Read on Twitter
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-53594466 "Ms Walker is waiting to hear from the FA whether she is medically eligible for competitive fixtures, but is playing friendly matches with her club in the meantime" What club would that be then?
"Sammy Walker, who plays for Bristol City Panthers in the Gay Football Supporters Network (GFSN) league." https://prideoftheterraces.com/2020/07/18/sammy-walker/ You know who else plays for the same team?...
None other than the writer of the top article the @BBCNews put up yesterday. Yes, its 'big up your mates season' at the Beeb! Do you want to use the BBC's reputation to sneak out biased pieces without any scrutiny and no dissenting voices? Get right on to Aunty Beeb now!
Can't see anywhere where any personal interest is declared?
Also, here are the links suggested as further reading at the bottom of the dodgy article. The latest is from last year, the oldest from 18 months ago (out of just 3). Who would know from these there was a controversy at all...
...I don't know if these links are 1)chosen or 2)automatically generated but if 1) then I have some questions about neutrality and if 2) it shows that the BBC follows a set script/format when reporting these issues and thus we get lists of articles with a very obvious slant.
And, there are a number of groups who could have been approached for a quote to balance this article ( @fairplaywomen springs to mind) but again the two links to stories about @sharrond62 and @Martina in it are from last year, as if there has been no public discussion since then.
Does @BBCNews or @JHolmesEsq have any comment to make?
https://twitter.com/MatthewGreenf11/status/1289686516294328320 Seeing as I've had no answer to this question, I suppose I'll just have to carry on without.
How did this article come to be written? Did Ms Walker contact the BBC/someone she knew or did the writer go looking for it? And why?
https://twitter.com/No7Sammy/status/1288339673044180993 This is the thread where Holmes was tagged. Read it. They are nothing out of the ordinary for this platform. If you put a picture of your cat up someone is going to tweet you that its ugly and that they hope it dies soon. Block and/or report.
Put up a tweet strongly pro or anti Brexit and see how the responses compare. I'm not aware of any BBC articles detailing the hurt feelings of "FBPE Pam from Stoke", for instance. But "Pam" doesn't have anything to offer the BBC by way of useful displays of inclusiveness.
Walker does a robust job in defence and engages with many of them, accepting parts of the arguments made (hurtful or not). Even going so far as to state the below.
The writer states that this is an article about online abuse, even though I have asked specifically about the part of it that mentions the controversy over trans participation in women's sports. Did he forget writing that bit?
Instead of outlining what the dispute is he links to two old pieces about high-profile individuals, (neither of which has anything to do with the online abuse he says is the sole subject of this piece) and negatively reports how they were "heavily criticised" for "speaking".
Less than 2 weeks before this article was written there had been a decision from World Rugby on the same issue, reported on the very same website, but this is not even giving a passing mention, but criticisms of Martina and Sharron from last year do (!?) https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/53476972
But this is the usefulness of framing your piece as solely a "human interest" story. You can skip all the icky stuff. But this isn't the 'This Morning' website this is the main news website of a publically-funded UK broadcaster and this is being presented as news journalism.
There is a very timely issue here of great public interest that affects many people and also concern conflicting rights, a key concern now, but time and time again (look at the linked stories in the article)rather than honestly look at the big picture it keeps doing this instead.
The BBC tells us that its values are founded on "trust" and that they are "truthful and fair". If that is so why are they always seemingly backing away from this one issue and when they do actually address it why are they always so shifty about it? https://www.bbc.co.uk/careers/why-join-us/values
