Music to read by:
So all alone, I keep the wolves at bay.
There is only one thing that I can say:
Did you stand by me?
No, not at all.
Did you stand by me?
No way.
Revelation: BBC director-general Mark Thompson
has claimed
Christianity is treated with far less sensitivity than other
religions because it is pretty broad shouldered
Christianity is treated with far less sensitivity than other
religions because it is pretty broad shouldered
By Paul Revoir
BBC
director-general Mark Thompson has claimed Christianity is treated with
far less sensitivity than other religions because it is ‘pretty broad
shouldered’.
He
suggested other faiths have a ‘very close identity with ethnic
minorities’, and were therefore covered in a far more careful way by
broadcasters.
But he
also revealed that producers had to consider the possibilities of
‘violent threats’ instead of polite complaints if they pushed ahead with
certain types of satire.
‘Without question, “I complain in the strongest possible
terms”, is different from, “I complain in the strongest possible terms
and I am loading my AK47 as I write”. This definitely raises the
stakes.’
- BBC
director-general Mark Thompson
But he added that religion as a whole should never receive the same ‘protection and sensitivity’ in the law as race.
Mr
Thompson was making his comments during a wide ranging interview about
faith and broadcasting, which included the furore provoked by the
Corporation’s decision to screen the controversial show Jerry Springer:
The Opera on BBC2 in 2005.
Hundreds of Christians rallied outside BBC buildings before and during the broadcast to protest about what they saw as blasphemous scenes such as Jesus Christ wearing a nappy.
At least 45,000 people contacted the BBC to complain about swearing and its irreverent treatment of Christian themes.
Hundreds of Christians rallied outside BBC buildings before and during the broadcast to protest about what they saw as blasphemous scenes such as Jesus Christ wearing a nappy.
At least 45,000 people contacted the BBC to complain about swearing and its irreverent treatment of Christian themes.
Many said that no one would have dreamed of making such a show about the Prophet Mohammed and Islam.
Mr Thompson has now appeared
belatedly to accept their argument. In an interview, he said Islam was
‘almost entirely’ practised by people who already may feel in other ways
‘isolated’, ‘prejudiced against’ and who may regard an attack on their
religion as ‘racism by other means’.
Strong reaction: Mr Thompson spoke about the
furore
provoked by the Corporation's decision to screen the controversial
show Jerry Springer: The Opera on BBC2 in 2005
provoked by the Corporation's decision to screen the controversial
show Jerry Springer: The Opera on BBC2 in 2005
But he said that Christianity was ‘an established part of our cultural-built landscape’ which meant it was ‘a pretty broad- shouldered religion’.
He conceded
that the broadcaster would never have aired a similar show about
Mohammed because it could have had the same impact as a piece of
‘grotesque child pornography’.
In
the interview posted online for the Free Speech Debate – a research
project at Oxford University – Mr Thompson said: ‘The kind of
constraints that most people accept around racial hatred, the fact that
it may be in certain forms of expression or certain forms of depiction,
may be outlawed because of the way in which they go to racial hatred and
potentially the promotion and incitement of racial hatred.
He added that religion as a whole should never receive the same ‘protection and sensitivity’ in the law as race.
‘I think religion should never receive that level of protection or sensitivity.
But
I think it is wrong to imagine that it therefore goes into the general
swim and that a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed is no more challenging
than a debate about what two plus two equals.’
Grave consequences: Mr Thompson said the fatwa
against
Salman Rushdie over his novel "The Satanic Verses," had made
broadcasters realise that religious controversies could lead
to murder or serious criminal acts
Salman Rushdie over his novel "The Satanic Verses," had made
broadcasters realise that religious controversies could lead
to murder or serious criminal acts
He added: ‘The point is that for a Muslim, a depiction, particularly a comic or demeaning depiction, of the Prophet Mohammed might have the emotional force of a piece of grotesque child pornography.
‘One
of the mistakes secularists make is not to understand the character of
what blasphemy feels like to someone who is a realist in their religious
belief.’
When asked by
his interviewer, the historian Timothy Garton Ash, if it was the case
that the BBC wouldn’t dream of airing something ‘comparably satirical’
as Jerry Springer: The Opera about Mohammed, he said:
‘Essentially the answer to that question is yes.’
He added: ‘The idea you might want to… think quite carefully about whether something done, in quotes, in the name of freedom of expression, might to the Jew, or the Sikh, or the Hindu, or the Muslim, who receives it, feel threatening, isolating and so forth, I think those are meaningful considerations.’
Mr
Thompson, who is expected to leave his job after the Olympics, said he
was a ‘practising Catholic’ who believed that the ‘truths of the
Christian faith’ were objective rather than subjective.
He
had never watched Martin Scorsese’s film The Last Temptation of Christ
or Monty Python’s The Life of Brian because he was ‘quite personally
sensitive to mockery of religious images’.
But
he said this did not mean that he was against either film being
broadcast, adding that the best advice if you thought something might
offend you was not to watch it.
However, he had no problem with the decision to show Jerry Springer: The Opera, and ‘thoroughly enjoyed it’.
Mr
Thompson said the fatwa against Salman Rushdie over his novel The
Satanic Verses, the September 11 terror attacks, and the murder in
Holland in 2004 of film-maker Theo van Gogh, who had criticised Islam,
had made broadcasters realise that religious controversies could lead to
murder or serious criminal acts.
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