Lord Herbert
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Kat wrote on Dec 20 th, 2014 at 11:28am: Rubbish.
Where DO you get these silly misconceptions?
The claim has been refuted and disproven so many times it's not funny. "The ABC provides us with a wonderful example of what happens when journalists do take over the asylum. And the record of the ABC shows quite clearly that journalists freed from effective constraints of accountability are not fearless prosecutors of free speech and open debate.
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Now, when was the last time any of us heard an ABC announcer refer to the 'radical' Greenpeace, the 'left-wing' Australia Institute or the 'ultra-left' or 'ultra-radical' anything? Only those deemed to be on the right of centre are automatically given ideological labels by ABC presenters.
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Nevertheless, one of the ABC's distinguishing features is how the biases one notices in political commentary is replicated in foreign coverage, environmental issues, religious broadcasts, coverage of art and cultural events, even in drama series. There is clearly a common outlook amongst ABC journalists, presenters, producers, researchers, writers: a common ABC culture.
What I mean by staff capture is that the ABC lacks a real owner, and the result is that it is, in practice, unaccountable to the general public. Furthermore, this lack of accountability makes the interests of ABC staff the dominant interest in determining its behaviour.
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Perhaps the most powerful evidence is from Queensland University Professor John Henningham's survey of journalists, where journalists rated 7.30 Report, ABC News, Four Corners and SBS News (in that order) as the most pro-ALP media outlets.
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It is a huge advantage being able to sell moral vanity to journalists. And journalists are eager buyers, particularly in the Fairfax press, The Australian, The Canberra Times, the Canberra press gallery and the ABC. It offers to participants membership of a moral elite, one requiring no effort apart from agreeing to certain attitudes. Failure to join, however, offers the prospect of exclusion, abuse and reduced opportunities.
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First, it is disproportionately important in the amount of news, current affairs and documentary broadcasting it produces---AM effectively sets the news agenda for the day.
Second, as a staff-captured organisation, it is far more dominated by the moral vanity games of journalists than any other media organisation, even the Fairfax press.
Such an approach is both inherently intellectually sterile, since it is hostile to genuine inquiry, and destructive of democracy. Both democracy and truth-discovery require flourishing debate and clash of opinion".link
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