UK News

A Kent school has censored a talk by Milo Yiannopoulos, a former pupil, an outspoken Donald Trump supporter, and member of the so-called alt-right movement. The censorship was apparently ordered by the Department for Education

Simon Langton grammar school for boys, which Yiannopoulos attended, said it had pulled his address to sixth-formers due to take place on Tuesday. Yiannopoulos is a senior editor at the US-based Breitbart website, whose chief executive, Steven Bannon , is Trump's choice for chief strategist.

The Canterbury school claimed the talk had been cancelled because of safety concerns, with almost all of the opposition to it coming from outside the school.

The alt-right may be a bit controversial but this hasn't really lead to any incidents of unrest so far. Anyway the school said:

The decision was taken following contact from the DfE counter-extremism unit, the threat of demonstrations at the school by organised groups and members of the public, and our overall concerns for the security of the school site and the safety of our community.

Yiannopoulos, who was permanently suspended from Twitter in July , describes himself as the most fabulous supervillain on the internet on his Facebook page, where he added:

My old high school has been bullied into cancelling my talk on Tuesday by the counter-extremism unit at the UK Department of Education.

Who even knew the DoE had a counter-extremism unit? And that it wasn't set up to combat terrorism but rather to punish gays with the wrong opinions?

An art exhibition featuring cartoons of Theresa May sitting on the toilet and Boris Johnson breaking wind is facing calls to be censored over claims the work is crude and pornographic .

The free exhibition entitled Dyma Gariad (Fel y Moroedd) ( Here is a Love [Deep as Oceans] ) opened recently at Penarth Pier Pavilion.

Anthony Ernest, a Penarth town councillor, whinged:

Constituents have come to me expressing their concerns over the quality of the exhibition and whether it is suitable for the wider audience which includes children, and indeed adults. I have to say, I agree with them. More than £1m of public funding has gone into the Pavilion, so its artwork should be suitable for the wider community.

I think public art should be interesting, and even provocative... BUT ...art of this nature, which is downright crude and pornographic, just isn't acceptable.

But artist Iwan Bala says his work is a direct response to the recent political madness of the Brexit vote and election of Donald Trump -- and that art is bound to offend some people.

The exhibition will be open to the public until November 30.

The Media Reform Coalition and National Union of Journalists are hoping to make Google and Facebook fund journalism in Britain.

They are seeking to persuade politicians to include a new amendment to the digital economy bill, which is currently going through parliament. It will propose a 1% levy on the operations of the digital giants in order to pay for independent and non-profit journalism.

A statement issued by the Media Reform Coalition (MRC) argues that digital intermediaries such as Google and Facebook are not only amassing eye-watering profits and paying minimal tax in the UK, they are also bleeding the newspaper industry dry by sucking up advertising revenue . It continues:

As national and local newspapers try to cut their way out of trouble by slashing editorial budgets and shedding staff, journalistic quality is becoming a casualty.

Public interest journalism in particular has been hit the hardest as newspapers are being lured into a clickbait culture which favours the sensational and the trivial.

In the light of this, we propose a 1% levy on the operations of the largest digital intermediaries with the resulting funds redistributed to non-profit ventures with a mandate to produce original local or investigative news reporting.

A libel claim brought against the BBC by Chief Imam, Shakeel Begg, has been dismissed today.

Begg, the Chief Imam at Lewisham Islamic Centre, sought damages against the BBC for libel in respect of a broadcast of Sunday Politics presented by Andrew Neil on BBC One, 3 November 2013. He denied being an extremist speaker who had recently promoted and encouraged religious violence by telling Muslims that it would constitute a man's greatest deeds.

Today in a written judgment The Honourable Mr Justice Haddon-Cave dismissed the claim stating that:

Shakeel Begg was something of a Jekyll and Hyde character whose speeches and postings, represent an overwhelming case of justification for the BBC, and that he clearly promotes and encourages violence in support of Islam and espouses a series of extremist Islamic positions.

A BBC Spokesperson said:

We were right to stand by the journalism of Sunday Politics. The judge has concluded, based on the evidence, that Imam Begg has preached religious violence and an extremist worldview in his remarks.

The trial took place between 27 June and 1 July 2016. The BBC defended the case on the basis that the broadcast was substantially true relying upon evidence from six speeches given by Begg to a variety of Muslim audiences between 2006 and 2011.

The Green party has complained to the press censor IPSO over the use of pictures of refugees by the Sun, Daily Mail, Daily Star and Sunday Telegraph.

Although it was absolutely obvious that some of the 'children' were many years into adulthood, Jonathan Bartley, who co-heads the Green party, has asked the Independent Press Standards Organisation whether the titles were justified in printing images of refugees in Calais whom were claiming to be under 18.

According to Ipso's code of practice pictures of children under the age of 16 should not be used unless adult consent has been given.

Bartley ludicrously argued that the coverage did not qualify as an exceptional public interest that would allow the newspapers to override the Ipso code.

In fact large proportions of the public were well interested in the fact that the authorities are so politically correct that they refuse to entertain reasonable doubt about the voracity of what desperate refugees tell them.

Bartley argued that publishing the pictures contributed to an atmosphere of prejudice against the refugees. A little bit bizarre considering the pictures demonstrated how far British officials are biased in favour of the refugees.

The Green party complaint cites editions of the Sun (18th and 19th October), the Daily Mail (18 October), the Daily Star (19 October) and the Sunday Telegraph (23 October).

Thailand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs has issued a statement deploring foreign media who allegedly misreported the number of Thais gathered to mourn the death of King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

The statement, which did not identify any media outlet specifically, deplored some big foreign media for reporting that thousands of Thais had gathered to mourn the loss of the King at the Grand Palace. The statement said the actual number was much higher noting that hundreds of thousands lined the route from Siriraj Hospital to the Grand Palace. It described the alleged discrepancy between thousands at the palace and hundreds of thousands along the route as manipulative and provocative.

After the announcement of the King's death Thursday evening, all television channels, cable channels and satellite channels under Thai control were replaced by a single government broadcast. The channels resumed at midnight on Friday night, but were told not to broadcast entertainment programmes for a month. However the BBFC and Al Jazeera news channels were subjected to additional censorship in that any news items reporting on Thailand were blacked out with a card announcing that Programming will return shortly.

BBC correspondent Jonathan Head confirmed their coverage about Thailand had been blocked in the country several times ever since. Head told news company Khaosod:

Whenever reporting on Thailand comes up our transmissions are blocked. Just now when I was reporting live.

We have received no official complaints, and the MFA has not mentioned any problems with the BBC's reporting. So we do not know why we are being blocked.

Presumably the reason for the blocking is more about discussions of the succession, rather than numbers attending funeral events. It is a very sensitive issue in Thailand.

Khaosod also reported that cable and satellite company, TrueVisions was looking for freelancers to monitor BBC and Al Jazeera news, and to switch out news reports from Thailand.

Wirral Council is expected to back a campaign encouraging retailers across the borough to stop selling The Sun newspaper.

At a meeting of the full council next Monday a notice of motion is scheduled to be debated which points out the tabloid published blatant lies about the Hillsborough disaster. The call from Labour councillor Ron Abbey adds:

For this reason we ask all retailers and vendors of newspapers to stop selling the Sun. We applaud the group called 'The Total Eclipse of the S*n' for their endeavours to rid our city region of this newspaper.

Liverpool councillors unanimously backed a similar motion to stop selling The Sun in September. Derry and Strabane District Council also recently agreed a motion also asking local newsagents to stop selling the title.

Y Llyfrgell (Library Suicides) is a 2016 UK thriller by Euros Lyn.
Starring Dyfan Dwyfor, Carwyn Glyn and Sharon Morgan.

The BBFC rated a subtitled version of Library Suicides as 15 uncut for strong threat, injury detail, sex, nudity, suicide references, drug misuse.

Exactly the same film is being shown without the subtitles at Aberystwyth Arts Centre. Now the Arts Centre bosses have tried to explain a dumb decision to slap its own 18 rating for the film just because the subtitles are turned off. They said that the BBFC had not rated the unsubtitled version, so it has to be listed by cinemas as an 18.

An Aberystwyth Arts Centre spokesperson confirmed the rating difference is not a mistake , saying:

The non-subtitled version has not been rated by the BBFC so we have to list it as an 18 rather than a 15, but essentially it is exactly the same film.

Derry City and Strabane District Council has passed a motion asking local newsagents to stop selling The Sun.

The motion was put forward to show solidarity with the families of the Hillsborough football stadium disaster.

It also called on the council to support the campaign group Total Eclipse of the Sun , which wants all shops to boycott the newspaper.

A spokesperson for The Sun described the move as extreme censorship :

We are astonished that in Derry - a city that has prided itself on its association with civil liberties and free speech - some elected politicians think it's appropriate to push such extreme censorship on its citizens and retailers.

The vote was proposed by independent councillor Paul Gallagher and supported by 27 SDLP, Sinn Féin and independent members. One unionist representative voted against, whilst seven more unionists abstained.

Liverpool councillors had previously backed a similar censorship motion a few weeks ago..