Which Reporter’s Name Should Be Used as the Scientific Unit of Media Bias? | Beastrabban\’s Weblog
The caption on this picture reads: “Nick Robinson, former Young Conservatives chairman and current BBC political editor, taking a selfie with some young Tories. Unbiased? (Photo courtesy of theblueguerilla.co.uk).
If it’s a choice between Nick Robinson or Laura Kuenssberg when devising a name for the scientific unit of media bias…
It has to be The Rob, doesn’t it?
Thinking about the Beeb, Nick Robinson and Laura Kuenssberg and their spurious protestations of objectivity and impartiality the other night, I remember one of the jokes going round Nazi Germany about Goebbels, Hitler’s notorious ‘Minister for Public Enlightenment’. There were a number of comments and nicknames about him. He was very promiscuous, so much so that he got the nickname ‘the Tadpole’. Like Hitler, he was also short, so that the Germans produced a saying ‘Luegen haben kurzen Beinen’ – ‘Lies have short legs’.
And one of the jokes played on the various scientific terms then being coined as research advanced. For example, in electronics there are the terms volt, amp and ohm, which all take their names from the physicists Volta, Ampere and Ohm, who did pioneering research into electricity.
Thus, German wags defined the Goeb – from Goebbel’s monicker – to be the minimum unit of power required to turn off 100,000 radio sets. The joke here being that every time the Nazi propagandist appeared on the radio to rant about how wonderful the Reich was, and how evil Jews, Communists, democracy, Socialism, trade unionism, ‘capitalism’ and the allies were, the Germany public reacted en masse by finding something much better to do. This might explain why family board games are still very popular in Germany. After all, if there’s a choice between listening to another foam-flecked rant from Adolf, or playing Cluedo, I think most people would probably opt for the latter.
Source: Which Reporter’s Name Should Be Used as the Scientific Unit of Media Bias? | Beastrabban\’s Weblog
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The “Peston”
How about both Surnames, Robinson Kuenssberg syndrome, to refer to political lies or misreporting of the truth?
The Rob would indeed be a good unit of political bias amongst reporters, although to the likely size of the unit (in terms of the amount of bias that one Rob equals) most reporters bias would have to expressed in milliRobs or even possibly microRobs!
I like this particular blog very much. A truly great use of an inspired metaphor. Thanks, Mike. :-)
Well I don’t think Kuensberg is so much biased as just considering her personal point of view is the only one which matters no matter what people talking to her are saying.
For me it has to be the “Kuenssberg Scale”
“Broadcasting today from the Conservative party conference, Nick Robinson’s report on the Home Secretary’s speech was surely a 9.8 on the ‘Kuenssberg Scale’.”
This is great fun, but with a serious side, perhaps a combination, Knoberg or such. These individuals are equally as distasteful, so why should either avoid infamy.
Escape From Colditz was one of our favourites.