Media outlet shows its bias
I am a Crikey subscriber and enjoy many of their articles. However they have biases and sometimes their opinion pieces detract from what is otherwise reasonable journalism.
Like so many other media organisations, at times their headlines can plain stupid. There was one recently following the election. It read: Albanese kicks Greens while they’re down as Bandt’s seat all but lost – The prime minister had some parting words for former Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather last night.
The background was that Chandler-Mather, now former Green MP, had previously been on air to tell everyone how bad he was treated in parliament by the Labor party and how he had done a wonderful job and that if he had the chance he would do the same all over again.
This despite that fact that his own electorate had booted him out, his party the Greens lost seats and that even his party leader was about to lose his seat (which he did in the next day or so).
When ABC later interviewed the prime minister, they asked him to react to these comments. He said: “Maybe what he needs is a mirror and a reflection on why he’s no longer in Parliament … it’s a bit rich for him, of all people. This is a guy who stood before signs at a CFMEU rally in Brisbane describing me as a Nazi. I think he should look at the way he conducted himself in question time … including the questions he asked of me, some of which were pretty offensive.”
To this Crikey ran a headline: Albanese kicks Greens while they’re down as Bandt’s seat all but lost.
When you consider the nasty stuff that the Greens, and in particular Chandler-Mather used to say about Labor and the prime minister, you would have to say that his response to the question he was asked was very calm and considered – very polite.
And indeed, it definitely would do Chandler-Mather a lot of good to examine his conduct and the damage that he had done to the Greens branding with the general public.
I am also mindful that Chandler-Mather was elected on several local issues including that he was going to do something about aircraft noise in his Brisbane suburbs.
As with many of his statements, this was yet another hollow populist gesture to fool the voters. He was good at that and you have to wonder how foolish some voters were to believe anything he said – let alone vote for him.
Meanwhile Crikey made the response from the Prime Minister as if he was the one being nasty – when Chandler-Mather was the one who had gone on air to attack the Prime Minister and had said nothing to say that he had mad a mess of things.
The shame about Crikey in this instance is that they have performed like so many other another mainstream media organisations that attracts attention by using misinformation disguised as a headline.
Normally I would give Crikey at least 6 to 8 out of ten. But for this article it would have to be two out of ten.
Here’s the article – click here