Tuesday 19th of March 2024

Myriad Mint's blog

Loosened cross-media ownership means more media bias – a tale from the 2004 election

It’s hard to find a better example of current problems of media bias & the implications of cross-media ownership than the case of the Herald Sun vs the Greens. This is not ‘news’ per se – it’s been covered for example in the minority non-Murdoch press. But as the Alan Ramsey article linked to below shows (read the last paragraph) , it's been a story attracting little interest overall, despite it's significance.

One of the most memorable media articles in the last Federal election was the Herald Sun spectacular "Greens Support Illegal Drugs" by Gerard McManus on August 31 2004. The article, loaded with emotive rhetoric, was an undisguised, virulent attack piece that made a plethora of damaging claims regarding Green Party policy. It was also almost entirely factually false.

The Democratic Audit of Australia

What could be more relevant to Your Democracy than the current ANU research program, the Democratic Audit of Australia? Running from 2002-2005, the aim of the audit in relation to Australian democracy is to:

"1) To make a major methodological contribution to the assessment of democracy...;

(2) To provide benchmarks for monitoring and international comparisons...; and

(3) To promote public debate over democratic issues—the Audit will contribute to a dialogue about the ways in which Australia’s democratic arrangements might be improved. With this in mind, the Program will over the next three years be communicating Audit findings through this web site and through discussion papers as well as through academic publishing."

Read on for more...

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