ABC under fire for lack of coverage over Lidia Thorpe’s vile outburst outside Melbourne strip club
The ABC has been accused of censoring coverage of Lidia Thorpe’s foul-mouthed outburst outside a Melbourne strip club.
Senator Thorpe was filmed insulting a group of men outside Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club, in north Melbourne, at 3am on Sunday.
The rogue senator was heard insulting patrons of the Brunswick adult establishment, telling one man “you have a small penis” and the other man “you, you’re scarred.”
ABC TV briefly mentioned the strip club diatribe during its Afternoon Briefing program on Tuesday, but coverage on the digital platforms seemed to be lacking.
Public broadcaster is under scrutiny for its “failed bias” for failing to cover one of the biggest stories in politics this week.
The ABC (pictured) is under fire for its lack of coverage of Senator Lidia Thorpe’s late-night outburst outside a Melbourne strip club where she hurled vile insults at customers
Senator Lidia Thorpe (pictured) was filmed unleashing an extraordinary stream of insults at a group of men outside Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club at 3am on Sunday
In a post shared on Twitter on Tuesday, One Nation leader Pauline Hanson accused the ABC of “protecting” Ms. Thorpe by not reporting on the incident.
“Why is the ABC website silent on Lidia Thorpe’s strip club incident?” Ms. Hanson wrote.
Lidia Thorpe is a senator caught using racially charged, sexually explicit, abusive language outside a strip club, so how can the national broadcaster not report it on their website?
The ABC has reported similar incidents involving other politicians, but not Thorpe. Is she protected?
“This kind of biased failure is exactly why I proposed that the taxpayer-funded ABC should act in a fair and balanced way.
“The ABC should explain why they didn’t hold Thorpe accountable. If they can’t, then we should cut their money, let them stand on their own two feet and see if people are still interested in their biased reporting!’
Ms Hanson has also called for Ms Thorpe to be investigated by the police for her behavior and foul language.
She said she believes no one, including Ms Thorpe, is above the law and urged Victoria Police and the Australian Human Rights Commission to investigate whether action should be taken against her.
Sky News Australia presenter Chris Kenny labeled ABC’s lack of coverage of a major story involving a federal senator as ‘astonishing’.
“Many Australians won’t even know… if only you get your news from the ABC, the national taxpayer-funded broadcaster that is supposed to be inclusive and unbiased,” Mr Kenny said.
“If you were relying on them you wouldn’t know this episode, they just didn’t cover it, not on the TV news, not on their radio news, not online, they censored it from the public domain.”
“They told the story when she claimed to be the victim, but they didn’t report her latest grossly offensive display that earned her a lifetime ban from the strip club.”
One Nations leader Pauline Hanson (pictured) accused the ABC of ‘protecting’ Ms Thorpe by not reporting on the incident
Ms Hanson said in a Twitter post on Tuesday that the national broadcaster has not held Ms Thorpe accountable for her actions (pictured)
ABC’s flagship online platform, abc.net.au/news, still has no reports of Ms Thorpe’s conduct.
Daily Mail Australia contacted the ABC for comment.
The national broadcaster’s latest article about Ms Thorpe appeared last month when she was knocked to the ground by police after attempting to disrupt an anti-trans rights rally.
The former Greens politician was suspended for life by the Melbourne strip club early Sunday morning for her behaviour.
In an official letter – seen by Daily Mail Australia – Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club told Ms Thorpe she was ‘no longer welcome’ and warned the senator not to ’embarrass any further’.
Footage of the incident, filmed by a witness and first published by 7News, shows Senator Thorpe pointing her finger at the men in a heated argument.
At one point, Senator Thorpe walks up to one of the men and says in a menacing tone, “you, you’re marked.”
One of them calls her a ‘racist dog’ to which she responds ‘f*** you’ before a friend stops her.’
She tells the men, “All I want to say to the black brothers out there and to everyone we fight…
“Any black man standing by that f***ing white little c*** like that – you (sic) can all get fucked too!”
One of the men asks, “How the hell does someone like you get into parliament?”
She hits back: “We’ve been oppressed all our lives in this country and you let this dog talk…”