What stands in the way of moderating Australia’s hard-line deportation of New Zealanders? “The risk of paedophiles!” Why can’t medivac legislation be left well enough alone? “Murderers, rapists, terrorists!” Why are Five Eyes authorities demanding that tech platforms allow them to hack encrypted messages? “Online child sexual exploitation!”
The common thread? Our very own Minister for Home Affairs, Peter Dutton. He’s picked up the danger of child abuse and sexual assault and weaponised it in support of increased security powers and tougher borders. It works because the media amplify his claims — usually uncritically. (It’s ruining international relationships, Crikey noted recently.)
Of course, sexual assault and child abuse should be a government priority. There’s a whole royal commission’s worth of ideas to be worked through, and a National Office for Child Safety set up to do it.
But when it comes to security and borders, it’s a right-wing talking point, long legitimised by Trump’s 2016 campaign launch where he said of Mexican migrants: “They are bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists.”
Like all talking points, it’s designed to mislead. It hacks the media with a tabloid precision, on an understanding that nothing is more guaranteed to be reported than crime, sex and government action. Nothing is less likely to get push-back than claims of child abuse. Even critiquing it as a talking point feels uncomfortable. It appeals directly to the aging demographic fearful of the modern world that reads the News Corp papers, listens to Macquarie Radio, watches commercial TV news and votes conservative.
So just last week The Australian prominently reported “Five Eyes nations target tech titans on child sex abuse”. Similarly, in mid-June, Dutton responded to NZ PM Jacinda Ardern’s call to stop deportations: “Where people are sexually offending against children, for example, we have had a big push to try to deport those paedophiles and people who have committed those crimes.” He was rewarded with grabs on the evening news.
And back at the height of the medivac brouhaha in February, Dutton was on 2GB telling Ray Hadley the law would let murderers, rapists and paedophiles into the country.
There has been some push-back from journalists. On Insiders in February, for example, Barrie Cassidy forensically questioned Attorney-General Christian Porter for details on the medivac claims, questioning both the scale and reality of the allegation. However, even challenging the talking point risks amplifying it.
Too often journalists act as if they are just the microphone. But journalists make decisions every day about what they report and how they report it.
Hard as a talking point can be to resist — particularly when crafted to appeal to the tabloid sensibilities that underpin much of “newsworthiness” — ignoring them can more often than not contribute to the “truth” than repeating them. Sure, Dutton rejected Ardern’s request — that’s news. But the sly innuendo of his comment concealed more than it added.
The craft debate is more advanced in the United States where they’re dealing with Trump and his daily tweets. As The Los Angeles Times editorialised last month: “We shouldn’t rise to his bait, but how can we not?”
Journalists can discredit the talking point by calling it out (to be honest that’s what I’m trying to do here). This can speed up its natural life-span as, for example, “the paedophile” has replaced “the terrorist” as monster-under-the bed of choice.
Another is to challenge it with facts, every time. The Washington Post’s Margaret Sullivan suggests a “truth sandwich” putting the spin between two layers of reality: “Avoid retelling the lies. Avoid putting them in headlines, leads or tweets.”
NYU professor Jay Rosen suggests if you can’t “ignore the toddler” then report the talking points as the gaslighting they usually are (perhaps with a specialised team), rather than taking them at face value.
In Data & Society’s The Oxygen of Amplification report, Whitney Phillips says the media needs to have policies to deal with “objectively false information” including political manipulation. Most importantly, ask: is there really something worth learning from reporting (and debunking) this claim?
It’s been reporting by journalists that put child abuse (particularly institutional abuse) into public debate. Now, journalists need to prevent it being used to restrain important reporting about digital security and border control.
Quote” “the paedophile” has replaced “the terrorist” as monster-under-the bed of choice.”
Exactly right. For a long time, since Howard, the justification used for the rollout of draconian law has been terrorism but more recently the government realised that people where getting tired of hearing that so they pulled out a new monster.
Like any dodgy salesman Dutton used the old bait and switch technique for his sales pitch of Australia’s world leading draconian anti encryption bill. He advertised that it was needed to ensure our security against terrorists and paedophiles and that is what the media driven public conversation was about but the government tried to get the legislation through parliament with a threshold of any suspected offence with a maximum jail term of 1 year !
In the end it went through with a threshold of suspected offences carrying a 3 year jail term which still encompasses a raft of minor crimes such as drug offences, property offences and certainly the whistle blower offences that journalists have recently been accused of.
I should say “investigated over’ rather than “accused of” (at least for now).
Dutton and the LNP can throw out the word “paedophilies” in any direction to shut down debate.
Asylum Seekers: peadophiles
Climate change: peadophiles
Franking Credits: peadophiles
Superannuation: peadophiles
Ironically, the only direction that they can’t shout “peadophiles” is towards religion. That would be awkward.
It was interesting in the Benighted States, after the Fall of the Wall and kommunism, that they lacked a big enough, scary enough and unquantifiable thret to keep the lumpen quiescent.
So they gave Satanic child abuse a road test and it was very successful, with many people convicted and some still serving time for concocted tales that would have made the Puritans of Salem fall about laughing.
That it was a beat up from start to finish mattered not a whit.
As noted, there is a problem cohort in the body politic – “As the aging demographic fearful of the modern world that reads the News Corp papers, listens to Macquarie Radio, watches commercial TV news and votes conservative.“.
Unfortunately they are a protected species.
For the moment.
A good article & I don’t expect to read many more like it. Most journalists are just knocking out the day’s stodge & government handouts will do.
Media organisations disinterested in ensuring such critical balance simply highlight their gross untrustworthiness. Journalists not up to this task are simply incompetent.
Obviously the key point is to attack the exploitation of fear – the basis of these particular political smear campaigns. An obvious start is to point out the reality that we are as bad at assessing risk as we are in choosing the best politician.
Economist Saul Eslake said in relation to the provision of expensive armed guards at Victorian stations that enjoyed very little crime: “We are paying a high financial price … and a price to our civil liberties, for the misreading of the risks we face and an inability to make intelligent judgments about probabilities and costs versus benefits.”
We are in far greater danger from one another on our roads than from even the keenest ISIL jihadi. Why have all journalists forgotten that Catholic and other religious paedophiles were protected by institutions, police and politicians for many decades?