WE all know that the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is the main source of news and information for many Australians. The ABC is funded and owned by the government, but the ABC is apparently editorially independent as a consequence of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983.
So, who is the ABC accountable to? Certainly not to you or me.
The ABC, for all practical purposes, is exempt from the normal scrutiny that can be applied to government-funded institutions and departments. In particular the ABC’s programming material is exempt from Freedom of Information Requests [1].
So, the ABC can deploy its staff to spend hours and hours phoning people about me, asking the most intimate and bizarre questions and volunteering information to the same people that has no basis in fact. What can I do about it? Absolutely nothing.
Last week the ABC phoned around to get snips of fact about me that it could intertwine with lies with a plan for a national broadcast Monday night on its Media Watch program. I tried to head-that-off with full and frank answers to the many questions they asked me [2]. Indeed I provided them with a lot of information that was none of their business.
But not content with all of that, this week ABC journalists and researchers continue with the same activity; they continue to phone about. And from the feedback I have received from those the ABC has phoned: they continue to peddle misinformation about me, and misinformation about the natural history of the Murray River.
These activities are undertaken at tax payer expense, but there is no way I can find out who specifically they are phoning, or what specifically they are telling people. [3]
Questions need to be asked in the Australian Parliament about this exemption and about the ABCs continual harassment of me for daring to suggest that it is in the national interest for the Murray River’s estuary to be restored – for the 7.6 kilometres of concrete sea dyke to be removed from the bottom of the Murray Darling basin. [4]
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[1] ABC FOI – You can’t open the chamber of secrets
http://abcnewswatch.blogspot.com.au/2010/02/abc-foi-you-cant-open-chamber-of.html
“For those considering an FOI request to the ABC for program related material, such as internal correspondence that might provide an insight into the way errors get into the ABC’s editorial process, beware of a clause in the FOI act that lists the ABC as an exempt agency with respect to documents “in relation to its program material and datacasting content” (Part II of schedule 2)…
“ABC cite ABC v University of Technology Sydney in relationship to this and from the ruling it seems the only way to open the vault is for the FOI ACT to be amended to allow access to ABC documents.”
[2] Media Watch Under Scrutiny
http://jennifermarohasy.com/2012/03/media-watch-under-scrutiny-2/
[3] Most government organisations are covered by a set of generally applicable exemptions many of which require a balancing of public interest. The ABC, however, could assign 10 people to research me and my activities and there would be nothing I could do about it or find out about it.
[4] Podcast available at the Sydney Institute http://www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au/speaker/jennifer-marohasy/
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Be confident, Jen. These people are angry, weak conformists. As their flimsily held ideals fall away with time, they have little but their status and money obsessions, and even those are of a paltry, whiny sort.
They won’t lay a glove on you.
Jennifer,
Continue doing what is right. Do not let these government workers posing as journalists intimidate you. This is another example of why government owned media and free media cannot co-exist. And, sadly, it is an example of why governments are so reluctant to force media to stand on its own.
I wrote that first comment as a disgusted reaction to a smug, insulated media machine attacking a hard-working, risk-taking individual. Looked at again, the comment was too harsh, and inclined to alienate rather than persuade.
So, if any ABC people are following this blog, redeem yourselves, challenge yourselves, break the mold. You’ve been loaded up with a lot of sclerotic notions and beliefs from the sixties. Nobody’s been checking use-by dates. Your stock is old, your air is stale. Are you game to open a window?
I’ll be happy to be proven wrong about you.
Monday on ABC radio news- ” The floodwaters which have been threatening towns in NSW have now moved to Victoria and are threatening the town of Barmah, in the State’s North ”
– Deep knowledge base there. Where’s Media Watch ?
On another level, Media Watch can be tipped off about stories from their webpage and I smell a Green push.
Ian,
You expect that the ABC would understand that the Murray River straddles the NSW and Victorian border!
Wrong.
What are the chances of the Murray being better managed in the interests of all when the GW scam is also so demonstrably riven with activists scientists and outright shonks peddling their untruths..with their manipulated science, and biases from second rate scientists… when they are also well known activists and advisers to WWF etc.
The ABC is so leftist, it is just protecting the arses of these self same activists and giving them free kicks at every available opportunity.
I stopped watching Q&A and Media Watch yonks ago and by all accounts neither have improved since.
The whole lot should be metaphorically towed out to sea and dumped …not just Gillard.
http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2012/03/13/the-authoritarian-impulse-and-climate-change/
The next thing to watch is the increasing way in which Professional Institutions have also been captured by the self same activists and leftoids types …such that some cant even hold democratic elections that comply with normal principles, of what constitutes a democracy.
One known to me failed 3/5 principles.
The abc is more of a national disgrace than a national broadcaster. Name one major prime time program shown on the abc over the last 30 years that had a well known conservative presenter fronting the program and name a program that had a definite conservative bias or content over that long period. Guess what they don’t exist.
Yet this is supposed to be our abc but of course is really their abc, promoting the Greens, Labor and any other allied group of lefties that need exposure.
Fairfax media at least is not publicly funded but the abc only exists because it is funded by all Aussies through their taxation.
The simple answer is that the abc must present fully the liberal conservative point of view as often as it presents the labor green totalitarian side. This does not happen at all. Programing should reflect the total Aussie point of view and that means truly conservative presenters and content 50% of the time.
This doesn’t exist at all at the moment and hasn’t existed for decades. Just how bizarre it is that this labor green propaganda machine exists and is totally funded by the Aussie taxpayer, decade after decade and always pushing and always promoting the left side of politics.
I sent Jonathan Holmes the Matt Ridley’s Angus Millar lecture to the Royal Society in Edinburgh a couple of months ago as an example of how the ABC should approach science reporting. An excerpt from his mild reply to this great lecture still shows the entrenched ABC philosophy:
“I agree with you that if it turns out that the ‘consensus’ is wrong, that climate science is pseudoscience, then the scientists will be principally to blame but that part of the media (including the ABC) which has been ‘compliant’ will not be blameless. However, what should be the position of those in the media (from The Australian to Andrew Bolt and Alan Jones) who have helped to transform the climate of popular opinion to the point where real progress in reducing emissions, here or elsewhere, is getting hard and harder, if the ‘consensus’ turns out to be correct?
I don’t think this is a simple issue. What has most depressed me about it, I confess, is the extent to which people’s views about climate science can be predicted by their political positions. (I don’t believe this is the case for scientists – I’m talking about non-specialists). The science you ‘believe’ follows from your political views; it has almost nothing to do with the science itself.”
What a very limited view these people have. They obviously do not investigate the science for themselves but are so prepared to take up the cudgells against anyone who does and comes to a different conclusion.
Sorry, that link above should be this one:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/the_abc_of_burying_mistakes/
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[Spangled, I’ve removed the earlier link and will add the text from this one
Marc Hendrickx on the ABC’s astonishing complaints procedure – a farce that the Finkelstein inquiry somehow overlooked:
For example, a recent report on ABC radio’s AM program erroneously claimed that South Australia had experienced the hottest start to summer in 100 years. There was no basis for the sensationalist statement. It took 58 days to settle, with action taken only after I submitted an analysis of SA weather stations along with news reports from January 1960 when temperatures were higher…
In June 2010, the ABC claimed that “Studies show temperatures are rising faster at Mount Everest than in the rest of South Asia”.
When challenged on the source of the studies, the ABC took two months to point to a table in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report. However, the table showed that temperatures were rising faster in another region of South Asia…. It took three months for the ABC to publish a correction.
In July last year, the ABC’s Background Briefing broadcast The Lord Monckton Roadshow. ABC reporter Wendy Carlisle claimed that Christopher Monckton misrepresented the science of climate change, providing two examples… It took the ABC 51 days to put together a reply that refused to acknowledge basic factual errors in the program were made. I wasn’t satisfied, and the matter has been with the Australian Communications and Media Authority since last September.
Looking over the ABC’s website, the past 20 upheld complaints took an average of 58 days to go from broadcast to posting on the ABC website. The last 20 corrections listed on the ABC News corrections web page took an average of 21 days from broadcast to listing.
Jen]
Yes Jen, I’ve got a long file of complaints to the ABC but they just wear me down.
They just wanna be like their big brother:
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/03/richard-black-the-fastest-apologist-for-misbehaving-scientists/
If only it were this sybil:
ALERTS TO THREATS IN 2012 EUROPE : BY JOHN CLEESE
The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent events in Libya, Egypt and Syria and have therefore raised their security level from “Miffed” to “Peeved.” Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to “Irritated” or even “A Bit Cross.”The English have not been “A Bit Cross” since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies nearly ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorized from “Tiresome” to “A Bloody Nuisance.” The last time the British issued a “Bloody Nuisance” warning level was in 1588, when threatened by the Spanish Armada.
The Scots have raised their threat level from “Pissed Off” to “Let’s get the Bastards.” They don’t have any other levels. This is the reason they have been used on the front line of the British army for the last 300 years.
The French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from “Run” to “Hide.” The only two higher levels in France are “Collaborate” and “Surrender.” The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France ‘s white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country’s military capability.
Italy has increased the alert level from “Shout Loudly and Excitedly” to “Elaborate Military Posturing.” Two more levels remain: “Ineffective Combat Operations” and “Change Sides.”
The Germans have increased their alert state from “Disdainful Arrogance” to “Dress in Uniforms and Sing Marching Songs.” They also have two higher levels: “Invade a Neighbour” and “Lose.”
Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual; the only threat they are worried about is NATO pulling out of Brussels .
The Spanish are all excited to see their new submarines ready to deploy. These beautifully designed subs have glass bottoms so the new Spanish navy can get a really good look at the old Spanish navy.
Australia ,meanwhile, has raised its security level from “No worries” to “She’ll be alright, Mate.” Two more escalation levels remain: “Crikey! I think we’ll need to cancel the barbie this weekend!” and “The barbie is cancelled.” So far no situation has ever warranted use of the final escalation level.
John Cleese – British writer, actor and tall person
A final thought -“Greece is collapsing, the Iranians are getting aggressive, and Rome is in disarray. Welcome back to 430 BC”.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-14/temperatures-may-rise-5-degrees-by-2070/3887672
More selective reporting by the ABC and selective science by the CSIRO.
One cannot help but laugh at the fact that whilst they beat up the drama of it all by saying what the temperature increases have been to date…
..no where do they say what our idiot carbon tax will do to reduce the temperature in the future.
We all know that it will have NO measurable effect what so ever, as in None- Zero – Zip ..and we dont need some second rate Phd and pompous title to work that out.
What is so comtemptible is the way they treat the tax payers… as though we as moronic as they are.
What an absolute disgrace
so 210mm sea level rise since 1880 – that 1.59mm per year or 143.1mm by 2100 – that’s less than 6″.
They also incorrectly state that global temperature continue to rise – they haven’t.
These guys are a joke.
Hi Jennifer,
Long time, no read! I’ve mentioned one of your quotes in two of my articles at hubpagesdotcom. It’ll probably help the article scores and SEO ratings the if each contains a picture of you. (Google loves pictures!)
Being a lazy bloke, I usually get pics from Wikipedia. That way, there are no worries about copyright issues. However the Wiki article did not have your photo. Is it OK to use a picture from this blog or from mythandthemurray? If yes, you may even want to pick the most suitable photo.
The first article is a generic, old-news polemic about AGW. Come to think of it, the most recent one is generic too, but it may prove to be educational for New Age buffs. Here’s a link.
http://larryfields.hubpages.com/hub/The-Scare-of-the-Month-Club-and-Evil-Chemicals
Sorry for being off-topic, but I still haven’t figured out how to escape email jail, and reach your email address in the Land of Oz.
Regards,
Larry Fields
MfT, here is a precis of that report which was an absolute travesty of “our” ABC’s mandate for even handed reporting.
An ex-CSIRO mate sent me the PDF yesterday and it is just cherry-picked exaggeration.
http://www.prodocom.com.au/html/actions/viewonline.php?ID=282788&cc=&loc=783a5c372d31315c74656d705c6175637369726f6d6f7267616e6875775c68746d6c656d61696c5c3238323738385c3836313934345c6174746163685c&email=gjfisher@westnet.com.au
I had to tell him to read this and get educated:
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/03/climate-coup-the-politics/
This is all over the ABC today. The blurb states:
“It is very likely that most of the surface global warming observed since the mid 20th century is due to anthropogenic increases in greenhouse gases.”
But they refuse to look just a decade earlier:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1909/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1909/to:1943/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1977/to:1998/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1998/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1943/to:1977/trend
Hi Larry
Thanks for the support. Some pictures if you scroll to the bottom here: http://jennifermarohasy.com/about/
Cheers,
The Commonwealth Freedom of Information regime is not as useful as it might appear, even without the additional fence built around the ABC as a special case.
Many of the exemptions available to governmet departments and agencies are designed so that they depend on where the “public interest” lies in deciding whether to release information.
The problem is that the agencies themselves decide where the public interest lies and substitute “government department interest” for “public interest”
Even if you try to go outside to the Information Commissioner they really are a slow, weak and indecisive bunch that seem to very reluctant to intervene, especially when it comes to the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency.
As with the ABC, its all an illusion. They want the appearance of fairness and openess, but the reality is that both the ABC and the FoI regime are funded by and controlled by those in power.
Well I never
The cretins have taken the page down
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-14/temperatures-may-rise-5-degrees-by-2070/3887672
Jen,
well done so far. But they won’t stop; they never do.
Can you
— share the name of the researcher who is making these calls and sending you arrogant, contemptuous notes? It would be interesting to background that individual as thoroughly as he/she is attempting to “profile” you
— the people they are contacting and to whom they are “volunteering information that has no basis in fact”, are they prepared to go on the record? If so, you may have a defo action — and a nice payout
Seriously, the ABC in general, and General Smug of Media Watch in particular, need to be taken down a peg or two. They appear to be leading with their chin, so why not smash it.
MfT, it’s still there and as “Grim” as ever. It would never occur to Connor Duffy to ask those Govt scientists a simple question like: If CO2 is at an all time high how come it correlates so poorly with temp rise either in recent or long term analysis.
It’s now 390 ppm at Cape Grim. Wow!
I thought it had been that for the last couple of years. Does that mean that the cooler oceans have stopped outgassing and are taking up or is that carbon tax starting to work?
Hi Jen,
The odd thing about Media Watch is that they have no scientific expertise whatsoever and are in no position to judge any science. Why is the debate about the lower Murray of interest to Media Watch. I could understand say Catalyst being interested in your scientific opinion but a program that examines the media, WTF?
As you point out unfortunately the real reason behind their interest is hidden behind the high wall of a FOI exemption.
Best Wishes
Marc
Media Watch is supposed to watch the media.
So where does Jen’s scientific observations fit into their breif?
In regard to the CSIRO/BOM State of Climate report part duex which has garnered the usual swooning adoration from the fairfax/abc 2-headed, no-brain monster, this may help:
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/csiro-and-bom-state-of-climate-report.html
Jen, if the ABC continues to harrass you, you should definately consult an aggressive lawyer. You might contact Michael Kroger of Janet Albrechtson, both of whom have been on the board, and both of whom are lawyers. They might be able to point you in the right direction. If the cost is a bit steep, I am sure that if the hat was passed around a tidy sum could be raised to help fund the lawyers.
Its Their ABC. Not mine.
http://www.cafepress.com.au/+green-bias-abc+t-shirts
Jennifer,
Have you still got a donation button?
Of course its no accident that the ABC and the CSIRO come out with their latest load of codswallop in the same week, if not the day, that the leader of the shop stewards collective were not releasing her carbon tax, for debate in parliament.
The blatant manipulation by the ABC and the CSIRO tells you a lot as to what they think of readers and tax payers
One wouldnt mind it if they were not so obviously biased and yes, dishonest, in that they dont tell the full story ..namely that even if the Co2 is the highest for yonks, there is nothing we can do about it, that will make a tot of difference to the Global temperature.
Hunter
Paypal won’t let me have a donation button, apparently I’m not a charity. At least they will not let me collect the money that you might donate.
Strange. What about for blegging purposes, or sale of trinkets? Did you get the money donated back in the day when there was a button?
Hey Jen what about using a tip jar like Jo Nova has – check hers out – I know it works
Australian Climate Madness has a ‘big oil’ tip jar with a ‘donate’ button http://www.australianclimatemadness.com/
I have a PayPal donate button on my site Jennifer and I’m not a charity. I don’t receive much from it but some of my international clients prefer to pay me directly via it instead of wire transfer.
Marc, congrats on your oped in the Australian about the complaints process at the ABC here:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/press-and-abc-polar-opposites-in-complaints-arena/story-e6frgd0x-1226298595034
I can confirm this; when the Steig paper on Antarctic warming came out in 2009 the ABC naturally gave it prominent attention but gave none to the rebuttals of this dreadful paper or subsequent revelations that Steig was one of the reviewers of the paper by O’Donnell et al which rebutted his paper a run at all:
http://climateaudit.org/2011/02/13/steig-and-the-knuckleheaded-reviewers/
When a complaint was made the argument from the ABCwhich came back after some months was that the peer review system was the benchmark which they adhered to. It really is a circular argument which is corrupt to its core. It is not just the ABC which needs a good flushing but the peer review system as well.
Hunter,
I grabbed the money when they notified me there was a problem/I needed to answer lots of questions. During a moratorium. Now the account, with no money in it, is frozen.
PS I’ve been told paypal wants evidence of charity status though I understand that is not a lawful demand.
Jennifer,
That is an interesting situation irt paypal.
That famous British thinker and public figure Malcolm Muggeridge once told our equally well-known Aussie ABC Journalist James (?) (forgot again…!!)
that..”The Media are basically destructive…” Our man quickly asked.. “Present company excepted…”? ….but was curtly told, “If the cap fits, wear it…!!”
I cannot help but agree, however my limited experience in this area has shown me that if the interviewee can rise to the occasion and be seen as capable of debunking and refuting the slanders and untruths thrown at them during the interview, then even the most distressing on-air grilling can be turned into a positive experience.
It seems to me that the media person is affording an opportunity for the interviewee to make a thunderingly good case against all accusations which can be thrown at him/her.
While this may not appear obvious at first, the interviewed person should be ready and schooled to jump at this chance as a large audience can sometimes be reached in this way, and innumerable valuable points may be unexpectedly scored off their unwary protagonist.
If Jennifer (Give ’em hell, Jen.!) and so many others can keep this in mind, positive debating points will be earned and possibly hearts and minds will be won.
But as James Delingpole says, these debates and their protagonists are being left in the wake of more serious business as Carbon Taxes, Wealth Initiatives and Sustainability Issues overwhelm those who cannot see the wave of politico-economic change, sweeping over and past them, day by day. Carbon Debating is a backwater of today; interesting but too late.
Malcolm Muggeridge did have some strange ideas.
He was contemptuous of fellow countrymen the Beatles. In a 1968 article in Esquire magazine, he called them “four vacant youths… dummy figures with tousled heads (and) no talent.”