Balanced Content and the peddling of bad news!

Donald Trump calls it ‘Fake News’, we in the UK are more reserved and would call it ‘poor content’ or even propaganda. Either way it’s dangerous, and in the days of daily government news updates, ‘content’ and its delivery/portrayal needs careful management.

As an example, the week beginning 18th June 2020 saw BBC News lead with: increase in UK death toll, jobless claims soar, fears of the worst recession in a generations and natural disasters in India. Around 80% of their content on the website’s home page was negative. Do we all need to know this negative content? Is financial recession top news for a pensioner or student? Content needs a careful balance between good and bad to keep the populous aware, but also, not scaring the bejesus out of them and reducing them to cowering behind the sofa. The term ‘shit-sandwich’ is often used to describe content these days, sadly it seems the BBC have run out of bread!

If you just chose the BBC as your news medium, you would have been forgiven for feeling anxious and panic-stricken. The content is often mostly negative, so naturally you’ll come away feeling so. Read other news agencies feeds, and the feeling seems different. There are other stories, non-Covid, not about kangaroos spotted in Hyde Park (how sweet), or Captain Tom to be offered the Queen’s position as Head of State (is he now?), but real stories to balance the grim news. The word here is ‘balanced’ and this should be mandatory, surely in all content writing or presentations, whether from the BBC or a blog from an aging Project Manager as as myself.

Throughout time, content and its balance, relevance and results have been continually fought over. C.P. Snow, the first owner of The Guardian’s mantra was “Facts are sacred, comment is free - and fact-based comment most precious of all”. This is very true but surely how you present/display/deliver these facts are as important. Put text alongside the wrong image and the message is lost, deliver the facts in a poor/muddled/not-thought-through press conference, and the populous start to mis-believe, and anxiety creeps in.

The Government’s content delivery has been poor at best, the BBC keeps peddling bad news alongside it and the grey-army reach for the Daily Mail. But that’s just the bad news, we should be balanced of course? The Government and BBC should work in tandem, like a boss to an employee in a one-to-one. Deliver any bad news yes, but then put an arm round and suggest things to improve, so you leave the meeting/news briefing feeling positive not anxious. Finally and most sad of all aside of all the awful deaths are the results of this unbalanced content on the elderly, the anxious and those who lack confidence in society. A bombardment of negative content from our national broadcaster only helps them to retreat further, to give in, and to not engage in society at all.

To conclude, balanced content is a must, whether it’s positive or negative, from the left or the right. It must be factual, with comments around it, without this the message is lost. The increase in positive news moving forward should be encouraged, and this isn’t a now Knighthood for Captain Tom! ‘Sir’ Tom is the news, not Dominic Cummings, how balanced!