BBC CENSORS PLAY ABOUT HONOR MURDERS TO AVOID OFFENDING GUESS WHO

Typical path taken at the Beeb:

The BBC have cut a line from play about honour killing in the Muslim community to avoid “potentially misrepresenting majority British Muslim attitudes to honour killing.” Playwright Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti, who was asked to amend the line in the Radio 4 play, has accused the broadcaster of “extraordinary” censorship.

Bhatti’s episode is called The Heart of Darkness and will be broadcast on Radio 4 on Friday afternoon as part of the station’s DCI Stone series. The drama follows an investigation into the murder of a 16-year-old Asian girl, who it later emerges is a victim of honour killing. DCI Stone is told to treat the case “sensitively” because of her Muslim heritage.

Bhatti spoke about the changes made to the play at Tuesday’s Index On Censorship conference, which discusses artistic freedom of expression in the UK. As reported in The Independent, Bhatti explained the controversial line: “At the end, a character says: ‘There is so much pressure in our community, to look right and to behave right.’ The compliance department came back and said, ‘we don’t want to suggest the entire Muslim community condones honour killings.’”

Bhatti continued, “It’s an extraordinary and awful situation. They said the lines were offensive but they absolutely were not. We live in a fear-ridden culture.” Bhatti said that the line was “a crucial part of the story”, and that the BBC said it could be kept in if she found factual evidence of community pressure resulting in an honour killing.

Once, there might have been freedom of expression in Britain. Now, there is not. And even if Bhatti can present factual research, I don't think the Beeb would let it pass anyway. They're already too far gone down the drain.