Gutless, Spineless, Supine and Craven

Not a firm of city lawyers, but the BBC Trust and its Director General.

The Mail reading zombie-hordes got what they wanted. Heads have rolled. Lesley Douglas felt compelled to resign. I may add here that Mark Thompson had no need to feel compelled to accept it. In fact, if he had any spine, he might have refused and told the reactionary hordes of offended 'Middle England', whatever that might be, to take a hike. Instead, we have had the unedifying sight of some sections of the media manufacturing a moral outrage that didn't actually exist. Just who were these 30000 complainants, and just what were they complaining about?

The result is that we are going to have further emasculation of the BBC as a place where performers and other makers of content feel able to take risks and push boundaries in a way that isn't possible on commercial networks. The one thing we don't need now is a more risk averse BBC, but this is what is likely to happen. In the end BBC fit for Daily Mail readers is a BBC fit only for Daily Mail readers.

Imagine going to the zoo and looking at the monkey enclosure. Imagine the monkeys gleefully picking up handfuls of their own (and others') excrement and flinging it around the enclosure, covering themselves and everything in the pen in ordure. Now imagine the keeper turning up, whereupon the monkeys all turn round and angrily start to protest that everything is covered in shit.

This is the British media. And we have got what we deserve.