Squirming under questioning about his own controversial statements by the BBC’s Andrew Neil, conservative writer Ben Shapiro got so angry that he walked out of the interview. Shapiro accused Neil — who is a conservative — of trying to make him look bad due to a liberal agenda.
“You purport to be an objective journalist, BBC purports to be an objective, down the middle network,” Shapiro said after Neil asked if the heartbeat abortion bans sweeping the nation are bringing America back to the “dark ages.” “It obviously is not, it never has been. And you as a journalist are proceeding to call one side of the political aisle ignorant, barbaric and sending us back to the dark ages — why don’t you just say you’re on the left.”
Neil runs The Spectator, which also leans to the right.
“You talk about undermining the public discourse,” Shapiro continued toward the end of the interview. “It seems to me that simply going through and finding lone things that sound bad out of context, and then hitting people with them, is a way for you to make a quick buck on BBC off the fact that I’m popular and no one has ever heard of you.”
Neil quipped that unlike in American broadcasting, there isn’t much money to be made at the BBC.
“I don’t frankly give a damn what you think of me since I’ve never heard of you,” Shapiro added, terminating the interview.
“Thank you for your time and for showing that anger is not part of American political discourse,” Neil responded.
Shapiro later apologized on Twitter for accusing Neil of being a liberal.
Just pre-taped an interview with BBC’s @afneil. As I’m not familiar with him or his work, I misinterpreted his antagonism as political Leftism (he termed the pro-life position in America “barbaric”) – and that was apparently inaccurate. For that, I apologize.
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) May 9, 2019
Watch the interview here:
