Lord Winston’s prejudiced and ignorant comments Sunday morning National Radio, Sunday 31 July 2011 Chris Laidlaw’s guest: ROBERT WINSTON
As long as Lord Winston speaks about genetic science and television presenting, he is plausible. Unfortunately, as anyone who has ever heard RICHARD DAWKINS blither ignorantly about the middle east, or listened to the New Zealand government’s science advisor PETER GLUCKMAN [1] will know, the seriousness and scientific approach of these people is often not carried into their politics.
As an example, witness Lord Winston’s incredibly naive and ignorant statements about Israel in the following talk….
LAIDLAW: Hrrrrumph. How important is your Jewish heritage?
LORD WINSTON: The Jewish tradition means that science and evidence are very important in forming an ethical standpoint.
LAIDLAW: Did your family have much consciousness about Israel?
WINSTON: No, not much at all. We never gave it a thought. My feelings on Israel came from when Israel was besieged on all sides.
LAIDLAW: Hrrrrumph.
WINSTON: The problem is that there is a deeply ingrained set of people who will not accept the fact that Israel exists at all. It’s an AGONIZING problem for Jews.
LAIDLAW: Hmmmmm?
WINSTON: In the House of Lords over the last year, theere have been ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY questions on Israel and TWO on Kashmir. [2] That gives you an idea of the focus. Israel has a lot to be proud of. Its development of high-tech industries is amazing! It’s got a lot to show New Zealand in that area of development!
LAIDLAW: Hrrrumph! We don’t have quite the same force of necessity do we! Hrrrumph!
WINSTON: Well, no, I suppose you’re right!
LAIDLAW: What do you have to say about homeopathic medicine?
WINSTON: Well, my wife uses homeopathic medicine and I tease her about it, but she persists! We need to expect the same standards of proof that we expect with conventional medicine.
LAIDLAW: Spoken like a scientist! Which we should have expected! Hrrumph!
WINSTON: [modestly] We-e-e-e-ll…
LAIDLAW: Television is an amazing medium, and you’ve used it SHAMELESSLY for good causes. Is there any evidence it’s had an effect on education?
WINSTON: That’s a very good question. We haven’t done the metrics on this….
LAIDLAW: Finally, Lord Winston, what would you like to be remembered for?
WINSTON: Oh Chris! Any personal achievement is trivial. My three children are the best thing I’ve done. For anyone, if you can produce children who contribute to society….
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Dismayed at Laidlaw’s failure to challenge anything this practised liar said, I sent off the following email…
FROM: Morrissey Breen TO: sundays@radionz.co.nz TOPIC: Lord Winston’s prejudiced and ignorant comments
Dear Chris,
You let Lord Winston get away with saying, with sinister smoothness, that Israel was “besieged” by all the countries around it, and that it is threatened by “ingrained” prejudice by people who “won’t even accept its right to exist”. Both statements are nonsense, and nothing more than hardline Israeli state propaganda.
His casting of an aggressor state as a victim is a perfect inversion of the truth: Israel is “surrounded and besieged” in the same way Germany was “besieged” by its neighbours in the 1930s.
His claim that Israel’s “right to exist” needs to be acknowledged is nonsense: Gandhi never accepted the “right to exist” of Pakistan, and human rights advocates all over the world never accepted the “right to exist” of the Soviet Union or of apartheid South Africa.
Robert Lord Winston is whipped cream, smooth, rich, satisfying. He is deprecating about all his wonderful achievements. And he likes to be eased comfortably nto his set speech giving his experiences. And everyone loves him, which is just as well as the man is ubiquitious.
I won’t forget hearing Kim Hill interview him, after the facts as usual, with queries that should have been simple for him to answer, though perhaps tedious as he has advanced so far in so many fields that explaining to a new audience about past history must be boring. But it’s the price of good book sales and large TV audiences. She didn’t put on her velvet gloves and stroke his ego, but treated him as the man of science he claims he is. He didn’t like it and told her so.
She didn’t put on her velvet gloves and stroke his ego, but treated him as the man of science he claims he is. He didn’t like it and told her so.
David Suzuki reacted angrily to Kim Hill a few months back. I thought he was over-sensitive, as Kim’s questions hadn’t been disrespectful, or even especially provocative. I would have thought Suzuki was smarter than to allow himself to lose his temper so completely.
Two less than savoury interviewees who Kim has reduced to spluttering anger areJeffrey Archer and William Shawcross. Archer screamed at her in 1993, snarling: “I was WARNED about you!” Shawcross was embarrassed and angry at being reminded of his past support for Saddam Hussein. I thought Shawcross was going to burst a blood vessel, he was so incensed.
Last year she keelhauled another dyed-in-the-wool liar, John Howard. While Howard licked his wounds in private, and decided to make no public statements about the humiliation, dear old witless Karl DuFresne decided to make a stand on behalf of the great statesman, and wrote a confused and woolly-minded attack on Hill in the Australian Spectator.
And did you see Kim Hill interveiw Brash on TV, this was after some chauvinistic comments he had made in the media, she destroyed him and by half time I was almost feeling sorry for him, almost, she could have let him off the hook, but to her credit continued to show him for what the sexist, shallow, old man he is.
Listened to precisely the same Laidlaw interview of Winston on Sunday morning and (much to the surprise of family members) let out one or two loud expletives.
Still, not at all surprising. I think I read about Winston’s lazy second-hand, Zionist-cliche-ridden views on Israel at least 5 or 6 years ago. It may have been in some sort of open letter to The Guardian. I seem to remember that both he and Melvyn Bragg were expressing some particularly ignorant Israeli apologetics in the British media either at the time of Israel’s murderous assault on the West Bank in 2002 (the so-called “Operation Defensive Shield” – Jesus, now there’s Orwellian absurdity for you !), or during the ultimately unsuccessful British attempt to boycott Israeli Universities in about 2005/2006. Or possibly on both occassions.
You’ve gotta love Laidlaw’s “Hrrrrumphs”. I think it’s his substitute for incisive/critical comment.
You’ve gotta love Laidlaw’s “Hrrrrumphs”. I think it’s his substitute for incisive/critical comment.
Actually, I think Chris Laidlaw is a well informed and deeply concerned interviewer. As well as all the Hrrrrumphing, he regularly voices a skeptical “Hmmmmm?” to show he is disturbed by what his guest is saying. On this occasion, he kept the interjections to the occasional neutral-sounding “Hrrrrumph”, and suppressed the disquiet I’m sure he felt.
Laidlaw believes in giving his guests a long rope. Often, as Lord Winston did on Sunday, the guest will hang himself by airing intolerant and ignorant views. It’s up to the rest of us to repeat and highlight this.
I am rereading Douglas Adams four book trilogy about an alternate future for the planet. He refers to The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy which recommends a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster and says that the effect of drinking one is like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick. (It has comprehensive coverage of this, the recipe, the price, ‘and what voluntary organisations exist to help you rehabilitate afterwards’.)
Well after listening to the never-ending-stoooooory of the USA great talkfest and stand-off over their economy which lies pathetically at their feet, along with any integrity and democratic standards that country ever had, I get a similar feeling. I think we need to resort to the odd evening off from trying to keep the whole thing on the rails, if we ever can find them. This Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster sounds like an experience that would take one’s full attention away from other considerations.
Try it when the RWC comes to our shores – a similar saga. Perhaps we could invent a colourful cocktail that echoes NZs spirits and charm. Something green but not with creme de menthe. Please could bloggers keep posting with news of interest to them while the ruggers on.. I anyway, am likely to miss many important events while trying to get shot of the rugby for a while.
Sunday morning National Radio, Sunday 31 July 2011
Chris Laidlaw’s guest: ROBERT WINSTON
TO: sundays@radionz.co.nz
TOPIC: Lord Winston’s prejudiced and ignorant comments
Northcote Point
[2] This is the sort of British parliamentary speech that angers worshippers of the Israeli state like Robert Winston….
He refers to The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy which recommends a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster and says that the effect of drinking one is like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick. (It has comprehensive coverage of this, the recipe, the price, ‘and what voluntary organisations exist to help you rehabilitate afterwards’.)