Today the BBC suffered another unfortunate turn of events in the ongoing, and continually tedious, Savile-gate. It accidentally showed an episode of the Tweenies from 2001 in which one of the characters parodies a Top of the Pops presenter and they unfortunately chose Savile as the inspiration (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-21108337).
Now I'm not saying they should have shown it - it does seem tasteless that they show a parody of an alleged sex abuser on a children's television programme - but it's something they may genuinely not have seen before broadcast. After all it was created over ten years ago when, in the public domain, Savile was an upstanding member of the community and a great provider to charity. I doubt that when they scheduled the show it would have had notes next to it saying it contains a pastiche of the show and even so if anyone would have made the leap of logic to check it, that there might be a small un-named pastiche to him.
But it brings me to another point: how far can we go to replicate 1984 and erase all memories of Savile from history? They're certainly trying with signs being removed from key buildings but it's impossible to do everything and, even if it wasn't, should we?
Jim Davidson was a great presenter of shows such as the Generation Game or Big Break. If he is convicted of something then should those shows be erased from history? The musical works of Gary Glitter are very good but they've been overshadowed.
There seems to be a determination to re-write history to fit in with new developments. But whereas removing Lance Armstrong's Tour De France awards is fair as he cheated to get them, the memory of them still happening are there. You can't just completely change the past.
Summing up, the BBC shouldn't have shown the episode but equally it wouldn't have come up on alerts and it's hypocritical of the mainstream press, who constantly flaunt half-naked pictures of barely-legal girls on their pages and website, to criticise them.
But the BBC do need to be careful.
Monday 21 January 2013
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