BBC attacked for PC ‘ban’ on use of BC and AD

COMMENTATORS have waded in to attack the BBC as politically correct over its apparent decision to ban the use of the terms BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini) in favour of the non-religious terms CE (Common Era) and BCE (Before Common Era) so as to avoid offending non-Christians – but have they got their wires crossed?

Sinister political correctness

This isn’t just puerile political correctness, says Boris Johnson in the Daily Telegraph. The BBC’s decision is "anti-democratic", and worse still, it has extensive cultural ramifications. "What the BBC decides, all kinds of other publishers and broadcasters will decide to follow."

Johnson goes on: "The BBC needs to stop spending time and money on this sort of footling political correctness. Someone needs to get out down the corridor and find the individual who passed this edict and give him or her a figurative kick in the pants."

One of the most sinister aspects of this sort of political correctness is the way in which it purports to be in the interests of minority groups, says Melanie Phillips in the Daily Mail. I am a Jew, she says, but "the idea that any of us would be offended by anyone else using BC and AD would be totally ridiculous."

A society should be allowed to express its own culture – and this attack on BC and AD, fatuous as it may seem on the surface, is an "attack on British culture and the Christian underpinnings which provide it with its history, identity and fundamental values".

What does CE even mean?

"What are they going to do next?" asks Ann Widdecombe, former Tory minister and Daily Express columnist. "Get rid of the entire calendar on the basis it has its roots in Christianity?"

Well, I’m not going to stop using BC and AD, Andrew Marr told his guests on the BBC’s the Andrew Marr Show. He went on: "I say AD and BC because that’s what I understand.  I don’t know what the Common Era is. Why is it the Common Era in 20AD and it wasn’t the Common Era in 20BC?"

There was no ban

Hang on a moment, says Polly Curtis in the Guardian. The BBC hasn't dropped the use of BC and AD. A single website editor decided that BCE/CE was more appropriate. Individual programme and website editors are free to make such decisions, but that doesn’t make it BBC-wide policy. But that hasn’t "stopped columnists pitching on the wider accusation".
 
In the Twittersphere, however, some see the lighter side of the debate. Steve Death tweeted: "BBC are replacing BC/AD for dates with AC/DC. Events occur before or after the release of Back in Black." ·