The BBC does not report on protests fairly.
How do I know?
Because I used to work there.
🟢 If they agree with you, you get sympathetic coverage.
🔴 If they disagree with you, you get smeared or ignored.
This is how the BBC rigs public perception of protests 🧵
This weekend, thousands of people protested at hotels across the UK.
The BBC ran just one story on it, focusing on “arrests”, “clashes”, and “anti-migrant groups”.
No interviews. No photos. No voices from the protestors.
Just framing: these people are dangerous.
I know first hand how this works. I worked at the BBC during the Sunderland protests and riots last year.
Here’s what I was told:
“The protests may go off peacefully, in which case they’re not newsworthy.”
The BBC only wants to cover protests against immigration when they are violent.
Let’s look at how the BBC has framed past protests, and how they reported on this weekend.
🟢 BLM: 7th June 2020
“George Floyd: London anti-racism protests leave 27 officers hurt”
bbc.co.uk/news/uk-englan…
The BBC reports that the protests were “largely peaceful”.
That’s despite the fact that 27 police officers were injured, including one “who suffered a broken collarbone, a broken rib, and punctured lung”.
The BBC then quotes a protestor, who says “"these situations don't come from nowhere" and the police had been "acting very aggressively" towards protesters.
Sympathetic coverage for the protestors and their cause, despite the fact that 27 police officers were injured.
🟢 Pro-Palestine: 22nd October 2023
“Pro-Palestinian protests take place in London, Birmingham, Cardiff, Belfast and Salford”
bbc.co.uk/news/uk-671821…
This time the BBC doesn’t call the protests peaceful, even though there were only 10 arrests at this one (including an assault on an emergency service worker).
But the tone is sympathetic: no condemnation, no smears, no alarmist headline.
And the BBC actually does journalism: it provides a background on why the protests are taking place, and it provides positive quotes from the protestors.
🟢 Southport Counter Protests: August 2024
“Police thank London for unity and 'community spirit'”
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…
In 2024, thousands protested against the “far right”, who apparently didn’t turn up.
The BBC frames it positively as a “coming together” full of “community spirit”, calling the protests “largely peaceful”, even though “15 arrests were made across the city”.
The message is clear: this side is good, the other side is dangerous.
🔴 Epping Hotel Protests: 26th July 2025
The BBC has covered some of the protests at migrant hotels.
But they only seem to do it when they can frame it negatively towards the protestors.
“Protests leave asylum seekers afraid to exit hotel”
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…
The article is framed around violence and the fear of an asylum seeker, with quotes from the charity Care4Calais and the chief executive of Refugee Council, who are both against the protest.
The BBC does give a brief background on why the protests are taking place: “The venue has been thrust into the national spotlight after a man living there was charged with sexual assault, harassment and inciting a girl to engage in sexual activity.”
But there is no wider context, no quotes from any of the protestors, just a framing that puts them in a negative light.
🔴Epping Hotel Protests: 27th July 2025
The next day they covered it again, but this time around the negative frame that there were more counter-protestors.
“Rival groups stage protests at migrant hotel”
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…
“Between 300 and 400 anti-migrant protesters… But they were greatly outnumbered by an estimated 2,000 counter-protesters.”
The goal is to downplay the side protesting against hotels.
The BBC also describes the two sides as “anti-migrant” and “pro-immigration”, implying the protestors are against individuals, rather than the government’s immigration policy.
It’s subtle, but labels matter. Call them “anti-migrant” and the public sees them as cruel. Say “anti-mass migration” and they sound more reasonable.
🔴 UK-wide Hotel Protests: 2nd August 2025
Now let’s look at the one story the BBC ran on this weekend’s protests, in which protestors across the UK far outnumbered any counter protestors.
“Arrests after asylum hotel protests in England” bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…
The headline focuses on the arrests, even though there were fewer arrests than the "mostly peaceful" BLM protest.
The article leads with violence and it frames the protestors as “anti-migrant” while downplaying the scale of the protests across the UK.
No depth. No context. Just enough to frame it as a public order threat.
The only voices quoted? Not the protestors, but Labour ministers, spinning why hotels might close by 2029.
Yet no mention of Labour’s broken promise to shut the hotels within a year.
What have we learned?
The BBC doesn’t report on protests.
It curates narratives.
🟢 If your cause fits the worldview, you get empathy.
🔴 If it doesn’t, you’re erased or smeared.
No overt lies, just framing that dictates whether the reader should sympathise with the cause or not.
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For more in-depth threads about media bias, free speech, and government lies, give me a follow @ChrisMid.
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