Our ABC, Dominated and Intimidated

This News Corp Narrative is an 'other' record of the performance of Australian media, and specifically the ABC, during the Gillard Years (2011-2013) It records how Australia's public broadcaster let Australians down by failing to provide fairness and balance, unable to resist the dominance and control News Corp had over narrative and agenda during those years. It explores the question of how the ABC became captive to the group think that vested interests intent on regime change imposed on Australian journalism. It is about the power to magnify a narrative of shortcomings, both real and fabricated and the power to silencing the narrative and evidence of successes. It gives a view of how a powerful propaganda machine could exploit sexism and misogyny and convince so many that the victim was the perpetrator. It raises questions about whether sexism and misogyny were on display in the inability of many Australians journalists to deal honourably with Australia's first female Prime Minister. It is about the Australian experience of the 'News Corping' of public broadcasting, a phenomenon of the takeover of the Fourth Estate. But it is readers who are invited pass judgment. Readers can judge for themselves whether this was a period of limited freedom of the press in Australia- not a freedom limited by draconian laws and ruthless enforcement- but a freedom limited by the dominance of one media organization prepared to use its control of the fourth estate for the benefit of the most powerful and privileged; a freedom limited by the lack of courage of 'journalists' in the employ of News Corp and of 'journalists' coaxed and badgered, dominated and intimidated as those from our ABC who feature in this narrative. Readers can judge how successfully the corporate giant milked the residual sexism and misogyny not only in the country but also in a selection of journalists who revealed much about themselves.