BBC Drama Accused of Racism

[Looks like Survivor Season 13 isn't the only show with a racialist
undertone.]

BBC drama draws racism fire
Thursday, August 31, 2006

A black activist has called on black people to refuse to pay the license
fee after it broadcast a drama that has drawn accusations of racism.

Shoot The Messenger, starring Spooks actor David Oylowo and written by
black playwright Sharon Foster, depicted a black teacher whose attempts
to improve the lives of his young black students are met with hostility.

Falsely accused of assaulting a pupil, he blames the attitudes and
actions of black people for all his woes, and begins to lose his grip on
sanity.

The deliberately provocative drama - originally meant to be titled F***
Black People - included lines such as 'Everything bad that's ever
happened to me involved a black person' and 'we should go back to
slavery, we were good at that'.

Now Toyin Agbetu, founder of Ligali, a black media campaign group, has
called on black pople to withold their license fee until the BBC 'stop
showing things like this and start treating black people with respect,
not just as entertainers or musicians or criminals.'

He said: 'I personally refuse to pay my licence tax, as I prefer to call
it, and we would urge people to withhold theirs in support... I am not
prepared to support a film that characterises our community in such a
negative way'

[
"'Everything bad that's ever happened to me involved a black person' and
'we should go back to slavery, we were good at that'."

Mark Burnett, the BBC has set that bar very high.
]