Should the Israeli national flag be banned in Australia if flags of the terrorist organization Hezbollah are banned?
Is it ‘hypocrisy’ not to apply such a ban to both?
These patently absurd questions – rooted in false equivalence – came from an ABC reporter, addressed yesterday to Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.
That’s right, they were asked by a journalist who worked for the taxpayer-funded public broadcaster, and not some fringe radical new media operation concerned with running on behalf of the anti-Israel forces in the Middle East.
Dutton was quick to highlight the absurdity of what he was being asked, noting that it made it clear to him that “the ABC is in bigger trouble than even I initially thought.”
That’s for sure, but not just because of the questions being asked.
The response from ABC management was perhaps even worse.
Asking the questions, however worded, is a direct criticism of new ABC chairman Kim Williams, who has called for an end to activism among his journalists.
Does management support the ABC chairman’s demands?
ABC News director Justin Stevens declined to comment directly on the questioning, The Australian reported.
Shortly afterwards, a lame, self-justifying statement was issued by ABC’s spin unit: “Questions at a press conference [yesterday] was not reporting nor a position taken by the ABC,” the statement said.
Talk about a lily-like reaction. Whoever wrote it should go into politics. One wonders if Williams agrees with the confusing sentiment behind it.
Or when he agrees that his news director seemingly lets the line of questioning pass him by.
The ABC’s chief executive, David Anderson, admitted he still hadn’t bothered to watch the exchange the day after it happened – and gave him the outing he presumably wanted when asked about it.
This is the ABC we’re talking about, remember. The intention is that the public broadcaster, in the practice of its journalism, should be above campaigning and scoring polemical points.
But apparently ABC journalists can ask questions – at a press conference that is broadcast live and in full – without this being part of their reporting.
If someone at the ABC wants to participate in left-wing activism, they should join The Guardian, for example.
Private media organizations are largely free to do what they want, unlike public broadcasters, which have different responsibilities.
If a place like The Guardian isn’t activist enough, moving to a think tank like The Australia Institute is always an option.
There are plenty of places to go if the intention is to run polemical lines in support of your cause of the day.
But to do this at the taxpayer-funded broadcaster is both wrong and contrary to the edict issued by the President.
Even if it apparently doesn’t bother the network’s leaders.
Protests in Melbourne following the death of Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon
The problem is that the tail is wagging the dog at ABC. The culture is bottom-up, with the inmates running the shelter.
And high-profile journalists are among the worst offenders, as we have seen all too clearly in recent months.
As ABC management had to admit during Senate hearings on public broadcasting.
So it is not surprising that this activist attitude also infects younger reporters who are tasked with asking direct questions at press conferences.
They see what the top “talent” within the organization does – and gets away with – and learns those bad habits for their own reporting.
It is even suggested that the question asked was asked by one of these senior ABC journalists, which helps explain why management has acted so flippantly. The reporter who asked the question read from her phone.
Short of a massive clean-up at the ABC, it’s difficult to know how to fix the culturally ingrained biases within the institution.
But that’s never going to happen.