Complaint to BBC

[Catiette]

I sent the complaint below to the BBC, and promised I'd post their response. It's comically disappointing, and has shifted me (more lurker than poster, cautious, & sensitive to how strongly both "sides" feel on this subject) from concerned to angry. If you have a complaints service, surely you have an obligation to read the submissions made to it, at least?! I'm trying to empathise with different perspectives and was quite genuinely interested in their response to my closing question.

Your letter is really good. It has one of the clearest explanations I’ve ever seen about the implications of adding trans identifying males to lists of women.

The BBC basically did not answer it. Rating their answer for quality I’d give it about 15% and that would be just because they replied at all and put a few sentences together. What a poor level of comprehension and communication it shows.

I am surprised by how captured the BBC remains following the Nolan series - it was so damning. Well worth a listen, if any BBC executive wants to properly understand what they are doing!

I don’t think they intend to understand.

The BBC response should've been "we include token trangender women on the list every year, every year it becomes harder to find another 'inspirational' trans woman and our team spend a long time trying to source one".

Thanks to all replies.

I'd hoped the response would at least have opened with an acknowledgement of the complexity of this issue and the changing landscape surrounding it. The BBC has a responsibility to be aware of this. Their editorial policies regarding bias exist precisely because of their capacity, as national broadcaster, to shape our social and political landscape.

On the day I sent the query, I'd read a Times article describing an NHS trust policy stating that a woman questioning a male's presence on a female-only ward would be comparable to "racism", and an Independent comment piece inferring that the opening of the sole? female-only crisis centre in Scotland is a cause for concern. Since then, I've read the comment piece decrying Beira's Place as a "monument to hatred", and a niche article referring to women self-excluding from their favourite sport because competition's become meaningless following male inclusion. The starting point for all of this is that "transwomen ARE women".

In this context, a national institution's editorial decision to conflate women and transwomen surely becomes politically significant. They absolutely may choose to defend that decision - and had they done so, their response may have reassured me, or disappointed me, or possibly even persuaded me, depending on the rationale taken. But for them to refuse to offer any meaningful comment (or, worse, to feel unable to offer this?) ironically makes bias seem more likely (Merriam-Webster: an "unreasoned" judgement!)

I think, before I became aware of issues like the above, I may well have been in support of their list as it stands. I'd always have found it frustrating in one sense - any and all public recognition of female achievement is still so deeply, desperately needed, and I've always taken such pride in reading of it - but I'd also have seen it as positive, in another - I've also always supported minority rights with a similarly deep-seated sense of relish at visible steps forward.

In the current context, though, I want clarification and reassurance. I want to know that those with infinitely more responsibility and influence than me are at least thinking as carefully as I am about these hugely complex issues. A direct, respectful and open response would have offered that to some degree. The one I got left me unsettled. It helps no one.

Sorry, lengthy again! Tend to use my few posts to marshall my thoughts...!

Don’t be sorry, my own thoughts became clearer through reading that.

:)

I dislike the theoretical confusion the BBC is showing here. EITHER woman is a biological category OR it is an abstract gender identity category. If it is the former, then male individuals, however deserving of applause, should not be included. If it is the latter, then individuals identifying as nonbinary should not be included.

Do you really expect any logic or consistency from a cult that boils down to trying to impose on the majority what is no more than a tiny minority's delusions?

I was just checking the BBC complaints section because of their unreasonable comments about JKR (there is another thread about the launch of the new Harry Potter game & the repeated R4 interview about this). This gem is on there

“Misuse of the service

We will treat you with courtesy and respect and expect the same consideration to be shown to staff. If you misuse the service we may stop correspondence or prevent your future access to it”

I’m not seeing Catiette treated with a great deal of courtesy and respect here, I’m seeing her views dismissed without genuine consideration and reflection

Catiette, you could follow up through Ofcom now I think?

Hi all,

Your posts reminded me I've to post the promised update. You'll be amazed by it (not!) An apology for a delayed reply to my follow-up complaint, then, ultimately, the following:

"We acknowledge you disagree with the BBC’s position on 100 Women and have read and noted your points but don’t consider they suggest evidence of a possible breach of standards. Opinions do vary widely about the BBC and its output, but this does not necessarily imply there has been a breach of standards or of the BBC’s public service obligations. For this reason we regret we don’t have more to add to our previous correspondence, and so will not respond further or address more questions or points.

If you are dissatisfied with this decision you may ask the BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit(ECU) to review it. Details of the BBC complaints process are available at www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/handle-complaint/ where you can read the BBC’s full complaints framework."

So, basically, the whole exchange can be summed up as:

Me: A reasoned and courteous query expressing concern that they pro-actively support the politically contested re-definition of "woman", and are thereby complicit to some degree in issues arguably impacting negatively on women's safety and dignity.

Them: Yes; we've been doing this for aaaages!

Me: Er, that was my concern. Could you address it?

Them: No.

:)

I don't expect a lengthy personalised response - they must be flooded with complaints & correspondence, from the legitimate to the absurd. But to ignore the content of my initial correspondence, then dismiss the follow-up without explanation, reducing a considered argument to a different "opinion", is rather galling, to say the least. Could they at least include a sentence explaining WHY they "don't consider" this an issue? Or a link to editorial guidelines? I genuinely do want to understand how this works!

My job involves analysing media texts: I know bias when I see it, however subtle.

I've seen people I know and love respond to Isla Bryson with appalled shock, despite my having told them this was happening well before it became politically expedient for those in power to acknowledge it, forcing all media to cover it. These people's preferred news sources are the BBC and Guardian.

Our concerns are not unfounded.

And I don't necessarily want my personal GC "opinions" favoured, either. In the "Hundred Women" list, there has to be a choice, admittedly, but on other subjects, all I ask is a proportionate amount of time devoted to the opposing view points, and that structure, diction, facts, soundbites and all the other subtle journalistic tools that can chisel a distinctive shape out of a complex issue are applied to support objectivity as opposed to being used to undermine these concerns.

I think there should be a review and analysis of complaints to the BBC. I bet hundreds of complaints from women are routinely dismissed in this way.

Am I right in thinking that the census showed transwomen are 0.1% of the population? If so, one every 10 years would be representative, not two on every list.

And thanks for your tenacity OP.

Your emails are absolutely brilliant, OP.
So clear and reasoned.

Are you going to pursue this? I really hope so. We need articulate, measured, evidenced challenges like this so desperately.

Your point about ‘subtle journalistic tools that can chisel a distinctive shape out of a complex issue’ is so well stated. This is absolutely why I find BBC reporting on this issue, even when the ‘opposing view’ is represented, so unsettling. In subtle ways, it is always pitched in way that makes self ID look like the mainstream, reasonable view and GC beliefs look extremist and wacky. It is so disturbing, and you’ve articulated it so beautifully.

I applaud you.

Thank you.

Maybe there should be a freedom
of information request regarding complaints of the BBC’s bias against any defence of women in the face of transgender ideology starting from when they traduced Jenni Murray; and regarding complaints of misinformation or lack of critical thinking on the subject of sex and gender including on woman’s hour.

Have you seen the other thread about Evan/PM?

CoffeeRightNow, that's EXACTLY how I feel when I read some of these articles - disturbed, unsettled. I realise on rereading that I used "unsettling" myself upthread.

I can feel infuriated by the Guardian and Independent, relieved by the Times (and embarrassed to agree with the Mail) - all understandable responses to how their various political biases interact with my own perspective on this issue. But unsettled? There's something uniquely... well... unsettling(!) about feeling that in relation to a national broadcaster.

If their bias was more shamelessly overt, then yes, it would be unthinkable, distressing... but there'd also be the catharsis of righteous indignation and ample evidence to appeal against it. (And if the bias DID go "our" way, then OK, I'd feel hypocritical relief, but others with contrasting perspectives would themselves have grounds on which to argue for objectivity, as is THEIR right).

But there's something so insidious about the approach taken - sufficiently present to mould opinion, but very hard to recognise for what it is, and harder still to prove. Plausible deniability...

And writing in this way takes such conscious skill. Of course, it's the ONLY way a national broadcaster COULD show bias on a contentious issue... but the thought and care behind it, the lack of accountability apparent in the replies I received? When this issue's inextricably linked to huuuge questions about who, or what, I am, and my most fundamental rights?

Yes.

Unsettling.

It will be interesting to see if any transwomen slip into the shortlist for the current Woman's Hour 100 UK Influential Sportswomen.

(If you haven’t nominated anyone yet there is still time, the MN hot money seems to be Sharron Davies as a Leader. Plenty of room on the nomination form to expand on your reasons. The nomination form is available on the Woman’s Hour website. )