Queen guitarist Brian May has hit out at the pro-hunting group The Countryside Alliance after they criticised his upcoming BBC documentary, Brian May: The Badger, The Farmers And Me.
The musician spent four years on this project, which saw him work on the field of bovine tuberculosis (bTB), an infectious disease which can affect cattle populations.
May had announced plans for this documentary last week. More on this here.
This project appeared to be on the receiving end of strong criticism from the alliance’s chief executive Tim Bonner.
According to a report from The Daily Mail, Bonner wrote to BBC boss Tim Davie, claiming that Brian May held “clearly partisan views”, adding that his documentary was “fundamentally incompatible with the BBC’s obligation to be impartial”.
“Hardly surprising”
Sharing a photo of this article via his Instagram, Brian May hit back, stating that the Countryside Alliance are more interested letting “blood sports continue” than protecting the welfare of cattle populations.
“Hardly surprising that the Countryside Alliance want to stop you seeing our documentary – the result of 12 years research into how the disease of bovine TB is actually transmitted. The CA’s remit, of course, is to try to ensure that blood sports continue, and they represent hunters and shooters”, May also wrote.
The guitarist continued: “These are the very people who find employment killing badgers in the Cull Zones, and they get paid a large fee per badger killed. It’s easy to see that the CA has a vested interest in making sure the badger culls continue. To date around 230,000 badgers have been slaughtered in the UK. Imagine how much money is being made here”.
May Hopes BBC Will “stand firm”
Elsewhere, Brian May is also hoping that the BBC will “stand firm” on this.
He scribed: “We can see also that they have a vested interest in TB NOT being eradicated. So it’s no wonder that these people would prefer that you didn’t see our film. Hopefully the BBC will stand firm. The documentary is scrupulously fair and honest, and it means a lot to me that the plight of the farmers is well and sympathetically represented”.
You can also check out this post in full here.
In a video, Brian May also added: “there are people trying to stop it being transmitted at the moment, trying to block it, notably the Countryside Alliance, who’ve protested to the Daily Mail that it’s not fair and it’s not unbiased and the farmers should have the right of reply”.
Last month, Brian May also praised bandmate Adam Lambert for taking Queen songs to places he never expected. Find out more here.
