It didn't take long for the usual suspects to call for this place to be shut down after the airing of an interview on Tuesday night in which a guest made sexist remarks about a female journalist.
Following the swiftest possible action from the channel, including the suspension of two of its presenters and an ongoing investigation, plus a fulsome apology to the journalist involved, media commentators, politicians and other public figures have been calling for blood.
An ad boycott is not enough for them. Ofcom investigations are not enough for them. Bad headlines and blanket negative coverage are not enough for them. They want us gone.
For a rival broadcaster like Adam Boulton to call for the closure of this channel is about as surprising as the news of Elton John's hair loss. And he's not just a rival, he's a classic member of the London liberal elite, the people who detest GB News so much.
Mark Dolan shared his thoughts on calls for GB News to be shut down
GB News
So just think about these words. He said, “I think there's a delicate and important broadcast ecology in this country. I think GB News is trying to bust that ecology”. Too right we are. Because our terrible crime is that we want to give you an alternative.
By the way, all three guests on Newsnight yesterday called for GB News to be closed down. I do hope the Newsnight program is not guilty of breaching Ofcom rules on impartiality or diverse opinion. That would be most unfortunate.
In the end, trusting someone like Adam Boulton to protect media plurality is like getting Count Dracula to protect the nation's blood supplies. He and many others wish to keep establishment media just the way it is in a woke progressive bubble, and he doesn't want any new media outlets to threaten his job or that of his mates at the Beeb, Channel 4 or ITV.
He doesn't want a threat to their dwindling television and radio audiences, and he doesn't want a threat to the prescribed political narrative. Spare me the pearl clutching from the likes of Boulton. He, like so many of this channel's perma critics, have a political and professional agenda to see the back of this place.
In the end, it's business. GB News is rapidly growing a strong and loyal audience, and it threatens these established stars and the business model of their newspapers, radio stations and TV channels. But in my view, there's another, darker reason why this scandal has been leveraged by those who wish us ill.
They hate you, the general public, with your inconvenient beliefs and values, ones that don't align with theirs, values that don't go down well at cafes in Islington. They don't want the great unwashed to air their filthy views on bet zero, Brexit, British history, immigration, race relations or any other issue.
Now apparently Radio 2 have also been banging on about us today. Every paper you can find is talking about us. TV networks, hundreds of hours! The coverage has been blanket! They're running scared, aren't they?
As I said last night, free speech comes with responsibility, as a television network that chose to be Ofcom regulated from the very start. Then, of course, Ofcom have every right to investigate what happened on Tuesday.
Adam Boulton said GB News is "trying to bust broadcast ecology"
BBC
As I said last night, free speech comes with responsibility, as a television network that chose to be Ofcom regulated from the very start. Then, of course, Ofcom have every right to investigate what happened on Tuesday.
In terms of adhering to broadcasting rules, accountability is critically important, but calls by authoritarian journalists for this place to be shut down, it's an effort to silence you, our thousands of viewers and listeners. Millions if you include digital.
Did anyone call for the BBC to be shut down after abusers like Jimmy Savile and Rolf Harris stalked the corridors of TV Centre?
What about Channel 4? Or the Guardian? Or the New Statesman? Should they be shut down for platforming an openly misogynistic Russell Brand, who called bedding women a "knobstacle course"? Of course not.
Don't be fooled by the crocodile tears. Spare me the faux outrage and the pearl clutching from the usual suspect bad actors, weaponising this story to get rid of this place and to shrink the national conversation to their own ends.
The liberal elites who have the real power in this country are enjoying this story far more than they're willing to admit. They want to cancel GB News. Well, you can cancel them with your remote control.
