The BBC has reportedly told its presenters and guests not to wear Black Lives Matter badges, the latest in a series of British institutions rolling back their support for the far-left movement after claims it was “hijacked” by political extremists. However, Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage has been warning for weeks that BLM was a Marxist anarchist movement that was at its heart, extreme.
Britain’s leading media producer reportedly said that it will not allow “visual symbols of support” for BLM on screen. The report came since recent tweets from Black Lives Matter’s UK branch, BLMUK, called for the abolition of police and the group posted far-left antisemitic remarks.
“The BBC cannot be seen to support any kind of cause over another, and Black Lives Matter is certainly a campaign,” a BBC source told The Telegraph.
The source added: “Therefore we wouldn’t want anyone on-screen to be wearing visual symbols of support.
“Our presenters and guests can discuss Black Lives Matter, and we’ve reported on it in depth. We’re not impartial about racism.
“But wearing badges on screen — just as with any other campaign — would be a step too far.”
While the source claimed that the BBC always deemed BLM a political movement — and support of which would be against their charter to remain apolitical — that has not prevented the broadcaster from giving a platform for the movement’s message that Britain is fundamentally racist.
Such narratives elevated by the BBC was that the British countryside is seen as a “white environment” by minorities. The broadcaster was also accused of bias when it described BLM riots in London that resulted in the injuries of 27 police officers as “largely peaceful”.
Last month, the BBC said that in response to the death of black American George Flloyd in Minneapolis, it would be using public money to make its content more “inclusive” and “diverse”.
Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage criticised the BBC, as well as other broadcasters including Sky News, for portraying Britain as a “cesspit of bigots and racists” and in its reporting of the death of Mr Floyd “also inferring that Britain is a hotbed of racism”.
“…these broadcasters have been utterly dishonest,” Mr Farage wrote. He added: “Instead of examining what Black Lives Matter truly wants, including its aim to ‘defund’ the police, the mainstream media has presented its coverage as though Britain is a seething cesspit of racists and bigots.”
Hertfordshire Police has also appeared to backtrack on its support for its officers taking the knee while in uniform, saying on Thursday it was not always “appropriate”. While Northumberland County Council removed its social media post supporting BLM, saying now that the group had “definitely strayed into the political arena”.
Other major organisations to pull a reverse ferret on their BLM support is England Premier League football, which said that political extremists had hijacked the group. The remarks came after BLM tweeted anti-Israel posts that employed the well-known antisemitic dog whistle that Israel was ‘gagging’ political discourse on the Palestinian territories.
The Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who like dozens of his MPs posed for social media while taking the knee for the far-left group, tried to distance his support for the BLM “moment” from the “movement”. He said that he did not support BLM’s calls to “abolish” the police.
While all these bodies have only recently been insinuating that BLM has been “hijacked” by far-left anarchists, the movement has been clear for years in its endeavours to tear down law and order and destroy capitalism. The American co-founder of Black Lives Matter Patrisse Cullors has been calling to “defund” alleged racist police departments since 2016.
Neither are its far-left extremist roots a recent revelation, either, with Breitbart News reporting in 2015 that Cullors was mentored by Eric Mann, a communist-supporting former domestic terrorist who worked with Bill Ayers, the former head of the radical militant left-wing Weather Underground.
Mr Farage has also been warning Britain for weeks about the dangers of the Marxist group and told the United States that BLM wants to destroy Western civilisation.
The establishment media attacked Nigel Farage for his warning on Good Morning Britain about BLM on June 9th, with speculation that the row, and other remarks questioning the motives of BLM, prompted the politician to lose his radio slot on LBC. The politician suggested it was the result of a coordinated campaign by far-leftists.
In reaction to the BBC and other bodies distancing themselves from Black Lives Matter, Mr Farage retweeted the Good Morning Britain footage, saying: “Now many others have woken up, this feels like a good time to share this video again.”
Mr Farage had said a month ago on the ITV breakfast show: “The slogan ‘black lives matter’ and the wanting to end the injustice and inequality is a laudable aim. The organisation Black Lives Matter is a far-left Marxist organisation whose chief aim is to defund and close down police forces so that we would live under anarchy.”
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