One of the most important corner stones of modern journalism was, until recently, unbiased objectivity. That came under threat when so called social media platforms encroached into the exclusive world of print, radio, and television news services. Some of these keyboard warriors were driven by ego and others wanted to tap into the advertising revenue which paid for professional journalism in its various forms. Most social media operators however lack the essential objectivity, accuracy and reliability that have been the hallmarks of professional journalism for more than two centuries. They found it was easier and quicker to comment on the work of professional journalists than seek out their own news stories and plagiarism became, at least initially, a minor annoyance. It was also easier to repeat misinformation than correct it.
Then the international tech giants stepped in and created a serious problem by providing on-line access to news stories created by journalists and siphoning off significant amounts of advertising revenue in the process. This was worse than plagiarism and closer to copyright infringement. The financial impact on professional news outlets was near catastrophic.
The Government eventually intervened in 2021 and established a contestable fund of $55million for “public interest journalism” but it was too little and too late and we now have dozens of long term community newspapers going out of business.
A major flaw in the government initiative was the inclusion of a requirement, by one of the most radically liberal and idealistically dangerous Labour led governments in our history, to actively promote the Maori language and the principles of Partnership, Participation and Active Protection under Treaty of Waitangi. This was a clear indication that either the government had no idea about the essential independence of journalism or was using the fund to promote their own political idealism. Treaty partnerships were, and still are, a subject of differing opinions and many senior journalists, myself included, saw that requirement as an intrusion into editorial independence. Journalists and editors should never be obliged to support any political philosophy or attempt to educate readers in the use of a second language.
Recently the current National-led coalition government has promised to pass a law, initially drafted by the former Labour government, that would require both Google and Facebook owner Meta to pay for media content shared through their platforms on terms that could ultimately be set by a regulator. In response Google said that if the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill was to become law there would be consequences and the tech giant might simply abandon New Zealand or refuse to provide access to New Zealand news. In spite of the rhetoric there are ongoing discussions with major news outlets.
It was the contestable fund however, which was part of a major and covert introduction of ethnic separatism and artificial Treaty of Waitangi partnerships, which inflicted the most damage.
The government and several media outlets ignored the warnings of knowledgeable journalists and the disquiet of many in the community, many of whom remained silent for fear of abuse or being labelled racist, that such social manipulations was unacceptable.
However many news media outlets were faced with surrendering their independence or risk going out of business. Others were taken in by the rhetoric. Sadly, once the contestable fund was exhausted, the damage was done and a significant number of journalists had adopted the far-left liberal idealism that went with the contestable fund and have become openly hostile to the current centre-right National led government.
That is now glaringly obvious in the number of left-biased feature articles and general reporting in mainstream media on one-sided Treaty of Waitangi issues, gender diversity and gay rights promotions. This has got to the ridiculous point where journalists now repeat by rote a number of phrases in Maori before each broadcast. Others are dictated to by members of the public about personal pronouns; people deciding to be referred to as they and them rather than he or she. As a bi-lingual journalist I find such tokenism demeaning and unprofessional. People can live as they please but no one has a licence to bastardise the King’s English.
Television interviewers in particular have also taken up the cause of Maori activists and all but abandoned any idea of balance and objectivity. The coverage of opposition to the Treaty Principles bill was a woeful example of journalists repeating known misinformation and pandering to one side of what should have been an important and balanced public debate.
Print opinion pieces, which traditionally applied the rules of context, analysis and accuracy are now so obviously left biased as to render them valueless as a window to public opinion. Even the works of cartoonists, who have traditionally enjoyed a very permissive licence to lampoon and poke fun at public figures, have become grotesque and ill-informed attacks on the government and portrayals of left-wing ideology. The highly skilled humour, pun and clever exaggeration of minor embarrassing moments has all but disappeared.
This development is not unique to New Zealand or journalism and many international news media companies, universities and the judiciary of many nations have fallen into the trap of left bias ideology. Included in this move to the left about fifty years ago were universities and polytechnics which train teachers who in turn educate children. We can now see the results in some teachers involving their students in left wing political activism We can see the same attitudes in graduate journalists and lawyers and was very obvious when a group of senior New Zealand lawyers (King’s Counsel) urged the government to abandon the Treaty Principles bill. Being King’s Counsel does not convey the mantle of infallible on all subjects or even objectivity and these lawyers appear not to have a good understanding of the subject matter or understand the importance of public ownership of our constitutional arrangements. The news media should have picked up on all of that and held them to account but failed to do so.
This far left liberalism includes telling people what they need instead of listening to what they want and was one of the contributing causes the defeat of the Labour led government at the 2023 general election. Voters ran out of patience with idealistic liberalism and underhanded social experiments in separatism, diversity promotion and swung to the right.
There are still numbers of highly skilled, professional and objective journalists but they are usually of an earlier, experienced generation who learned their craft before the intrusion of liberalism and who have not sold their souls. Most have left the mainstream media outlets and established their own social mediaplatforms. They are far outnumbered by those who would not have survived the first semester when I was tutoring many years ago.
The end result is a dramatic and record loss of trust and confidence in all mainstream journalists as more and more disillusioned readers get their news and information from unprofessional social media platforms which do not have to meet the basic standards of accuracy and impartiality.
It will take a team of exceptional journalists, courageous business leaders and a significant financial investment to turn this tragic state of affairs around.