Back to China yet again…
I remember the first time I consciously settled myself before a telly I had an extensive shock and a repeating feeling of déjà vu. I think it was some decade ago, at 7pm Beijing time. It was much like a scene from 1984: all the channels were showing one the same piece of news, read by the same anchors. A decade later, standard Beijing antenna can receive up to 74 channels, including regional and international channels, and out of those, around 15 channels broadcast children’s programmes, some broadcast classical music, some regional channels show their own home-made soaps and the rest, the rest obediently gives its way to the CCTV news. I can’t believe I’m still shocked by it.
30 Oct 2005 12:02
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[Skip to the latest comment]Mathew Mannion
When I was in China this summer it took a long time for me to realise that the news programs that I could see in the hotel (BBC World Service, Fox News) weren't actually available from a regular antennae, and that even though the news was obviously censored in places on the World Service and on the feed from Fox News, it's nothing like the difference you get from watching CCTV news instead (which was surprisingly easy to understand for someone whose Chinese doesn't extend past "Ni hao" and "Xie xie")
30 Oct 2005, 12:29
Durnovo
And how can people say that there is no progress!
30 Oct 2005, 12:48
The CCTV news is essentially about the goodness of communism, which is good! Except nothing can be that good. And if people don't come to realise it's 'selective truth' they grow idealistic and happy about the little swamp they carry their existence in. The CNN and the Fox News I get are * b-a-d *. Bad in terms of their bias, as well as accent. And the BBC World service broadcasts all sorts of trivial crap, far from world politics and economics. The only good media in China is perhaps the pirate DVDs that one can purchase for around 50 pennies. Now, that I love! And that's where the progress is ;)
31 Oct 2005, 09:44
Mathew Mannion
The BBC is the last world bastion of independent news and should be highly regarded as such
31 Oct 2005, 15:38
Durnovo
Wooooo is it really Mathew?
Tell it to those working for the BBC World Service who were given orders as to what to say and not to say by the British Government during the First Gulf War….
01 Nov 2005, 15:49
Gosh, historians… ;P I presume the BBC does have a bias. The bias being 'be unbiased'. And the media does get whored as a massive and the most effective tool of manipulation, at 'worst' times tho. Like, when the population needs a doze of patriotism injected into their brains. But personally I prefer the BBC to almost any other media, apart from the HK news channel Phoenix. I think they are quite alright. But the BBC is doing a fairly good job at educating me. And for that alone, and probably for not being the CNN, ABC or Fox, I'd pay the ostensibly huge TV licence fees.
01 Nov 2005, 16:00
AStudent
The only time the BBC have a bias is when their Royal Charter comes up for renewal!
Listen to CCTV: Big Brother is working well for you :D. hahaha…..
09 Dec 2005, 20:50
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