We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.

Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

Your licence fee at work

We all know that the Olympics is a money-pit; ask any council-tax payer in London about the cost of the 2012 London Olympics and you are likely to get a scowl. The benighted citizens of Communist China, like the Brits, have relatively little say over the vast circus about to start later this year.

And of course, anyone who wants to watch television has to pay for the BBC; “Auntie”, bless her, is sending 150 journalists to cover the Beijing Games. 150 sentient lifeforms. The next time I hear a BBC executive carping about job budgets, I will bear that fact in mind.

9 comments to Your licence fee at work

  • Ian B

    I don’t have a TV. When the nasty little man from Auntie comes around and his face has gone all glum when he found me sans televisor, I normally ask him something like “Do you have a shotgun?” and when he says no, I say I’ll be around his house later to search for one, or something like that. Which is little comfort, but cheers up the experience a wee bit.

    Anyway, can somebody with some knowledge of the history of sporting jamborees explain to me how the Olympic bods got themselves into this enviable position of getting cities around the world to bid frantically against one another to give them money? Shouldn’t the IOC be going around cap in hand begging for money, then paying cities to hire a venue for the event? How did this whole gravy train get this way? Am I the only person who thinks it’s an astonishing inversion of rationality?

  • My Dear Mr. Pearce,

    You have made a common mistake. You said “…sending 150 journalists to cover the Beijing Games. 150 sentient lifeforms.” Having met a large number of journalists, I can assure you that of the 150 that the BBC is sending to China, at most 20 will be sentient lifeforms.

  • Jerome Thomas

    I think the BBC’s “auntie” nickname, often used almost completely unironically by the media and public is grotesque. I can think of no more glaring example of the British publics whimpering submissiveness in the face of The State As Parent.

  • Condor

    You think the London 2012 games are bad? Check out how Vancouver is shooting itself in the foot for their Olympics. If I’m not mistaken, they’re building an entire road for the damn thing.

  • Sam Duncan

    I wonder if the “Auntie” nickname was in use when Orwell came up with “Big Brother”. It’s well-known, of course, that he based his Ministry of Truth on his experiences at the BBC.

  • Paul from Florida

    What’s not to like? Tibet will be quiet. Actually, sealed off, but never the less quiet. Most cars will be off the streets, factories closed down and stands filled by young people of the Communist Party elite, getting subsidized show. Beijing will suck money off rube, rural Chinese and gullible Western T.V companies. Freak athletes will have their endomorphin delusions reinforced. I just wonder what kind of salute the Commies will use? Straight out Nazi arm is out, I suppose. I wonder if any organ selling companies will have ads of happy donors meeting happy recipients. Probably not.

  • pete

    The real scandal about this is that hardly anyone is interested in the Olympics. For some reason the government insists they are shown on ‘free to air’ TV as if they were something that has wide appeal to the nation, but ITV never bids for them. I expect that is because the games attract pitiful TV audiences. The BBC’s blanket coverage of them is pure self-indulgence.

    Given the level of interest in the games in the UK a 30 minutes highlight programme late at night using bought in film would be sufficient. But that would mean no junketing for BBC staff using our money.

  • watcher in the dark

    The Lympics are still seen as some sort of measure of a nation’s virilty and an irrefutable mark of the quality of their people. Like a sort of warfare really; our runners being faster than your runners so it follows our lives and aspirations are better than yours.

    Which is why I used to be so desperate to move to Leipzig before the wall fell down…

    The odd thing about this funfest of runners, riders and ravers is what sports are excluded and what may be in. Technically ballroom dancing’s claim is strong: it has humans performing and is judged as points out of 10.

    Leek growers say theirs is an even more competitive sport. People get quite angry in some places over what rival leek growers get up to.

    As we know, the Lympics appeal has been considerably boosted by “sports” where a judge decides if one is better than another and votes are given. Not that this is like, say, the Eurovision song contest where votes are given to neighbours and “approved’ nations. It is all quite fair.

    But think, if we had leeks and waltzes in there as well, there would have to be even more experts flown out to comment on it. So maybe we are getting away with it cheap, all us TV tax payers who fear jail for watching other TV channels without wanting to pay for the Beeb.

  • Ian B: I am guessing that a lot of people in the hosting cities are making a lot of money off the games, at the expense of the taxpayers, of course.