Freedom of (worthy) opinion and the OLO

The reason for this was that very few, if any, reporters had a by-line (that is, to be allowed to attach their name to an article or be identified in a radio report as being by them). Even then, they had to be a respected, highly trusted, impartial reporter. Political opinion was always reserved to the editor.

Today, every bushy-tailed kid from the copy room seems to be a journalist and a commentator and is able to express an opinion on anything they report. (The ABC has over 1,000 journalists and no editor.)

The advent of guru-style political commentary in relation to social and current affairs, began on radio in the mid-1950s and later moved on to television.  It was introduced by a multi-media personality called Eric Baume who, with a bombastic manner similar to present-day shock-jocks that drowns out any argument or dissent others may have, began a segment on radio 2GB called “This, I believe” and then took it to Channel 7 in 1956.

That kind of ‘in-your-face’ commentary now demands to be listened to, and to influence, and to call into question and attendance for ‘cross-examination’ (without regard to the rules of evidence), political leaders and decision-makers with one purpose only: the hope of scoring off them and making them appear foolish, and to press upon them and the public the interviewer’s own opinion on whatever the subject may be. It’s a situation that politicians have been forced to endure in order to balance out the mis-information and often the sensationalised aspects of particular issues drummed up by the media as the day’s ‘big story’.

Even more disruptive of the formulation of sensible, well considered public opinion has been the advent of talk-back radio, once illegal, now 56 years old, which has become the most ill-informed and insidiously influencing public opinion-making medium.

Today, the news involving political and current affairs issues is not presented to us on the basis of ‘here’s the unvarnished facts for you to think about’. No, it comes to you as ‘here’s what you should know and here’s what you should believe. Now don’t argue. I’m telling you what it means. I’m a journalist’.

One has to ask: Who gave these news-gatherers the special mission of interpreting the facts relating to particular public issues, let alone being self-appointed to represent the public in advocating and dictating to government and others, how those issues should be addressed and resolved?

We live in uneasy times. With a self-made buffoon running the World’s most powerful nation and with the “utopia of triumphant individualism”, as referred to by Richard Tomkins in a significant  article published in the first edition of OLO, going nowhere twenty years on, there is more than ever a need for the publication of serious, well informed articles that bring to notice worthy opinions and concerns relevant to political and community affairs.

I join in congratulating the Editor, Graham Young and the Editorial Board of OLO on their outstanding achievement over the past twenty years and wish them well for the Journal’s continued success.