This weekend, if you wanted to watch Kneecap’s Glastonbury performance live on the West Holts stage, you wouldn’t have found it on the BBC. Instead, you’d have had to find Helen Wilson’s TikTok account, where she burnt her fingers holding her phone up in 30-degree heat to livestream the entire set from her spot in the festival audience, knowing that our public broadcaster had decided not to. Thousands were watching.
The band was expected to be one of the festival’s most anticipated acts, with organisers warning prior that there would be a large crowd for their performance. The BBC announced it wouldn’t be broadcasting the set live on TV, but that edited highlights would be offered later, on iPlayer.
“Whilst the BBC doesn’t ban artists”, it said in a statement, “our plans ensure that our programming meets our editorial guidelines.” This comes after band member Mo Chara was charged with a terrorist offence, for allegedly displaying a flag in support of Hezbollah at a performance in 2024.
On the day, the BBC tried to play it safe, choosing to edit Kneecap’s performance for iPlayer. Surely this would shield it?
During the set, Mo Chara commented on the sheer number of Palestinian flags at the festival, and led crowds in chants of “Free Palestine”. Another band member wore a T-shirt reading “We are all Palestine Action”, in reference to the soon-to-be proscribed direct action group.
In the end, the BBC’s editorial timidity didn't save it. Instead of livestreaming Kneecap’s Palestine chants, it livestreamed rap duo Bob Vylan’s, whose call-and-response about the Israeli military (“Death, death to the IDF”) has resulted in significant criticism – even from the prime minister – and demands that the broadcaster be defunded or prosecuted. Both Kneecap and Bob Vylan are now under police investigation.
For bad-faith critics, censorship – the most extreme editorial choice – will never be enough. Refusing to air band sets at Glastonbury, or editorially sound documentaries like Gaza: Doctors Under Fire, will never be enough. Sacrificing the BBC’s dearest editorial standards and values will never be enough. Because censorship is the call of those who don’t want reality to be shown – and the reality is that there’s growing public support for Palestine, and growing anger at Israel’s actions in Gaza.
This shows itself in the folk-hero status given to artists who speak up, in the hundreds of thousands who have protested down London streets across 20 months, in the sea of Palestine flags at Glastonbury. Public anger cannot be censored away, no matter how much anyone tries. If an artist shouts “Free, free” on a Glastonbury stage, the audience will roar “Palestine”. Showing the reality of this public sentiment should be a priority for our public broadcaster.
I want a BBC free of influence, a BBC that is editorially brave in the face of pressure. It’s crucial that our public broadcaster makes its editorial decisions freely, not based on the perceived anger of bad-faith critics, but based on accuracy, evidence, human rights, and core principles that must be upheld – principles such as free speech and public service.
The BBC that refused to remove a documentary series on Indian prime minister Narendra Modi’s role in the 2002 Gujarat riots, despite pressure from his government, is the BBC we need. It’s the BBC we deserve. Not the one where a member of the public has to burn her fingers to air what it won’t.
Karishma Patel is a former BBC newsreader and journalist who resigned over its coverage of Gaza
