and it appears that many Americans no longer get either.

[draxil]

Good to see.

BBC seems to get a lot flak nowadays for perceived bias. As someone with friends across the political spectrum it always pleases me that they get criticised on this by people on the left & right, which I think speaks for itself :)

[tcpip]

Fascinating. I wonder if this is a shift in Andrew Neil's thinking.

In the past, he's been an advocate for war in Afghanistan and Iraq, employed revisionist historians, has opposed the scientific consensus on climate change, and the link between AIDS and HIV.

Shapiro probably thought that he was going to get it easy.

[abomvubuso]

Perhaps he has decided to "evolve", realising that he's been losing ratings (I'm not sure if he really is, just guessing).

[johnny9fingers]

I wonder if this is a shift in Andrew Neil's thinking.

Well Peter Oborne (another Spectator stalwart) has done a volte face on Brexit.

The one thing Andrew Neil is, is he is not stupid. Right-wing, deliberately controversial, anti-PC etc; but he is still a journalist operating in a tradition that harkens back two or even three centuries. If he fucked up on that basic metric he'd be chucked out of the Garrick Club and cold-shouldered at El Vino's. (Paxman is another attack dog journalist, but in his case of the centre-right.) We need more Paul Foots in this world; but we don't need any more slightly dim ideologues like Ben (the dog ate my homework) Shapiro. If you're going on a programme with real journalists (even those of the right if they are real journalists) at least do your prep.

Also it's about audience. Ben Shapiro speaks to the "American people". Andrew Neil talks to the British ruling classes. The audience requirements for the American people are very different to those of the UK ruling class; though it is true you cannot talk down to either - for apparently opposite reasons, obviously - though in my opinion both stem from cultural hubris.

[tcpip]

That's all pretty sound. Although there are issues where his opinions are simply contra-factual. I understand that conservatives can make a case for the invasion of Afghanistan or Iraq, as much I strongly disagree with it. But it is hard for me to see how anyone who claim adherence to facts could say that climate change isn't real (let alone isn't human-caused) and that HIV doesn't come from AIDS.

[johnny9fingers]

Well I don't think Neil is peddling the HIV shtick any more; he is not one to sustain personal ridicule well, and jumped off that particular bandwagon. He is palaeolithic in many respects and will argue his beliefs right up until they become unsustainable. A bit like most of us, I suppose. Siding with Lord Lawson on climate change was a bit bonkers, and I guess that Neil will be amongst the last to change his opinions in this matter; but that would be in character. As is adhering to set standards of journalism, despite having been employed by Roops.

He's on the Beeb, attempting to put a balanced viewpoint, and Shapiro hadn't done his homework. I believe that Stalin and Trotsky had a few arguments, but that was before the internet age. It is not unknown for folk of similar political stances to find specific ideas unacceptable. I was in favour of going into Afghanistan after Bin Laden, but emphatically against the second Iraq war. I'm a conservative who sees the need for some change. But if I had a mantra it would be "Evolution, not revolution."

However, it appears policing against international terrorist outrages sometimes requires invasions; which appears unfortunate, if you will excuse the meiosis. I'm happy to get the perps who do the bad things, but the scattergun approach of using 9/11 to go after other targets was in my opinion, both a war crime, and the most strategically inept policy of modern times. Whereas all coalition forces centred on Afghanistan might have brought Bin Laden to ground earlier and maybe have mitigated or entirely prevented the clusterfuck-up of Iraq War 2 and its aftermath, the divided forces of a twin campaign contributed greatly to the present chaotic mess. Such is. We are here now.

And we must not let the populist ideologues like Shapiro get away with nonsense. If they have an actual point it tends to be drowned out by the frothing insanity of the rest of their demotic rantings; it is what Shapiro is good at, after all. And that actual point will be presented in a very particular fashion. Sensible folk will reflect on the point being made, badly educated folk will hear the frothing rantings and agree... it is an obvious propaganda strategy but it is still remarkably effective. I'm pleased that Andrew Neil didn't let the blighter off the hook easily.

The original "Spectator" under Addison and Steele is still one of the greatest historical documents of the mores of English society in the C18th; as well as helping define modern English usage, English political journalism, English social journalism etc & etc. We have to thank Addison or Steele for our present use of the semi-colon rather than the Latin colon; for although Ben Jonson was the first notable writer to use it in English, Addison and Steele popularised it. (I went through a period of only using the classical colon, despising the more modern innovations - I am still at heart a conservative.)

[mahnmut]

Ben’s a whiny little bitch.

[arhalvaztrirjournal]

This is really more 'Stop! Stop it, he's already dead!' than something to cheer about as these ideologues shun actual journalism for precisely this reason. The USA doesn't do this because its political system is decaying in the same sense as the Roman Republic did when it was corroding into the Empire.