Gavin Esler, like many of his Newsnight and Today colleagues is one of the better exponents of BBC journalism and frequently probes the inconsistencies of government policy, domestic and foreign. As a public broadcaster, the BBC is not informed by the more naked class interests that drive much of the press. However, major events - war, strikes, terrorism - have a way of revealing the role that broadcasters like the BBC in preserving orthodoxy and delineating its borders.
Such was the case with Esler's interview with George Galloway on Friday night. Galloway could not have made clearer his revulsion at the acts of the terrorists and his support for their being brought to justice and punished in the severest of terms. He also stressed that one should never - can never - negotiate with the perpetrators of such atrocities. Yet Galloway, quite legitimately, argued that the attacks cannot be isolated from British and Foreign policy in the Middle East and Afghanistan.
Blair, Bush and other advocates on the 'war on terrorism' strive to suppress such criticism, arguing that the country must unite 'steadfastly' behind their policy. To dissent is to offend decency.
Decency insists that in a respectful manner those who dissent do so, clearly, calmly.
Galloway put it even better in his speech to Marxism 2005 and if truth be told, he allowed himself to be drawn on the question of his right to raise such issues. If Galloway has a weakness it is to be drawn from the issues to the personal. Understandable, but it weakens the message.
But the exchange highlighted the limits of the BBC's role and role it plays in maintaining hegemony.
For more on Marxism 2005, see this space in the coming days.
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