Dr.N.Padmanabhan (October 16); if you don’t like the ABC and prefer Newscorp, I think you’ve swallowed the Murdoch Kool Aid.
Look where this particular news source has got the USA: Fox News and one-sided political reporting, misinformation, division and chaos, lack of trust (and) democracy in tatters.
By contrast, as we confront COVID, where our national cohesion and self-discipline has been tested as never before in peacetime, the ABC has been doing what its legislated Charter requires: informing, educating and entertaining.
Its journalism must be of a high ethical standard and – to protect our democracy – it must hold authority to account without fear or favour.
Hence the ABC is an antidote to fake news.
You say the ABC is bloated – did you know it costs a commercial news outfit an equivalent amount to operate?
You’d rather the ABC’s budget was spent on struggling small businesses, the homeless and needy; well, it is.
For example, the Four Corners investigation into the banks led to a Royal Commission showing a litany of failures towards customers.
So, if customers receive justice and are no longer being cheated, they’re able to spend more money in small businesses and give to the homeless and needy.
In a scarily warming world, the ABC’s crowning achievement is its dogged determination to educate Australians on the facts of climate change.
Because if we don’t reduce our emissions, we will all be homeless and needy.
So how is all this “anticonservative, left leaning and overtly hostile”?
Instead, the hostility came from Murdoch’s outlets who blamed “arsonists” and “greenies” for last summer’s fires – a claim so untrue that a News Ltd senior manager resigned in disgust, and James Murdoch spoke out against the company.
This is not a conservative outfit – it’s a mis-information juggernaut.
Last time I looked, Kevin Rudd’s petition to the Parliament on the need for more media diversity in Australia has 225,000 odd signatures.
Lastly, your accusation that the ABC is “elitist” is a misuse of the word.
For Pete’s sake – you are of the elite – you’re a trained doctor.
Elite athletes are the only people who win football Grand Finals – are you going to sneer at them too?
Nobel Prize winners are elite scientists – Eddie Woo is an elite mathematics teacher.
They’ve worked hard to be good at what they do – why is the ABC any different just because it does what its legislated Charter requires it to do – and does it well?
The ABC is there for all of us in a crisis – even you.
Email, Oct 19
C. Moe, Bensville