H.M. Parliament is to consider before December 31st, 1946, the renewal of the B.B.C. Charter for the next five years. Some M.P.’s have asked for a Public Inquiry before this step is taken, and in common with many citizens we warmly support their appeal.
The B.B.C. is a State-owned monopoly. Its revenue of nearly £10,000,000 a year is obtained via the Post Office from millions of licence holders. It is responsible to Parliament. We are therefore definitely of opinion that M.P.’s of all parties are entitled to insist that the content of broadcast programmes should be made subject to a more thorough censorship than in the past. Is there not a cause?
Unhappily, the B.B.C. is becoming one of the most powerful forces in fostering the secularisation of the hallowed hours of the Christian Sabbath in our midst.
In its early years under the first Director-General, Sir John Reith, it showed a recognition of the principle that Sabbath programmes should be different from other days of the week. That is no longer the guiding principle at Broadcasting House.
Nowadays, Sabbath programmes are devised so as to include Murder Trials, Detective Stories, Novel Reading, Jazz, Tangos, Waltzes; Stage Plays, Musical Comedies, Variety Turns, Football Match Reports, and the like.
True, a minimum of religious items are interspersed—it would seem as a sort of sop in order to allow a preponderance of more-or-less secular features. For example, in the week in which these sentences are being written the Radio Times announces for the Lord’s Day 55 non-religious to 7 religious broadcasts. In other words, they include 3 hours 38 minutes for God, and 27 hours 27 minutes for Mammon. It was a typical B.B.C. Sabbath, September 8th, 1946.
Is not this proportion of hours lamentable? It is a slight, it is in effect like a blow in the face of Almighty God on His Day. If those in high influence in the nation determine to treat His Sabbaths in this way, can we expect a continuance of His blessing on our Land?
The L.D.O.S. submission is: “Continentalising” of the Christian Sabbath in radio programmes should be made to cease. A much higher standard of broadcasting on Sundays is called for. We plead for more uplifting programmes on the Lord’s Day.
We have also had occasion to lodge with the B.B.C. a Protest against another deplorable innovation—the latest tendency to indulge in (1) continuous Drink Propaganda, and (2) depreciating the habit of Church Attendance as “Victorian.”
A concrete instance of what we mean took place on the eve of the Lord’s Day, Saturday night, May 11th, 1946, in the broadcast of a play entitled “The Younger Generation.” Mr. Hannen Swaffer, an eminent journalist, by no means a Sabbatarian, writing in the Daily Herald, commented: “This comedy makes a mock of a Chapel-going family and would offend many religious folk.”
The script of the play is before us, and we entirely agree with Mr. Swaffer. The leading character in the play is a modern young man described as “completely and benignantly drunk.” He shamelessly argues in favour of “getting drunk occasionally,” saying: “it would do you a world of good to get drunk,” and that it is “a symbol of revolt.” Going to Sabbath School and Chapel and reading the Bible are sneeringly mentioned; whilst what are termed “Chapel-goers” are made objects of derision.
Lies are excused. Puritans, to whom in history Britain owes much, are held up to execration. The play also encourages young people breaking away from the moral control of Sabbatarian parents and homes.
Altogether the play in our opinion tends to lower moral standards—and at a time when it is generally admitted there is a serious decay in our national life. Its staging on the air in A.D. 1946 is altogether unworthy of a Christian country.
Sad to relate, the B.B.C. in its written reply to the L.D.O.S. Protest, attempted to defend this broadcast play. They went so far as to say: “On its merits it certainly deserves a place in the B.B.C.’s programmes.”
We would, however, respectfully remind this great Corporation that church-going people are not the least worthy citizens of Britain. What, we ask, would life in our land be like if it had not been for the moral and spiritual and elevating influences of the House of Prayer in past generations?
For the reputation of the B.B.C.—for the good name of our country—above all for the glory of God, we make an earnest appeal to M.P.’s to join in the demand that there shall be no repetition of such offensive broadcasts. The new B.B.C. Charter should be drafted to ensure amongst other things this overdue reformation.—Lord’s Day Magazine.