Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Woman's Hour now: BBC walking away from Stonewall

314 replies

nauticant · 11/11/2021 10:06

Emma Barnett is asking the questions.

OP posts:
LaetitiaASD · 11/11/2021 20:29

@Shedbuilder

NewlyGranny If you think about other things we learn, like driving, say, you don't expect to be paying for and receiving ongoing training every year, do you? You put what you earned first time round into practice and get on with it!

Lots of us — nurses, doctors, gas engineers, electricians — have to pay to be registered and have to be assessed every so often, for which we also pay.

Pretty much anyone with any sort of regulation or accredition has to keep learning and, at the least, recording their learning.

Most jobs - even the "lowest" - would probably benefit from trying to learn and keep up to date with current best practice.

Drivers should have to do theory tests every 5 or 10 years IMHO, and there's worse ideas that 5 yearly or 10 yearly tests.

Shedbuilder · 11/11/2021 20:24

NewlyGranny
If you think about other things we learn, like driving, say, you don't expect to be paying for and receiving ongoing training every year, do you? You put what you earned first time round into practice and get on with it!

Lots of us — nurses, doctors, gas engineers, electricians — have to pay to be registered and have to be assessed every so often, for which we also pay.

LaetitiaASD · 11/11/2021 20:20

Dear oh dear, what a pathetic pathetic BBC response to good questions from EB.

borntobequiet · 11/11/2021 20:18

Ah thank goodness it was a parody. But I had to scroll down a bit to be sure. Nothing - no amount of nonsense - would surprise me nowadays.

WarriorN · 11/11/2021 20:15

My god that was a pregnant pause!

Doubletoilandtrouble · 11/11/2021 20:03

Thank you nauticant, that was brilliant. I really enjoyed listening to the squirming. Go Emma!

borntobequiet · 11/11/2021 20:02

So true. For those who missed: job description

That’s got to be a parody. Please tell me it’s a parody.

After listening to the interview with the Nations person - man - I did listen to the rest of the programme. V. good. Immeasurably better than the drivel of yore. (I’m an old lady and have no time for yummy cooking, celebrity cat cafes, yarn bombing escapades or the other stuff WH has been featuring for about three decades now.)

WarriorN · 11/11/2021 19:56

Listening on catchup, this is brilliant!

agedmother · 11/11/2021 19:23

You've got to them love them a bit for this.

LobsterNapkin · 11/11/2021 19:22

@NewlyGranny

If you think about other things we learn, like driving, say, you don't expect to be paying for and receiving ongoing training every year, do you? You put what you earned first time round into practice and get on with it!

If you mess up you get sent back for a refresher, but your whole organisation doesn't have to sit in and pay for it.

Unless what you're learning is such nonsense on stilts that the content keeps shifting and growing, of course, meaning what you learned last year at great expense is now completely wrong and highly offensive ...

I had a similar experience with certain kinds of training, particularly anti-harassment training, in the military. Most of which was completely what you'd expect even if you were doing it for the first time. The standard however was changed every few years so everyone would have to be retrained.

Another that was quite similar was safety training.

What I came to realize is that it was about two things. Ass-covering, with a sub-section of liability, and continuing to provide employment for various groups and HR people. Every year the safety people would get together and say - what can we make more safe? Because you can always do better.

It almost makes one want to cry when you think about the real, useful things we might accomplish instead.

agedmother · 11/11/2021 19:22

@Datun

They should have run the entire thing past the Director of Better.

Amateurs.

So true. For those who missed: job description
CriticalCondition · 11/11/2021 18:56

Wow. Just listened on catch-up.

That was like listening to a snake being pinned down with forked sticks.
Go Emma. It's been a long time coming but you are totally nailing it.

I'm back on board with WH. Except for Anita Rani's Fluffy Fridays which are like being force fed candyfloss. Her unprofessional and partisan TWAW tweet was the last straw.

ScrollingLeaves · 11/11/2021 18:32

“@TheCountessofFitzdotterel
We know that gay men were also over represented (and have been for years) at the BBC.“

Please would you elaborate? Are gay men over represented at the BBC compared to their representation in companies in general?
Or over represented compared to their presence in other creative industries?

Gay men have often, as generally less conforming people, been attracted to creative pursuits. I don’t believe it is just because they were discriminated against in other more conservative jobs, though that must have a bearing too.

TreXX · 11/11/2021 18:32

@WhereYouLeftIt

I'm actually looking forward to Anita Rani's show tomorrow. She's full-on TWAW - it could be interesting. I stopped listening on Fridays after she tweeted this.

After all, it's possible she's wised up too - EB was a bit TWAW at first. I do find myself wondering - was EB toeing the BBC line of the time, was she a secret terf, of was she TWAW until this gig has exposed her to what's going on?

I complained to BBC about her lack of impartiality after she tweeted that.
WhatyoutalkingaboutWillis · 11/11/2021 18:31

Emma has a new fan in me. Brilliant

Itmightbepossibletomoveonnow · 11/11/2021 18:30

Great interview by Emma today, good listening. The lack of leadership leading is the key here.

And just in case the BBC have forgotten how far they’ve got to go yet….

mobile.twitter.com/Newsround_Blog/status/1151821906707984385

FannyCann · 11/11/2021 18:29

Oh dear. Seems quite a lot of BBC workers are about to discover no one is indispensable and jobs with prestigious organisations may not be quite so easy to find just now.

BBC staff vow to QUIT over plans to end Stonewall relationship
mol.im/a/10191733

Mollyollydolly · 11/11/2021 18:25

I worked in a BBC newsroom in the regions for years, just like in real life, the vast majority of people think it's all bollocks. Just like in other workplaces they haven't felt free to say so, that's what changing and it's wonderful to see. And the demographic in newsrooms tends to be slightly older (and wiser), departments like children's full of bright young things who've swallowed all the gender stuff. The BBC is a microcosm of society in general really.
What I loved about Emma's interview was the nuance, she was really drilling down into the practicalities, the reality of changing language, it was brilliant to listen to.

Tanith · 11/11/2021 18:10

“ BloodinGutters, exactly. I say this about any organisation, it's the easiest thing in the world NOT to discriminate, why the fuck should any reputable organisation need a lobbying group to tell them how to do so.”

You forget how entrenched Stonewall was - and still is.

When Government organisations, universities, schools, supermarkets, law firms, political parties, etc. etc. are all members of the Stonewall Diversity programme, the pressure to join the scheme is immense.

I remember being appalled when someone published the long, long list of all the organisations that were Stonewalled. I really began to understand just how this ideology had become so entrenched in almost every aspect of our lives.

I think it was the people who did the hard graft of writing to them all that started all this, all those FOI requests. They forced these organisations to evaluate exactly how much money they were spending on Stonewall’s programme and what they were getting out of it.

RedToothBrush · 11/11/2021 18:05

Wow! Where's that from? Is that not just demonstrating they exceeded their target?

The 2018 BBC document on diversity.

We know that gay men were also over represented (and have been for years) at the BBC.

TheCountessofFitzdotterel · 11/11/2021 18:01
Also Kelley’s antisemitism quote and a nice list of ‘big Stonewall scheme quitters.’
BloodinGutters · 11/11/2021 18:00

@RedToothBrush

The BBC. Where there was a target to REDUCE LGBT representation in the work place at the same time as Stonewall goes nuts and seems to have far too much influence (which apparently doesn't influence despite paying to train staff to be influenced).

Fascinating.

The most oppressed seem to have a disportionate amount of power in the media compared to the country as a whole (and women are unrepresented).

At a glance that looks like that’s their minimum target to reach, not that there would be any problem over reaching.
Needmoresleep · 11/11/2021 17:57

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10190853/BBC-withdrew-Stonewall-diversity-scheme-didnt-want-appear-biased.html

They managed to get the gingerbread people poster in.

MonsignorMirth · 11/11/2021 17:56

@RedToothBrush

The BBC. Where there was a target to REDUCE LGBT representation in the work place at the same time as Stonewall goes nuts and seems to have far too much influence (which apparently doesn't influence despite paying to train staff to be influenced).

Fascinating.

The most oppressed seem to have a disportionate amount of power in the media compared to the country as a whole (and women are unrepresented).

Wow! Where's that from? Is that not just demonstrating they exceeded their target?
LizzieSiddal · 11/11/2021 17:51

The BBC have been in a massive Stonewall bubble for about 4 years.

That bubble has now well and truly popped!🎉