Apart from excitement of Origin I have been pretty quiet on
Twitter this week. The blood sport that has been our
politics has been particularly unedifying and to be perfectly
frank, has depressed the hell out of me. I don’t mean the
fanbois type cheering of Rudd vs Gillard camps, or the glee of
LNP supporters, I mean the fact that what has occurred is the
culmination of 3 years of reality TV style politics that as a
student of History, I am pretty sure is going to be looked back
on as a shameful period in Australian Political AND Social
History.
When I was young, maybe 11 or 12 there was a bit of a mini drama
where I lived in regard to the ‘wogs taking over all the fruit
& veg stores’, now, I went to a school with quite a few
Italians, Greeks, Yugoslavs etc., and did not quite ‘get’ what
the big deal was. I came home one afternoon and directly
hit up the fount of all knowledge, my grandad.
Needless to say, having been in World War II, working on the
Railways most of his life and being like a lot of his generation,
maybe not well educated, but well read, a very interesting
conversation ensured. Basically he instructed me on the
shameful period of Australian society & politics called the
“White Australia Policy” and it’s lingering affects, as a
'modern' kid I was horrified. I found it truly hard to
believe that Australians supported & thought that was a good
idea. I arrogantly stated, “thank god we are smarter than
that now”.
Reflecting back on that conversation,
nearly 3 decades ago now, looking at what has happened during the
43rd Australian Parliament all I can surmise is that we as a
nation have learned nothing from our history. In fact have
a lot to be ashamed of.
I don’t know if the Gillard overturning Rudd came as a surprise
to the Journo’s and they could not get past being filthy about
missing out on that? Whatever it was, from dot it was
inferred that something shocking had happened to this nation, we
lost our elected Prime Minister, this theme continued
verbatim. Seriously? Anyone who had been a journo for 5
minutes could tell you how many leaders have lost a party room
ballot in the past 20 years alone? It is utter rot and was
never the big deal it was made out to be. So I can only
assume it was because they were caught on the hop & shock of
all shocks, it was a woman. I won’t even go into the way Ms
Gillard has been treated since becoming our first female Prime
Minister. Many good articles, and by good, I don’t mean
News Limited Deathstar articles, look at the shocking treatment
that this PM has received. This tone that was set very
early in the day, has ‘allowed’ the likes of Mr Abbott and
others to somehow pour personal insult on this woman and
for it to be acceptable public discourse? How do you think
that Historians will view that in 20 years? What will our
daughters & granddaughters think of that?
To the horror of the media Mr Abbott didn’t win the
election. Quite frankly that was not in the accepted game
plan. Worse, it was a “Hung Parliament” AND the nasty
red-headed upstart proved to be a better negotiator than the
anointed heir apparent. I highlighted the word “Hung
Parliament” as the use of this term has been used by Mr Abbott
& the media consistently to infer a sense of disarray,
instability etc. in our Government. If you have not
viewed the below I suggest you do, a lot of commonsense in regard
to the "denigration of the Parliament"!
“Speaker Anna Burke reflects on 43rd
Parliament”
Fact is, as the media well know, once the deals are done it is
just “plain Parliament”. It may be a
minority, it may mean that true democratic process has to occur
in dealing with minor parties, independents and the like, BUT it
is 'PARLIAMENT'. It is not Hung, it is not
unstable, we don’t have tanks in the bloody streets (and yes I
mean blood letting) and we sure as hell don’t have an unstable
nation while politicians bicker for 3 months to even form a
Government as happens in many nations. Yet, we have had
this constant inference of chaos, which in turn is presented to
the Australian public as fact. This has probably been one
of the most reprehensible results of the past 3 years. We
as a nation should have been proud that we have a strong
democratic system, that we have a Parliamentary system that would
be envied in many a foreign country.
You only have to read the foreign papers covering recent days to
see the stark difference in reporting: New York
Times - Australian Prime Minister Is Ousted by
Party Rival "She also faced a relentless political
opposition that worked hard to deny her the accolades a different
leader with a similarly wide range of legislative accomplishments
might have received." Unlike our media, they honestly
include the nasty side of politics in their wrap up, including
mention of the famous misogyny speech AND how "Mr.
Abbott had appeared at rallies alongside vulgar and sexist
placards calling Ms. Gillard a liar, and worse."
OR Japan Today - Rudd ousts Gillard in Australian
leadership ballot "Since assuming power, Australia’s
first female prime minister endured near-constant speculation
about her leadership."
Speaking of the dreaded foreigners, I would like to go into the
Asylum seeker issue, but really, too depressed, as that is
another flogging to nowhere. The beat-up that just keeps
giving. If you believe the polls, that is the biggest issue
we have in this country. All I will say is, yeay sure!
How many in this nation actually know, hell how many have
even met an Asylum seeker? If we had responsible reporting
this scare mongering would have been nipped in the bud years ago,
another period of our history that is yet to finish, but will be
looked back upon with disgust.
Now don’t get me wrong here. I am actually one of the few
on Twitter who despise the derogatory all encompassing term of
MSM (Mainstream Media). Apart from the ultra conservative
News Ltd Deathstar talking heads, the majority of ‘reporters’
that we actually read & see on TV are decent, hard working
Journalists. My ire is directed at the Editors of the
papers & the Producers of the Political Affairs we see on TV,
don't even get me started on the sub-editing done overseas
because it's cheaper. The rise of Reality TV and it’s sound
bite, manufactured ‘personality’ rubbish has infected our ‘news’
cycle as well. Therefore these people in charge of
disseminating the news are driven by ratings & ad revenue
clicks, not honestly informing the public of
matters of importance as should be their primary
mandate. By the way, can anyone explain to me what the
license obligations are of being an official News outlet?
I am sure there are many issues that will be raised by
journalists with producers or papers that would be of national
concern, yet can see the top bloke (face it, normally a guy),
saying “Yeah yeah, that is a constitutional concern, but
sorry, Border Protection is the go at the moment, shitload of
clicks on those pages, come back to me with a few choice quotes
from Scott Morrison and we might have a goer, actually if you can
get a seriously inflammatory quote from the nutter, might even
give you front page”... This has resulted in a
lack of real news, lack of information disseminated to the public
and sadly the lack of investigative journalism we used to have
many years ago. Like our politics, short-term 'popularity'
all hype and no substance, is more important in today's
media.
So even in the dying days of this term of Parliament, when the
media and nation should be reflecting on what has been achieved,
how wonderful it was that we had finally had a female Prime
Minister, how robust our system of Government is, and looking
forward now to an election and what ALL* the candidates and
parties have to offer, what do they all plan for this nation
etc.,? Instead, on a historical day in this nations history
we get this grubby reporting from columnist Ms Miranda Devine
which is not only poor form, but a breach of the media rules in
Parliament “4.6 if you want to look it up” with
an invasion of privacy with this photo "Former prime minister Julia Gillard
kicks back with a cup of coffee after Rudd takes her
job".
Sadly the system is stacked against the public actually doing
anything about what you think is wrong. Mistakes like Ms
Devines above are actually rare. In fact, the reporting
with slanted connotations, lack of full information, innuendo
etc., is all legal. Technically. That is the biggest
problem, it allows those in power to shape the news to our
detriment. The below is a perfect example. David
Speers is actually the head honcho of the Press Gallery, yet note
the use of “...again”, like Mr Rudd has
been accusing Mr Abbott of negativity for 3 years, seriously, the
bloke had only been back in the job for 10 mins...
Now if Mr Speers had chosen to tweet “Mr Abbott calls for an election... again” that would have been a better use of the “OMG how many times do we need to hear this old chestnut again” connotation. I for one would love a buck for everytime that line has been trotted out. But hey, can’t scare the people & keep up the ‘unstable’ Government narrative unless Mr Abbott can repeat that verbatim in the newspapers and on our TV screens nightly?Rudd attacks Abbott for negativity...again
— David Speers (@David_Speers) June 27, 2013
Do we really want to live in an Australia where Malcolm Farr's point 10 in "10 things Kevin Rudd will do differently to Julia Gillard" is not a reflection on the calibre of his writing, is instead a sad, yet valid reflection on what too many Australians think, even if they don't want to admit it?
Take a 'normal' family to The Lodge. The residents will be a church-going married couple and the PM's spouse will have a full-time job, to the satisfaction of voters who objected to Ms Gillard's domestic arrangements.
For anyone who is thinking I am being ‘precious’ about the state of our media, the reporting standards, and the sheer ‘base’ attitude of this nation – as face it, unless there was a market for this hyped up reality style reporting we would not be getting it, which is even sadder – I will leave you with the following tweet with the top 3 articles in the Age today. Classy, still kicking the ex Prime Minister, even while she is down AND still no real reporting or policy in sight AND sadly, this is a Fairfax publication, not even the dreaded News Ltd that we would expect this from...
No cheers today, just sad reflection and a quiet hope that many in this nation, both in public life and privately also reflect on the past 3 years with an open mind and endeavour to be better human beings so we can have a better Australia, not the rabid racist, homophobic, sexist and truly ugly one we currently have.really awesome that the Age can concentrate on policy now that Gillard’s gone pic.twitter.com/slToBaG0Xn
— Scott Bridges (@s_bridges) June 27, 2013
Regards,
Noely
PS. Plea to media, would be nice if we could go old-school for a change... *We have more than 2 parties in this country, know it spreads you a bit thin, but if you could ask your bosses if you could cover more than 2 party preferred crap, that would really be a service to the Australian Public.
**Meme at top of page courtesy of "Exposing Tony Abbott & The LNP Memes & Stuff"
