JoNova » Three times as many Australians think the ABC has a pro-Labor bias

The ABC will declare that “most Australians don’t think the ABC is biased” but while half the nation thinks it’s balanced, 30% don’t know, and of the 20% who are sure there is bias, there are three times as many who think it’s pro-Labor as those who think it’s pro-Coalition.

Bear in mind ABC1 only has about 10% of the Australian audience, so 90% of the nation prefers to watch something else. Did the survey ask respondents if they watch the ABC? We might find that of the 20% of the population who are familiar with ABC coverage, most think it’s biased to the left. With some probing questions, we might also find that people of different political persuasions define bias very differently. Could it be that those more likely to vote for the Coalition tend to value free speech even if they don’t agree with the views?

On the other hand those more likely to vote Labor or Green seem to think balance means skeptics shouldn’t speak at all. Is their idea of bias just “if the ABC allows skeptics to comment”. The Centre for Independent Journalism had a whole forum devoted to asking whether “balance” meant they still had to report skeptical views. (The panel was made up of one ABC reporter, one Fairfax editor and three academics). The (Labor) Minister for Science, Kim Carr, said (referring to climate skeptics) “We don’t have to accord superstition and wishful thinking the same status as science.” Clive Hamilton, former Greens Candidate lamented that climate denial got any ABC coverage at all.

by: Nick Leys From: The Australian

“ONE in six Australians believe the ABC provides favourable coverage to the Labor Party while one in 20 believe the ABC is favourable towards the Coalition…”

The ABC will be patting itself on the back, but they have disenfranchised a large section of the Australian population.

This research of more than 1000 people shows that 15 per cent of the population believes the ABC’s coverage of the climate change debate leans in favor of climate change believers, a figure higher among Coalition voters of whom 29 per cent believe the ABC is biased on this issue.

Here’s the sleeper… if 83% of the population think the ABC’s coverage of climate change is not biased, imagine how much “upside” there is for anger and outrage to grow when 16 million Australians realize how the ABC has let them down, and fed them science-according-to-Greenpeace.

Of those 83%, how many don’t read any newspaper, or only get the Sydney Morning Herald or The Age? How would any of those people know they were being spoon-fed propaganda?

That’s why word of mouth is so important. Those who only see The Love Media won’t have any idea unless you give them a good natured jibe at the staff BBQ and inspire them to hunt on the web.

You could start by asking them if they know which corporations stand to make the most from a carbon market. Which media outlets and which voters would get that answer right?

“All voices are welcome?” As if.

Mr Scott (ABC managing director) said:

“… unlike some of our partisan competitors, all voices are welcome at the ABC,”

Which is why the ABC calls us deniers right? To make us feel welcome?

That’s why they hire activists to fish for dirt, launch petty ambushes based on misinformation, and let guests trash logic and reason, equate skeptics to pedophiles, mock skeptics for their illnesses (and get it wrong), mouthing opinions they’ve done no research to aquire, especially on the ABC Ad hominem Unleashed blog?

That’s why ABC “reporters” ask me how I am paid, but when I turn out to be a volunteer they don’t report it. If I had been paid by Chevron, would they have not-reported that? They’re fishing for dirt, hoping to catch skeptics out. If skeptics make a mistake it’ll be a headline, when they act as the Guardians of the scientific method, catching paid officials making mistakes, or asking questions that ABC journalists should be asking, the ABC doesn’t want to know.

It’s why the ABC goes out of it’s way to find out what the highest traffic skeptical blogger in Australia says by flying a team to her house, interviewing her for two hours, then leaving in just 18 fragmentary words which say nothing of any real content? (Read what the ABC left in, versus what it left out, see the un-cut video in full.)

About 50% of the Nation’s citizens are skeptical. Where are their voices on “Our” ABC?

As I will keep saying, it’s not that there is a problem with the media, it’s that the media IS the problem.

If we had a truly competitive free market on air, stupid ideas would not become National Policy with a $10 billion fund.

It’s inept groupthink, not a conspiracy

Gerard Henderson: “The essential criticism of the ABC is that it does not engage even one political conservative as a presenter or producer or editor on any of its prominent television or radio or online outlets. This despite Scott’s pledge, made over six years ago, that, under his management, a ”further diversity of voices” would be carried on the public broadcaster. It has not happened.

The ABC is replete with leftists or left-of-centre presenters/producers/editors. But it remains virtually a conservative-free zone. If ABC management is aware of conservatives to match the likes of Phillip Adams, Jonathan Holmes, Fran Kelly and others – then it should name names. Otherwise, it should cut the pretence.

There is no conspiracy at play here. It is a natural phenomenon that like-minded people tend to mix with, and engage, their own.”

Read more: The Age

Andrew Bolt discussed the “ABC-Fairfax-and-academic-journalists” policy of not giving skeptics any airtime, and asked in 2010:

“How broadly should this restriction on reporting sceptics be applied? Should it also include not reporting them when they point out failed predictions? The vested interests , sheer nuttiness, religious fervor, totalitarian tendency or extraordinary hypocrisy of some warmists?”

“All voices are welcome?” As if.

It’s inept groupthink, not a conspiracy

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