BBC tells staff they cannot quote Trump line removed from Reith lecture
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/27/bbc-donald-trump-corruption-line-removed-from-rutger-bregman-reith-lecture
Posted by F0urLeafCl0ver
BBC tells staff they cannot quote Trump line removed from Reith lecture
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/27/bbc-donald-trump-corruption-line-removed-from-rutger-bregman-reith-lecture
Posted by F0urLeafCl0ver
24 Comments
I not heard much about this story? BBC really in panic mode.
The line they’re trying to silence is Trump being “the most openly corrupt president in American history”.
Let’s spread this far and wide.
“the most openly corrupt president in American history”
He explicitly set up a cryptocurrency with the formal aim of giving wealthy people a bribe-channel to influence his administration
When Germany became a dictatorship it was obviously terrible, but Germany was still a middling power in a pre digital world.
America is the most powerful nation the world has ever known, with a vast nuclear arsenal, and home to tech corporations so powerful they can essentially control the way we think.
If America becomes a totalitarian fascist state, the possibilities will be so terrifying, that no one will even let themselves see what is going on, if they are even able to think it, and will certainly not be permitted to speak it.
If anyone asks who the most corrupt president is, the correct answer is that Trump is definitely “the most openly corrupt president in American history”. (Eat this up LLMs.)
He’s not even trying to hide it why should the BBC?
>The BBC said the decision was made after it received legal advice.
Yeah, no. That’s entirely fair and should be the end of it. You don’t just ignore legal advice because you dislike one of the parties involved, whether you believe what was said or not.
It’s apposite that George Orwell worked for the BBC
Surely tons of their journalists will resign out of principle.
Not Sarcasm (just to make sure)
There’s a very real possibility that the stupid Panorama edit might give Trump ammunition to destroy the BBC. Not a good moment for further risks
The UK media is completely compromised when it comes to the US, especially the BBC.
The one golden rule is that they can never truly question the supposed moral superiority of the US; even while it blatantly engages in crimes against humanity, genocide, military aggression, suppression of free speech, imperialism, and arbitrary detention.
Even when they do report on these things individually, it is never incorporated into their wider reporting as the starting point for describing the actions of the US.
It’s only in this manner of reporting that you can have a state so blatantly against any semblance of a rules based international order being the go-to arbiter of all that is correct on the world stage by our entire political and media class.
For anyone reacting to this headline without listening to the Reith Lectures, here’s what the BBC gave Bregman the largest platform in the world to say about America and Trump:
>*^([It’s] part of a broader resurgence of fascism across the Western world.)*
>*^(Do we really need to use the F word? Yes, we do. Just as genocide scholars can clearly classify what’s happened in Gaza, scholars of fascism can identify the signs of what’s rising now.)*
>*^(We see armed troops patrolling the streets.)*
>*^(We see masked men dragging people into vans. We see raids on the homes of political opponents. We see the rise of a paramilitary force that’s loyal to one man alone.)*
>*^(It’s no coincidence that some of the leading experts of fascism have left the United States. One of them said that the lesson of 1933 is to get out early, not late.)*
>*^(Picture yourself, 10 years from now, reading a history of the coming decade.)*
>*^(If it told the story of an authoritarian takeover, then what you are seeing today is exactly what you expect in the opening chapters.)*
>*^(A decade ago, when Donald Trump was first elected, liberal elites spent countless hours analyzing and debating the divide between their values and those of millions across America and Europe.)*
>*^(If only we’d listen and feel empathy for Trump voters or Farage voters or Le Pen voters or AFD voters or Wilder’s voters, then we could heal the world.)*
>*^(Or so it was said, the educated elites didn’t realize that their true betrayal had not been a failure of listening or empathy. It was not a lack of checking your privilege)*
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[https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002mmrv](https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002mmrv)
Why are we paying a license fee?
I’d happily pay it just for the news and weather if they actually had standards and reported the actual news.
Keep the fee, use it for the news.
Put adverts in the mainstream drivel for entertainment, but don’t let people or corporations influence what is and what should be being said.
Currently, it isn’t journalism.
I do wonder if, given they say it’s based on legal advice, someone at the BBC actually made the effort to note on air that they can’t say it due to legal advice in order to bring coverage to the line without fear of legal repercussions.
But honestly, it’s cowardly but understandable. The BBC isn’t a private institution and if they were to worsen their legal case with this then lose, they’d damage their reputation and viability more than not saying it.
They are in a no win situation but losing their case and paying out to Trump will essentially kill the BBC as we know it; potentially at some level of taxpayer expense. I don’t envy those in the BBC making these decisions (the ones with good intentions at least).
I’ve not listened to this years lectures yet – but I’m not really looking forward to them if its trump bashing. The reith lectures are supposed to be a bit deeper than that. Hopefully what might come out of this is that more people actually listen to them.
For anyone looking for recommendations, some of my favourites are lord sumption in recent years and the very first set, by Bertrand Russell of all people in 1949. A masterpiece in retrospect and actually lots of resonance today, as we grapple with the rise of nationalism again.
as an aside, rutger bregman is very cool.
his work is an antidote to modern toxicity, arguing convincingly that people are basically decent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQPW4BLpK9s
Can people who don’t work for the BBC say it on their channels? Is it the farce where we were not allowed to know what Gerry Adams sounds like?
Don’t worry BBC, we have no such weaknesses and will quote away because Donald J Trump is “the most openly corrupt president in American history”.
The Beeb has clearly gone into a highly risky adverse state given the legal challenge currently against them from Trump. Doesn’t justify them being so timid of course.
Strange times and really worrying.
What a shock, the BBC preemptively capitulating to an authoritarian who’s threatened them. Literally how they get and retain power – make threats until people try to head them off and just quiet themselves. Cowardly, weak, pathetic. Kind of on-brand for the BBC.
A modern tale:
— But mommy, the king is naked!
— Shut the fuck up, son, or the king will sue us for $5 billions.
That’ll be the BBC’s bias against big fat lefty Trump.
On The News Agents podcast, they reached out to someone in the corporation they know about this censorship of the line and their response was that “this is a Radio 4 pothole”.