BBC Programming

The BBC has got out its dressing up box and tonight was the first episode of Charles Dickens Little Dorrit. Now at the risk of committing sacrilege, while I do like some of Charles Dickens cannon, some of it is rather variable. However, Little Dorrit was the last Dickens that I read about four years ago. So I am looking forward to the rest of this dramatisation.

Another programme that the BBC will be running this week will be the Autumn watch. For those readers that are overseas, this is a daily live wildlife watching event. While like its sister programme in the spring called.. well you can guess the title of that, it can be variable in quality. But that said, it has been getting better. Also this year they are at a new location, so I will be looking forward to that, as it really is informative. I have learnt something every year that I have watched it. Also many of the films do inspire me to get out and watch and film wildlife myself. It also makes me realise that there is just so much out there to see. I could and will spend the rest of my life discovering new things about wildlife, the natural world and the beauty of my country.

Also while I am singing the praises of the BBC, they are not paying me, Honest! Although if they want to... During this year there has been two series that the BBC transmitted that were real eye openers for me. The first was one called the Lost Land of the Jaguar It featured one of the few areas of virgin rainforest left in the world. And the scientists on the expedition were discovering species that were new to science. The other show was called Pacific Abyss and again the scientists were discovering new species with every dive. However, the real common factor was just how seriously both these areas are under threat from climate change. In the Pacific Abyss programme in particular, they dived on one reef where because of coral leaching there was only a single species of coral still living. Yet on all the other reefs they had been teeming with life.

When both these programmes were aired I was going to post something on them, but I did not just want to post yet another tirade about why don't we do something about climate change. Then, while watching some of the coverage of the US presidential elections and the Canadian elections I suddenly realised what the problem is. I have always seen climate change as a scientific argument, but it is being treated as a political issue. As though by following another policy will just make the issue go away. When the reality is that the solutions to climate change are political, the reality of the science is indisputable. This is where I would strongly criticise the BBC. The Natural History unit in there programmes show Climate Change as the scientific reality that it is. As it does across its science programmes. But in the News and current affairs programming it treats Climate change as a debate where if you ignore it, global warming will just not be there.

If a normally reliable news organisation like the BBC continues to cast doubt on the science of global warming and continues to treat it like its a matter of opinion they will only add to the damage of inaction.

Well at least the Beeb can redeem themselves by continuing to showing the best Natural History programmes in the world.