I have a serious point to make

would you believe it?
Anyway, my serious point regards John Sweeney's piece about the 'Church' of Scientology on Panorama. Unfortunately, I was nominally revising, so didn't see the entire piece, but that's somewhat immaterial. What I want to discuss is the major talking point, John Sweeney losing his temper. See this video (from the scientology people):

And then there's the BBC's version:

Now, it should be noted that even in the BBC's version, he's losing control of his voice, but in the CoS version, the sound is actually distorting - either they're using cheap equipment OR they've deliberately manipulated it to make it seem like it was louder than it was.

Now, my point on the whole issue is this, this Tommy Davies character could have wound John up, made him explode, and got a great capital out of it. Maybe he thinks that he did.

He didn't. See the thing he didn't do was shut up. Had he allowed John to shout and then calmly responded he may have managed to acquire the intellectual high ground. As it was he just kept his condescending monotone waffle talking right through him (which also shows the value he has for his own point of view). Maybe he was hoping that by continuing to talk and winding John up further he could keep him shouting and come out on top.

It didn't work. You see, the thing that Tommy failed to realise is that we've all seen his type before and most of us aren't impressed when we see the archetypal 5-year-old putting his fingers in his ears and going "la la la la, I can't hear you". That's what Tommy is doing and it's the last refuge of someone who realises that his argument has run out of steam. Another five year old would probably have hit him. Maybe he was hoping to keep John shouting and try to look good for not being a raving madman.

It failed. I, and I suspect many others, saw past the shouting man to the other man who was deliberately winding him up. Being the person losing their rag is bad; being the person who deliberately winds them up is worse.

Now, back to Tommy. If you watch the BBC clip right through, you'll see another little gambit with the roles reversed and this time John demonstrates far better how to deal with an angry shouting person. John is talking about the CoS and qualifies it with the phrase "some say it's a sinister cult" and Tommy leaps on this and goes off on one about religious freedom and storms off, refusing to answer John's really very valid point about freedom of speech. (While it maybe be Tommy's right to hold whatever religious beliefs that he wants, it's equally Johns right to label it a sinister cult.) Now, it's interesting to notice that it takes him a good few seconds to erupt, during which time it becomes clear as to where John's line of questioning is going. Is it taking Tommy a while to wrest back control of his anger behind those dark glasses or did he figure out what the question was going to be about and quickly backtrack so he could shout about some side topic before leaving quickly? Also, if he has such great faith in his beliefs why does he get so angry that someone who doesn't share them doesn't put so much stock in them? (Which, in fact, wasn't even the case since John was simply quoting a oft-repeated popular opinion of scientology).

Kudos to the BBC for tackling this head on and not letting the CoS silence them (or at least getting a lot of it out there). The CoS may have thought that agreeing to do this would give them some good publicity and show the world that they're going mainstream. It hasn't. They're the same bunch of raving nutters and winding a BBC reporter up to the point of getting him shouting has only reinforced that view. Perhaps they thought they could break and discredit the BBC. They haven't. It's going to take quite a lot to shake the BBC's reputation for (normally) quality journalism and this wasn't enough. Go for a smaller fish.

So, in conclusion, a few tips for Tommy:

• Don't wind people up.
• Don't talk over people.
• Don't go for the condescending monologue, it doesn't look good.
• Don't go banging on about your right to hold religious beliefs; it doesn't extend to forcing others to respect them or not call them a cult.