Saturday, 16 April 2011

Fagburn Vs The BBC: Round Four

I've finally received a reply from The BBC in response to my complaint about their stupid reply to my original complaint about their use of the word "homosexual" in news stories.

Dear Mr Fagburn

Reference CAS-683973-X7DZ7N

Thanks for contacting us with your further comments regarding BBC News. Please accept our apologies for the delay in replying. We know our correspondents appreciate a quick response and are sorry you've had to wait on this occasion.

We’ve registered your comments on our audience log made available to BBC staff across the Corporation.

Thanks again for contacting us.

Kind Regards

Stuart Webb
BBC Complaints
www.bbc.co.uk/complaints

Oh great - a form letter!
Is there anyone who can tell me if BBC staff ever read the audience log?

3 comments:

  1. Yes, yes they do. The (anonymised) audience logs are available to all BBC staff on the intranet , and production and editorial staff read them regularly.

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  2. Aha! That's good to hear - thank you.

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  3. The BBC has known about using the word 'homosexual' for years. Mark Thompson had all the good stuff about treating gay people fairly removed from the editorial guidelines about a year after he took over as Director General.

    This is what it used to say about 'homosexual' -

    "Be sensitive to the effect of language. 'Homosexual' has wide currency. 'Gay and lesbian' is often preferred and is certainly acceptable."

    (web archive) http://web.archive.org/web/20010913024157/http://www0.bbc.co.uk/info/editorial/prodgl/chapter9.shtml#sex

    My blog goes into quite a lot of detail about BBC prejudice.

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