NBR on the media
November 12th, 2008 at 6:52 am by David FarrarNBR editor Nevil Gibson scrutinises the recent media:
We have to say it because no one else will: Almost alone among mainstream media, the National Business Review’s call on the election result turned out to be the best one.
Our summary: “National will easily win a mandate while the Greens become a stronger force on the left. Maori will not hold a balance of power and Winston Peters will be history.”
Yep. A very good call.
The left’s wholesale defeat was not reflected in the spread of commentators and pundits employed across the board. The public broadcasters – both radio and TV –can always be relied on to give Labour any doubt.
But it’s more surprising when private equity-owned MediaWorks chooses to lean even heavier to the left, mainly by hiring National Radio and TV One heavies.
Perhaps the reason Radio Live and TV3’s Sunrise have failed to gain much traction is that their personality mixes have too many of the media’s trendy lefties and not enough of those who reflect the country’s anti-socialist mood. (You can see why Newstalk is cleaning up with its strong conservative/populist line up.)
National truly reflects the heartland, yet the media are continuing down their path of denial by giving more coverage, in newspapers and on radio, to the Labour leadership issue rather than accept the broad mandate for a new broom government is much more newsworthy.
Possibly part of the problem is too many media are in Wellington, where the mood for change was dampened. More talking to people in the provinces would get you quite another feel – something the NZ Herald did with their excellent Simon Collins series.
November 12th, 2008 at 7:06 am
Its a media thing as much as a Wellington thing.
Vote:Trotter ( http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominionpost/4754717a26342.html and http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominionpost/4756012a26342.html) and Braunias (http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominionpost/4754711a26342.html) in the Sunday Star Times and Linda Burgess’ putrid grief in the DomPost ( can’t find a link) are all of a kind. But in Wellington that media lack of self awareness (of where they fit in the world spectrum of ideas) may be shared by a higher proportion of the population.
November 12th, 2008 at 7:28 am
I see Trotter is still in denial about the election. How the hell can he say by the narrowest of margins Labour lost the election? I believe some of the MSM are just plain lazy. They stick to their own groups and nod in agreement with each other as to the direction of the country. Try getting out once in a while.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 7:29 am
I think its more the case that the media were compelled to try and make things seem more interesting than they were and that stories about a tight race sell more newspapers than front page leads about a foregone conclusion.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 7:35 am
Too many of the media commentators have been around too long. They believe. what they say must be true as a result of never having called to account
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 7:43 am
The provinces?
Like Upper Hutt or Martinborough?
Now, where did I put my copy of the Dom, time for another latte.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 8:03 am
I, like many other ex-pats here in London, watched the election unfold on Saturday and was very very pleased with the result.
But then watching the appalling media coverage was painful. If ever you needed proof that the MSM in New Zealand has a distinct left-bias, this is it.
That Steve Braunias article read like it was written by a spoilt child who’d been sent to bed early.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 8:31 am
With the average age in many newsrooms being about 14, we have a generation of journalists who have spent most – if not all – of their working lives under a Labour government.
Journalists tend to be Lefties anyway (not surprising given what they are paid) with a crusading mandate to “keep the bastards honest”. More often than not, that means politicians and the business community.
Couple this with a lack of knowledge among many media (NBR is the shining exception here) about how business, the markets and how political systems work, Key faces an uphill battle in getting the media to even understand how his programme will work, never mind win their support.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 8:42 am
I note the Duncan Garner hasn’t let the small yet crucial matter of being so far wrong he’s starting to show out the other side slow him down and is choosing to apply characterisitions to peoples actions based on the National coalition being about to crumble any second now.
My question for TV3 is, have you checked Dunky for a zipper to see if its actaully Bahgdad Bob in a suit?
Stop telling us what to think you pudgy failed jouralism student and you might find people stop switching over to reruns of Friends.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 9:08 am
TV1 wouldnt call the election for national… when 90% of the vote was in…
hell i dont know if they ever called it, just showed helens speech.
as for radio live – what a shitty line up they have from 1pm onward. the midday hour is great.. then ya get willie and JT.. my god..
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 9:29 am
The mood may have been different in the “provinces” from that in Auckland, and especially Wellington.
However, the news media were not more awake and independent, if the Christchurch Press is any indication. It has veered to the left and is over the gravel shoulder and bouncing along the grass verge.
Its “national affairs editor” Dan Eaton, this morning kicks off with the astonishingly predictable statement from Labour’s new leader Goff: “The incoming National government may last only one term.” Then seven paragraphs later quoting Goff:”I think it is entirely possible the new government may last a term only.”
Then later: “Goff and King will make a formidable Opposition team.”
Time to pull off the road for a quick rest I think Dan.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 9:45 am
Further to my post: I note some of the comments above put the blame on media bias on age.
Dan Eaton in the Christchurch Press from his photograph looks to be in his late 20s, which is hardly old.
In some of the American TV I note that some of the most interesting and alert interviewers are in their 70s.
I’ve just consulted an old friend who is a retired journalist and he reckons most of the lefties are in fact young folk. He says things might improve with the evolving credit crunch. He reckons this will drive some older news heads out of public relations etc and back into newspapers.
Perhaps the problem is more in the selection and training of media people. Are too many of them from the same lefty light academic background: political science (and other soft humanities subjects)?
I’m suspicious of statements about pay, too. In my experience good teachers, cops, etc, are driven by factors other than pay. My mate says news media people driven by pay would now be in public relations, and my experience of those folk is of a fairly light weight, arse licking mob. On reflection, I’m not sure if their return to the general news media will help it at all.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Agree, Jack5 that many journos are driven by factors other than pay. They remain excellent journalists, but their relative economic status means they see the world from a leftist viewpoint.
On the selection process, journalism graduates are aware of the profession’s lowly pay and conditions when they sign up. This filters out those for who perhaps have a better understanding of business, and for who higher financial rewards are a priority.
With newsrooms being hollowed out worldwide, this – sadly – isn’t likely to change anytime soon.
Also, journalist recruiters pick those in who they see a reflection of themselves and their own values. Hence, the culture is perpetuated.
PR folk I know would – to a person – go back to journalism in a flash if there was better pay, the resources and time to do a proper job and greater – or any for that matter – career prospects. It’s a great job, but an increasingly unsustainable one for people with commitments and aspirations.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 10:34 am
Almost all the gallery journalists come from an urban background, then are indoctrinated in the left leaning universities and then move into the big city media outlets where most of their colleagues already tilt to the left. Any young budding journalist hailing from provinces or from a right leaning family and kept their conservatism intact through Varsity will stand a very slim chance of being hired. Time in the big city newspapers newsrooms, TV 1/TV 3 newsrooms or Radio NZ further entrenches their leftist echo chamber. Almost to a man and women in the gallery they are pro gay marriage, anti capitalism, pro the open ended welfare state and anti American. The Labour/Green nexis merely reflects what to them is their normal world view and so the policies emanating from these two parties strike the media as eminently normal and practical. Once they are stuck inside the Wellington political beltway of like thinking Beehive staffers and senior civil servants (also promoted due to their fealty to Helengrad), the isolation from middle NZ is completed. National seems uncomfortably right wing, John Key a smarmy upstart and any attempt to get the economy on a more economically sustainable footing by adhering to the basic principals needed for capitalism to succeed at doing what it does best – generating the most wealth for the most people – will be misunderstood at best and seen as an assault on the holy cow of welfareism at worst. So when Labour’s spin began to fall on deaf ears due to their social engineering, the pledge card rort and the EFA fiasco they sought to cover for them because any socialist in power no matter how corrupt is better than those capitalist pigs on the right.
The unequivocal nature of the centre-right victory caught them all by surprise and now they are in disbelief that Helengrad is over hence all the obsequious genuflecting to Helen and their obsession with Labour’s new leadership. Meanwhile NZers give thanks that they haven’t been kept waiting for a month or more trying to find out who their new government will be as in prior MMP elections when each major party took it in turns to see who could bend over further to be rogered by Winston!
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 11:00 am
Excellent analysis, Kiwi in America. That should be an online op-ed that we can all link to.
I really wish some conservative initiative could be taken to counter that Cultural Marxist “long march through the institutions” incredible success with universities, education, and journalism.
Could someone with the money, please get Ian Wishart running a daily paper? Perhaps the “Herald” if its for sale?
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 11:50 am
Unbelievable isn’t it? All these media outlets that didn’t get on board with John Key when they “should” have!
PS: I wonder if Stephen Franks will elaborate on what he meant by “in Wellington that media lack of self awareness (of where they fit in the world spectrum of ideas) may be shared by a higher proportion of the population.”
‘Cos I always thought the general public was free to choose where they fit in “the world spectrum of ideas”…
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
Ratbiter you’re missing the point though. No one is saying that the media “should have got on board with John Key” – that would have been just as bad.
Their job is to report the news as it happens, not to report the news after filtering it through their own prejudices and biases. (Not to be confused with analysis).
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
KIA “universities” are not left leaning. Specific departments are. The loud mouth media studies ones for example.
Ghengis Khan would feel at home in some of them. But reporters don’t ask the history or geography department what they think when they want a sound bite for John Campbell.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
As the son of an academic I can tell you that almost all departments are left leaning and probably 90% of academic staff vote Labour or Green. Exceptions are the law and commerce faculties and even there, most vote Labour. I know several friends who were what Americans would call Independents and who work in Management departments and both now are irretrievably Labour and Green respectively.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Ratbiter writes: ” I always thought the general public was free to choose where they fit in “the world spectrum of ideas”.”
The public also have the right to question our rather oligopolistic media both electronic (the state’s TVNZ and Radio NZ plus mainly overseas firms) and newsprint (Fairfax media and the NZ Herald group both foreign controlled). The electronic mob are left leaning top to bottom, and the foreigners don’t seem to care what their staff do as long as the advertisements and subscription money roll in.
The journalists of both seem predominantly left wing, and seem to have the lattitude to use their bias in stories, selection, presentation.
NBR is one exception, but the real freedom of the centre and centre-right now lies in the Blogosphere.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Chris Trotter:
“Clark and her colleagues stood for all that was good about the baby-boomer generation: its idealism and its 40-year refusal to bow down to the reactionary values of an uptight, male-dominated society driven by a dangerous determination to discipline and punish.”
A lot of alliteration by anxious anchors placed in powerful posts!
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
There is no doubt in my mind though that we cannot underestimate the impact the blogosphere has had on this election. The media has had a free run for many years. Prior to the blogs it simply was not economical to get your dissenting views in the public domain. Even talkback radio was limited by time, unless someone was listening, they would not hear you.
Thankfully there has been no (to our knowledge) media cover ups such as what happened in the last election with the police commissioner. The blogs are keeping them honest and in no small way have contributed to our democratic process.
Cheers to all you guys, lefties included.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
I’ve been watching all the TV3 video on demand because I can’t get TVNZ via the internet overseas, which is perhaps a blessing. Campbells interview of John Key was OK although admittedly pretty lightweight.
However watching the Sunrise show we had a single token right supporter surrounded by Brian Edwards & Chris Trotter who were both aided and abetted by the clearly left wing Oliver Driver. Nice balance eh?
Unfortunately this is about all we can expect from a media riddled with Labour sympathisers.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Jack5 suggests:
Sorry, Jack5, but I suspect your friend is guilty of wishful thinking. I’d love to be back in journalism but the pay is a joke unless you’re one of a handful of tired hacks who convince their bosses that they’re a “personality” and thus deserving of six figure salaries. People have mentioned Radio Live – check what their on air “personalities” are paid to sit and pontificate with dubious accuracy versus what any journalist supplying the real news gets.
Even in Australia, even in the midst of the boom, media were offering senior positions at laughable salaries. You were doing exceptionally well if you could get $50 or $60k, whereas in PR twice that was easily achievable.
Now the economy isn’t as rosy its seems that – so far, at least – there’s enough companies who realise that the last thing you do in a downturn is stop advertising, marketing and running PR to actually marginally increase demand for PR hacks such as myself. At least that’s what I’m finding. Whereas everyone from Rupert Murdoch on down (or up, depending on your perspective) is predicting tough times for news outlets with redundancies and wage freezes.
I don’t have an easy answer, but if I were running, say, Radio Live or one of the TV channels I’d be offering the “stars” the choice of a realistic wage or the door, and redistributing the savings amongst the newsroom – particularly to retain or attract some experienced people.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Actually, having mentioned Murdoch I should probably direct you to this year’s Boyer Lectures, a series of in-depth ruminations delivered this year by the News Corporation Chairman and CEO and transmitted on none other than the state-owned ABC. The first two lectures are archived on that site. The third, entitled “The Future of Newspapers” is coming up. In terms of charting the future of media I think it’s likely to be the most pertinent, though the others are well worth a listen.
There’s some irony in the fact that these interesting and in-depth considerations of the world from a man undoubtedly powerful enough to influence history could only be carried by a non-commercial, state-owned network because the audience for them (as opposed to, say, “The Biggest Loser”) is far too small to make it viable content for any commercial channels.
Perhaps suggesting that state-owned and financed media – run properly and relatively free of bias – should be a vital part of any future media landscape.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
I agree rex, state owned media is the only place one is going to hear good content like that, from both sides. People can harp on about newstalk all they like, but it will never do half of the job of RNZ. Also, listening to Jim Mora and Morning Report I can’t really see where this left wing bias comes in, I find them both quite neutral.
Oh, and if you guys care so much about the state of journalism, how about becoming right-wing journos if you truly believe what you say? Also I know a few RNZ journo’s and most of them knew a change of govt. was coming and supported it, but no, they’re all raging lefties.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Oh and can you guys really be so naive as to believe in a neutral media? That’s the biggest problem with this country’s media, that they actually think they are a neutral lens. There is no such thing as neutrality and if we acknowledged that the way they do in britain and france and have openly left leaning and right leaning papers then our coverage might actually improve. Believing in press neutrality free from any personal bias is as stupid as believing that jesus is about to walk off the 4:15 flight from heaven and save us (hello kiwi party).
I think the blogosphere does this well because if i want a left perspective i read the standard et al. If i want to see what you guys (righties) are up to, i come here etc and there’s no bullshit.
Vote:November 12th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Absolutely SWT, to expect neutrality is wishful thinking if not delusional, as you so rightly say. However but it’s the illusion of neutrality that the MSM strives to maintain when presenting what is often a biased view that does my head in.
As you also say it’s time it was acknowledged.
Vote: