In my most recent tutorial we watched a segment from the ABC’s Media Watch (which by the way is a fantastic example of real, professional journalism) where they discussed a sad story in which a young girl and man are lost in the bush, even once they are eventually found the girl dies of dehydration. However Media Watch revealed that one news outlet wrongly reported that the man was a child sex offender. Many news stations across the country then simply copied each other instead of investigating the issue for themselves, and eventually morphed the story from that of two persons missing to an abduction of a young girl by a pedophile.
Another problem with the reporting of the story was that even after the girl had died, her name and photo were used in the story, even though it is widely known that showing a photo of a deceased Indigenous person is culturally insensitive. The reporter knew this and also stated that he “didn’t get a yes from the girl’s mother but also didn’t get a no”, as his reasoning for including the photo. I am still baffled as to why he and his editors thought this was okay?!
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