Well yesterday the Church of England Synod did something very significant – they passed
that Measure, which they so spectacularly failed to do last November, enabling
further steps to be taken now which will eventually see the consecration of
women as bishops. Good for them – actually
I believe, good for all of us!
Yet I just observe this – back in November when this felt like really bad news the BBC led every bulletin with it; yesterday when it became transformed into a good news story it was relegated to the tenth item on the BBC news website! What is that all about?
It reflects a conversation which the Today Programme’s guest editor, the Birmingham poet Benjamin Zephaniah, had with John Humphreys last year. For one day Zephaniah wanted a more balanced programme in which good news was broadcast alongside the bad. He dared to ask the question of why that isn’t official policy - only to be told by Humphreys that the public wouldn’t tolerate it! Well I would!
Of course I’m not suggesting we ought to return to the days of the Pathe newsreel when even the most disastrous events were accompanied by upbeat marching music. But, I suggest, we have lost a sense of proportion – even reality – in the way we represent the world on news programmes. In truth the world is not as habitually bad or as continually in crisis as the news makes out. Yet good news stories are deliberately buried or cynically ignored by news editors in favour of a bleaker view of the world. Hence the relegation of yesterday’s Synod vote to item number ten.
Monday’s newspapers quite rightly threw everything at Andy Murray’s brilliant Wimbledon victory. I called into our local corner shop and smiled as I saw his picture on every front page – hugging that trophy as if he never ever wanted to put it down! But why limit a good news story on the front page exclusively to a sporting victory – and probably later this week a royal birth? There’s so much more in our society that is equally worth celebrating.
St Paul put it this way, ‘Whatever is true, honourable and of good report – think on these things’.
With best wishes,
Yet I just observe this – back in November when this felt like really bad news the BBC led every bulletin with it; yesterday when it became transformed into a good news story it was relegated to the tenth item on the BBC news website! What is that all about?
It reflects a conversation which the Today Programme’s guest editor, the Birmingham poet Benjamin Zephaniah, had with John Humphreys last year. For one day Zephaniah wanted a more balanced programme in which good news was broadcast alongside the bad. He dared to ask the question of why that isn’t official policy - only to be told by Humphreys that the public wouldn’t tolerate it! Well I would!
Of course I’m not suggesting we ought to return to the days of the Pathe newsreel when even the most disastrous events were accompanied by upbeat marching music. But, I suggest, we have lost a sense of proportion – even reality – in the way we represent the world on news programmes. In truth the world is not as habitually bad or as continually in crisis as the news makes out. Yet good news stories are deliberately buried or cynically ignored by news editors in favour of a bleaker view of the world. Hence the relegation of yesterday’s Synod vote to item number ten.
Monday’s newspapers quite rightly threw everything at Andy Murray’s brilliant Wimbledon victory. I called into our local corner shop and smiled as I saw his picture on every front page – hugging that trophy as if he never ever wanted to put it down! But why limit a good news story on the front page exclusively to a sporting victory – and probably later this week a royal birth? There’s so much more in our society that is equally worth celebrating.
St Paul put it this way, ‘Whatever is true, honourable and of good report – think on these things’.
With best wishes,
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