The term “western for corr” was used as a term of elite status by an English correspondent for a UK channel here in Moscow. The person lumped a few others covering Russia and Belarus 2 years ago into a group that has done more to actively distort the view of Russia than do actual reporting. The same person was happy to use my contact to try upstage Maria Zakharova (failed badly), then when I asked for a return favour told me that good news from Russia was “not interesting”. Four years later and it’s gotten even worse.
Just try to imagine this - a guest comes to your house. They spend their time telling everyone they know outside the house that it’s stinky, dirty, uncomfortable and awful. That You, as the owner, are a bad person. That your family, sorry regime, is corrupt and terrible and really. really bad. They keep this up, day after day, week after week, month af……you know where I’m going. So they just never stop accentuating the negative, even making up stories about the negative or simply presenting things in the worst possible light and language. You keep serving them dinner. You keep washing their clothes. You keep asking if they need anything else. You answer their questions and show them the “good room” (all Irish and British people know what this is) and even let them wander into family members bedrooms, just to be nice. And even when they are invited to a bbq in the new patio out back, they tell everyone outside the family that you’re after slaughtering pigs and cows for the hamburgers and hotdogs for an opulent, crass celebration of sunshine.
Now how long would you put up with this guest? A guest who is being paid by a foreign government or corporation to tell these negative stories. You sit down one night and go through ALL the tales they’ve told and then torture yourself by watching the reports. Not a single good word about the house or the family. And worse, they’re even sneering about your guests. Privately you ask them what do they want, can they not, for once, show something positive? They say - It won’t be interesting for the people I tell my stories to and the people who pay me to tell those stories. End of.
What do you do? You know your house isn’t perfect. You know your eldest sprinkles when he tinkles and doesn’t always clean it up. Your daughter, the middle child, is loud and plays that bloody music early in the morning to wake everyone up. And the twins, they’re always up to something. Hooligans. But Mam and Dad are trying, even with Granny and Grandad out in the “garden house”. You see your daughter inviting the guest to share the pizza she ordered for herself and that awful boyfriend of hers. The guest takes a slice, thanks her, then starts tweeting about how tasteless it is and how she only got one slice (2 slices went to the dog by the way). So, again, what do you do?
Misery porn sells. Good news, doesn’t. Football “writers” hate when a manager is doing well, because it gives them nothing to report. When he’s in trouble, about to be sacked, or angrily responding to questions - that sells and they feel important. Same with “western for corrs”. Going to visit a newly reconstructed kindergarden for children with special needs - what? “You think anyone is interested in that?” I was told. A course for blind athletes to keep them in education longer and give them skills to join the workforce after their career is over - excuse me? “It’s not sport, it’s not news, it’s kind of nothing, sorry.” Was the answer I got when I asked if they’d like to visit. And this, this is the life of a “western for corr”. Yet, from that “Global South” or “Global East”, you hand them this and they cover it, even putting people in contact with their home countries for cross-cultural exchange and cooperation (India & Zambia respectively for the above 2 projects). “For corrs” from those countries are interested in reporting news, developments, projects and stories that will catch the eye. They can be cynical, enquiring or just amused, but they do what has been forgotten for the last 2 decades in too many “western” news rooms - tell a story with facts and no spin.
So what do you do what that ungrateful guest? The Russian Foreign Ministry reviewed stories reported and even word for word how they were reported. According to one official who was tasked with handling “only” UK news organisations - from January 2016 to January 2021 - just over 97% (97.25% to be exact) of news stories were negative. How so? Critical of the President, government, policies, individuals or Russians as a whole, or culture, including sports. State-affiliated media outlets like the BBC, he told me, were the worst. In 2021, having seen Russian journalists be denied visas to the UK, the Russian government did a childish tit-for-tat. First up was a BBC journalist who was a prolific anti-Russian propagandist, yet she was far from the worst. Her visa was not renewed - but of course, she was “expelled”. She wasn’t, but why let the truth get in the way of a negative story.
She was one of that initial group of “western for corrs” and her subsequent behaviour, and self-imposed victimhood to get a book deal, rebounded on all other “western for corrs”, even those who genuinely report and present the truth. Now, each of them get a 3 month visa, leaving them all worried about that next quarter. As one told me:
It’s a pain, because you never know if you’ve to pack your bag. But I don’t worry as I just report the news, not do anti-Russia pr bullshit.
It still hasn’t stopped the negative stories, or the lies, but it has put the guests on notice that if you abuse the hospitality, there are repercussions. Of course it could be me next. It should be me. For over a decade I’ve reported on corruption in Russian sport from doping to matchfixing, to athlete abuse to plain terrible management. And yet, and yet…..I’ve also given a voice to Russian sports. I’ve reported on the wonderful moments and acknowledged the genuine efforts at improving the culture. I’ve taken part in forums and working groups and committees to try make it better for coaches, administrators and athletes. I’m involved in grassroots sports and will still call out bad deeds when I see them. But there could come a day when my demanding a leading Russian skating coach be banned for life, annoys the wrong person, however I do hope when that day comes, my body of work will at least get me a fair hearing. Because for those select group of “western for corrs” whose arrogance led to one of their number not having her visa renewed - the house owner will have a bulging case file against them.
BBC Bollocks Broadcasting Cunts
Dude. Don't get me started. Lol