The debasement of public debate

The worst offenders in this debasement of public debate are quickest to denigrate their critics. Alan Jones, criticised by the ABC's Media Watch over years (they broke the cash for comment affair), recently labeled these critics as 'losers' and 'just nasty small minded people on the ABC.' He defended his right to ignore criticism by stating:

It's called the Alan Jones show. Much of my stuff is opinion. I'm a broadcaster. I don't pretend to be a journalist and I don't know what that means anyway – they've got a certificate or something. If those opinions lack validity or if those opinions are extreme or if they are overly provocative, they won't listen. I've stood the test of time.

This is deviously deceptive, to say the least. But Jones seems immune from both commercial radio regulations and any sense of responsibility.

In the wake of Anders Breivik's atrocity in Norway, and comments on his admiration for named Australian conservatives, even Gerard Henderson opined that 'Right-wing extremism forces rethink on civil liberties.' He wrote that there was 'room for a thoughtful discussion' about major issues from all perspectives, but concluded with a mealy-mouthed defence of the current tactics of public debate:

There is an obligation on all involved in the public debate to moderate their language, to desist from exaggeration and to disavow symbolic or real physical violence. However, mass murder in Norway should not be allowed to inhibit free speech. That would be counter-productive.'

As is his wont, Mike Carlton went straight to the point with the statement: 'Curb the hate mongers, for all our sakes.' Commenting on the ways in which Anders Breivik's 1500-page diatribe reflected admiration for all sorts of 'heroes of the political right', including some Australians (Howard, Costello, Pell and Windschuttle), Carlton wrote of Breivik:

His words and actions were a seamless, linear progression of right-wing rage and loathing. At one end, you start with the anger and paranoia fomented by rightist politicians, demagogues and commentators for their own cynical political ends, the bigotry and racism that is daily grist to the talkback radio mill.

At the other end is a clear-eyed fanatic with tonnes of fertiliser, automatic weapons and an ubermensch mission to save the world. The dots join up.

Carlton went on to point out: 'The temperature of hatred has been rising in Australia for most of this year. Lately we've reached critical mass, with public calls for the murder of Julia Gillard and senior ministers.' A list of contributors to this culture of vituperation include Joe Hockey, Murdoch's Herald Sun, Alan Jones (a serial offender), Brian Wilshire and Chris Smith. The last three are all broadcasters on 2GB, which regularly breaches both Australian hate speech laws and the Australian Communications and Media Authority's commercial radio Code of Practice. The very first clause of ACMA's commercial radio Code of Practice states: 'A licensee must not broadcast a program which, in all of the circumstances, is likely to incite, encourage or present for its own sake violence or brutality.'

That clause then says 'there must be nothing likely to incite hatred against, or serious contempt for, or severe ridicule of, any person or group of persons because of age, ethnicity, nationality, race, gender, sexual preferences, religion, transgender status or disability.' But hatred, ridicule and contempt are standard right-wing weapons in politics and the media. Joe Hockey and Christopher Pyne act like schoolyard bullies (primary school, at that) by trailing Julia Gillard in the corridor and taunting her with derogatory songs and sledging. Allan Jones, when asked a question he didn't like at the Convoy rally in Canberra on 22 August, 'spluttered with rage and verbally abused' the female reporter, Jacqueline Maley, then took the microphone on the stage, named her, shouted abuse at her and incited the crowd to boo and jeer. She wrote: 'I then left because I feared for my safety.'

At the same rally, Jones and other key speakers loudly denounced the stopping of part of the truck convoy at the border, despite knowing in advance that it was simply not true. There is a bumper sticker on a few cars around Sydney at the moment, asking 'Is that the truth? Or did Alan Jones tell you?' There should be more of them. But the debasement of public debate is an issue that goes to the very heart of the workings of a democratic society. When significant sections of the media abuse the standards for their own ends, they are exercising the worst type of power. As Stanley Baldwin put it in 1931, criticizing the media barons of his day, they exercised 'Power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot through the ages.'