It`s fair to say that BBC Scotland, Radio Clyde, the Record, Sun and Herald have, amongst others, all been targeted for vilification over partisan reporting - or failure to report at all when a story was staring them squarely in the face. Bannergate and Videogate are just two news items that Scotland`s national press ran from until the Aberdeen Press and Journal broke the ice, thereby allowing their bigger brothers to go to print relatively free of risk.
The Herald tolerated a discredited reporter for years until he was finally removed to a lesser organ. Radio Clyde prefers to discuss football matters only - unless Rangers are in the dock for a controversial non-football incident - and BBC Scotland employed someone who filed a picture of a Rangers player using a swear word between his first and last names. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
It`s a sorry tale of once-worthy media outlets losing integrity and replacing it with partisan and hateful bile. What a surprise it was then when an international broadcaster of repute was caught deliberately manipulating the facts in favour of its own fictional tale. Sky television, a favourite of football fans all over the UK, almost burst the net with the kind of own goal that we might have expected from the usual suspects closer to home.
At the recent Falkirk v Celtic match, it broadcast a minute`s silence for Remembrance Sunday and muted the sound because Celtic supporters were intent on mounting a singing protest during the sixty seconds. In an era where clubs can be deducted points for the behaviour and song selection of their supporters, Sky censored their broadcast to portray the truth as they wanted us to see it rather than to broadcast the truth as it actually was.
In that one minute, Sky committed its greatest-ever error. Sky`s reputation spiralled into the ground and didn`t stop until it had bored its way to Australia as its viewers saw only the tranquility and solemnity of those who could be relied upon to act with appropriate dignity. The silence was deafening - and it was a lie.
While Sky leaned on the mute button during the less than silent minute, national radio had broadcast the Celtic support singing in a deliberate act of dissent, and foreign television stations had also broadcast the reality instead of the fiction. Sky had been caught out trying to protect Celtic and its supporters from the criticism - and possible punishment - that would surely follow.
Sky has apparently admitted its role in the matter, waffling about how its audience needed to be protected from the Remembrance minute being interrupted. One has to ask then, if so many are offended by the sound of the Billy Boys being sung, why hasn`t Sky ever muted it? If the Rangers support interrupts a minute`s silence for anyone and for any reason, can we now depend on Sky to press the mute button in case its viewers are offended? Is anyone so naive as to believe that Sky will ride to the rescue of the Rangers support if a wee chap in the back row of the Copland quietly mouths fenian blood?
The Rangers support believes it has witnessed some creative editing of match highlights; it believes it has seen certain players tracked for an entire match by a dedicated camera in the apparent hope that an indiscretion would occur(remember the Novocam?); it has wondered about the low volume when the Celtic support gives voice to songs that might incriminate it, and it has wondered too about extra microphones being hung above the Rangers support in certain games in this Scottish McCarthyite era, perhaps to catch a lyric that is controversial or contentious.
Thanks to Sky, the Rangers support now has a rock-solid foundation for its suspicions - because Sky has proved beyond reasonable doubt that the media will interfere to suit its own agenda, and that agenda might suit one club, but not another. Had there been a protest during the Remembrance minute by supposed Muslim extremists at Falkirk on Sunday, would Sky have turned the other cheek and not reported the incident, or would the story have provided banner headlines on its every news broadcast? Sky has painted itself into a corner: the dunce`s corner.
Some people are more upset by the behaviour of an element of Celtic fans than in Sky`s unfortunate part in this regrettable episode, and although they are well-intentioned and motivated by loyalty to the fallen, they are mistaken.
What fallen hero would object to the freedom those Celtic fans had to make their distasteful protest? Those lost to us fought for this freedom to prevail, but they most certainly did not fight for broadcasters to delude, lie and deceive. We may not like what those Celtic fans did on Sunday, but they were free to behave as they did specifically because the supreme sacrifice was made by others on behalf of all of us.
No-one knows the Celtic support better than we do, and while spin and history revision is rooted there, and while their delusion knows no bounds, the Celtic support itself should be firmly opposed to an international broadcaster making fools of us all by manipulating fact and portraying instead its own self-imposed "truth".
We all believe the press and media periodically lies to us, but on Sunday we caught part of it in the act of doing just that - and we caught a whopper. Are we going to let it off the hook - or are we going to wrestle with it until finally it is required to pay a high price for its flagrant dishonesty?
When next we hear of television evidence being used to help bring honesty and accuracy to decision-making in football, think again. I`d put my trust in a referee with a blindfold before believing a broadcaster which can prioritise its own agenda ahead of the facts.
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