Boy, oh boy! I bet Don Brown (above), the MLA for Capalaba, regrets accusing Nine News Brisbane of a beat-up!
Monday night’s 6pm bulletin returned the favour in spades – or maybe they used shovels, judging by how the pollie looks this morning.
And what was Brown beaten up over? A Facebook claim earlier on Monday that the bulletin’s segment on youth crime the night before was a beatup.
Was it? Pretty much so but nothing more than what we can now expect on a nightly basis from now on from the newsroom that has basically declared itself the principal fighter in what it sees as rampant youth crime that has the entire state in its insidious grip.
Yes, folks, Nine News is the real voice for victims! Youth crime is an out-of-control scourge that has all Queenslanders frightened and quivering in their homes! It’s an appalling state of affairs that this particular newsroom is determined to convince us the Palaszczuk government has no answer for!
But it’s how Nine portrayed Brown that is particularly sickening and highly offensive. Brown’s Facebook post criticised one Sunday night segment and Nine news executives have decided that he has somehow downplayed or made light of the plight of families who have lost loved ones through home invasions or road hoonery by the state’s young criminals.
It was a disgusting, illogical and defamatory attack, the sort I’ve always associated with rightwing arseholes; a non-sequiter piece of nonsense, a bullshit piece of Alexander Downer-level sophistry they should be thoroughly embarrassed over and should apologise to Brown for. You might even call it simply a dirty rotten lie.
Brown repeatedly made it clear on Monday night’s program that he was referring to the previous night’s footage. I’m not saying he comes across all that well in talking to Nine. His Facebook observation might have been right in saying no crime was committed in the Sunday night footage but the kids with golf clubs clearly had other ideas.
To his credit, though, he also tried to explain that crime was down in his electorate. And he is not wrong in arguing that constantly portraying the entire state as being held hostage by young crims is stoking unnecessary fears.
But if you want beat-up, here’s our two Nine newsreaders opening up on Monday night.
Andrew Lofthouse: Grieving families are tonight unleashing hurt and grief at the Palaszczuk government after a senior MP dismissed youth crime in Queensland as just a media beatup.
No doubt that hurt and grief was felt the moment Nine News approached them with their highly distorted version of what Brown said.
Melissa Downes: Those who have lost loved ones to teenage criminals say the staggering claim is a betrayal.
Staggered, no doubt, the moment Nine News approached them with their highly distorted version of what Brown said.
Both intros are monstrous beatups which rely on completely ignoring the general trust of Brown’s comments. Or by focusing entirely on several words poorly stated if not mischievously distorted. I don’t know Brown very well at all but he seems a decent enough chap and I imagine he would be entitled to be completely upset and aggrieved by any suggestion that he has somehow made light of, or downplayed, the tragedies those families have gone through.
But his general frustration as a Labor MP at Nine News Brisbane is totally understandable. Nine, along with the LNP’s Bowen Hills branch – sorry The Courier and Sunday Mails – are out to bring down the Palaszczuk government and they see youth crime as a key way of doing it.
Neither news outlet will ever give Palaszczuk and her mob an even break over youth crime. Anything the government tries will be widely condemned.
This is not journalism, Nine News. It’s politicking. So maybe we at The Bug should start calling you the LNP’s Mount Coot-tha branch?
It’s why, were I Premier or any of her ministers, I wouldn’t give Nine News or News Queensland mastheads the time of day let alone privileged treatment, yet Channel 9 the other day claimed Palaszczuk had given it an exclusive interview on that issue. If that’s the case then maybe they’re right and Palaszczuk needs to go! What the fuck was she thinking?
Ditto for Acting Premier Steven Miles if this promo (below) for The Courier-Mail is correct. If Miles has sided with Newscorpse and/or Nine over this latest confected piece of faux outrage, then maybe he needs an overseas holiday with a one-way ticket too.
Miles is on a slippery slope to nowhere if he agrees with Newcorpse and Nine Entertainment Co versions of any political issue instead of backing his own party people. At least have the decency to check first what his people have said instead of giving the impression they’re basically shit-scared of what Peter Costello and Rupert Murdoch might do to them.
Don Gordon-Brown
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