(graphic: BBC News)
[ updated: see below ]
Or, for that matter: Should the British royal family be rounded up and guillotined? Just asking. Sure, it’s “a stark and challenging question, but … it accurately focuses on and illustrates the real issue at stake.” And, besides, it worked out pretty well for the French, so why not? Discuss amongst yourselves …
The phrase “Yes, we accept it is a stark and challenging question, but think that it accurately focuses on and illustrates the real issue at stake” was used by the editors of BBC News to justify their public poll yesterday that asked the question, vis-Ã -vis Uganda’s exterminate-the-gays bill:
Should homosexuals face execution?
Here are a handful of the responses to the BBC’s question:
“Bravo to the Ugandians for this wise decision, a bright step in eliminating this menace from your society. We hope other African nations will also follow your bold step,” wrote Aaron P. in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
David from Uganda wrote: “God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. What the Ugandan parliament is doing is to protect the traditional moral heritage of its people. The backstabbers, as gays are sometimes described, can best be described as social misfits, who need to be isolated ‘permanently’ between four walls.”
Chris from Guildford, UK said: “If homosexuality is natural, as we are forced to believe, how can they sustain the species? I suggest all gays are put on a remote island somewhere and left for a generation – afterwhich, theoretically there shoild (sic) be none left!”
Perhaps the question should be: Should Peter Horrocks — director of BBC World Service — be summarily executed for his insensitivity and irresponsibility? According to Horrocks:
The original headline on our website was, in hindsight, too stark. We apologise for any offence it caused. But it’s important that this does not detract from what is a crucial debate for Africans and the international community.
The programme was a legitimate and responsible attempt to support a challenging discussion about proposed legislation that advocates the death penalty for those who undertake certain homosexual activities in Uganda – an important issue where the BBC can provide a platform for debate that otherwise would not exist across the continent and beyond.
FAIL.
This is a fail of epic proportions and those responsible for the offense should be … Oh wait … let’s allow, in the interest of free speech mind you, the reading public to decide their fate:
Should the directors and editors
of the BBC face execution?
This is not a matter of free speech. This is a matter of irresponsibly floating a grotesque idea that, in the mind of a psychotic, hateful individual (see comments above) could have disastrous and deadly consequences.
Although, in my opinion, an apology from the BBC is hardly adequate, Michael Jones, at Change.org, makes it easy to demand one with an online form:
Send a message to the BBC right now, letting them know that polls like this are unacceptable and offensive, and demand that the BBC apologize for suggesting that an entire population of folks should be murdered.
Please take a minute and lend your voice.
+++++++
UPDATE (17 December 8:55 pm):
Peter Lloyd, writing at PinkPaper, has an update on the BBC’s gross insensitivity and this quote from Lynne Featherstone:
Senior political figures throughout the UK were quick to complain. Liberal democrat Lynne Featherstone was one who wrote to the BBC general director.
“I would be the first person to stand up for open debate and free speech, but any conversation that starts ’should homosexuals face execution’ is completely skewed and unacceptable in this forum. Suggesting that the state-sponsored murder of gay people is OK as a legitimate topic for debate is deeply offensive. The BBC are only fanning the flames of hatred as many of the comments demonstrate. They must act and apologize for their gross insensitivity.”
Lloyd notes that of the 243 responses to the question, only 122 were published. Given some of the homophobic ignorance that went live, one can only imagine what was in the comments deemed unfit for public consumption.
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