Martine Croxall was out of order, says the BBC

[MassiveWordSalad]

FFS

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3epwz08ewzo

The rule is very simple: You must not express, or give the impression that you are expressing, a personal view.

And yet, on the BBC Breakfast news, they push and encourage precisely that: the presenters to make little personal quips, comments and observations.

Even if it's just some stupid filler story about a dog who found a big box containing 6 months' supply of dog biscuits in the shed and ate the entire lot in 10 minutes, they'll always make some equally stupid comment at the end about the dog probably not wanting his Christmas dinner this year or whatever.

Yes, I know it's all scripted; but it's deliberately designed to look like the presenters are sharing their personal thoughts on whatever story is being discussed.

It would be interesting to know how many newsreaders have been castigated for betraying their feelings on air via their facial expressions. Not many, I’m sure. I wonder why Martine’s slip up was so egregious? (Goes off to ponder this.)

That would have merit if the BBC were scrupulously impartial in their content, but the inclusion of the phrase 'pregnant people' as a description in a news broadcast script demonstrates that they aren't. 'Pregnant people' has a very specific origin as TRA prescriptive language, it would never be used otherwise.

Given how much bad behaviour the BBC has allowed to be covered over within the organisation, including on journalistic standards, it shouldn't be scolding Martine Croxall for a fleeting facial expression. I hear Huw Edwards always kept a straight face.

Using the phrase pregnant people is massively biased and enforces a fringe belief -
that isn’t really a belief but is about coercive control of women at a population level

ONLY WOMEN CAN BE PREGNANT

But some women who are pregnant identity as men, and this, as the BBC would say, is about respecting them

Women's Rights Network.

She was correcting the script which was an activist driven misquote of the actual research which said ‘pregnant women’.

There is no defence of the BBCs position on this at all.

The fact that they are pregnant underlines that they are female.

‘transman’ (or whatever claimed trans identity - non binary etc) is a reference to gender identity and that is not relevant here.

SEX is the relevant factor in pregnancy related topics.

You mean indulging them?

Clive Myrie managed to read the news about the devastation in Jamaica without showing any emotion, although he looked as if he was struggling. However, he did make a personal comment on one bulletin I saw about having family on that side of the island. So maybe he broke the rule too? But it would be heartless and a total over-reaction of anyone to complain. Just as it's a total over-reaction to complain about someone inferring that men can't be pregnant. Because they can't!

I listened to this on Radio Four news yesterday and it sounded like 1984 or the Handmaid’s Tale territory. Very sinister.

But not respecting the truth... That you have to be female to get pregnant.

The BBC is so far from impartial these days that it beggars belief.

Genderism is a neo-sexist ideology.

We don't expect the BBC to respect racists by accepting their ideas about race so why is it any different for sexists?

Well it appears Maxine has committed the heinous sin of heresy
Bring the soft cushions someone or perhaps the comfy chair??

I support Maxine Croxall but the report is correct, she ceased to be impartial and the BBC is supposed to be impartial. Cannot call out the BBC on its bias if we applaud biases we agree with. Sorry.

saying pregnant people is very much NOT impartial - how can you not see that.

it is factually incorrect.

Pregnant "people" is part of the Dentons/Stonewall agenda of compelled speech. There is nothing neutral about it. The biological fact of women being the only sex who give birth is not political. The research that was being quoted was mis-quoted in the autocue dialogue MC was required to read out. She corrected it.

I agree and I support her correction. But she also screwed up her face which many will have interpreted as showing an opinion re 'pregnant people', which she should not have shown because the phrase is political and she showed she had chosen a side. No matter how much I agree with her, and she's right it's an expression that erases women in the most important function our bodies have, she still showed bias and people will have complained, some of whom agree that it's a demeaning phrase but still picking up on bias. The BBC needs to get shot of the ideologues who produce this rubbish, of course, and go back to using the proper words - because not doing so shows that the BBC is biased, too.

I do see it as factually correct and I support the correction. It's her expression which shows that she has chosen a side in a political debate which she is not supposed to do. It infuriates me when other commentators, readers, interviewers clearly agree with a political position I don't agree with and I would like them to be impartial. That means objecting all bias not just the bias I don't agree with. The BBC needs now to stop pandering to a vociferous minority of a minorty and use the proper words, remembering that women are the majority of their viewers and a growing number of them are fed-up with being erased.

I get your point but when the issue relates to political propaganda the response from the BBC should to say that what happened was its own mistake and it would not be reasonable to blame Croxall in the circumstances.

Yes, I agree. The BBC is at fault, not Croxall, as a matter of fact. But the people complaining won't see that and nor will the BBC. We need to bring the matter right up to the door so the BBC can smell the flowers.

The excellent Shelagh Fogarty will be covering this at 2pm today on LBC.

Do message/call in if you can

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It's attempting to coercively control a female employee.

It was an involuntary fleeting expression. She's being expected to walk on eggshells and control her natural responses.

They have an argument about not reading out the autocue as given but they're lying and dehumanizing women with that language so not doing their job and incredibly politically biased.

And they've failed to mention all the messages of support for Martine and women writing in saying thank goodness there's at least one BBC employee not lying about biological fact and dehumanizing women! Because I wrote in and I bet others did too. Their behaviour is aiming at coercively control female employees.

It really is a 1984 facecrime. The BBC is high on being the ministry of truth in their own narrow misogynistic minds, clearly.

Defund the BBC!!

Croxall's answer to the complaint was that the language in her script had been lifted directly from an external press release, rather than being rewritten in the BBC house style, which is what threw her off and caused her to react.

And again, the content of the script was irrelevant - her job was to read it impartially, she didn't, and that's what this telling off was for.

People seem desperate to frame this as her being dragged over the coals for showing distain towards the 'pregnant people' language, when that simply isn't the case.

The content of the script is irrelevant. That's not what's being covered by the impartiality guidelines. It's the delivery from the presenter that was the issue.

That's what has to be impartial, and it wasn't.