Revealed: How Opinion Pieces In Mainstream Media Portray Muslim, Chinese And Indigenous People

Pile of printed newspapers on blue background
B&T Magazine
By B&T Magazine



A new study has lifted the lid on how the opinion pieces in the mainstream media have been racialised.

The study, conducted by All Together Now, analysed 315 opinion pieces from April 2019 to April 2020. It looked at The Sydney Morning Herlaid, The Age, The Courier Mail, Herald Sun, The Australian, The Daily Telegraph, The Project, A Current Affair, 7:30 and 60 Minutes.

It found that when these pieces were discussing Muslim people or communities, 75 per cent of the commentary was negative. For Chinese people, 55 per cent was negative, while for Indigenous people 47 per cent was negative.

For other racialised communities, this number was 54 per cent.

This amassed to 159 negatively racialised opinion pieces. The study also found that 89 per cent of these negative pieces were authored by people from Anglo-Celtic and/or European background.

It also pointed to recent research from Media Diversity Australia, which revealed that 75 per cent of presenters on FTA television were of Anglo-Saxon background and that 100 per cent of national news directors in Australia were Anglo-Celtic and male.

To address these issues, All Together Now recommends reforms to build cultural competency and racial literacy within newsrooms, while also increasing the cultural diversity of journalists, producers, presenters and media workers.

“Many journalists and journalism educators have cited the need for cultural change within media organisations to challenge the negative racialisations of First Nations people and people of colour,” says the report.

“Media organisations should take proactive steps to drive systemic change, promoting cultural change internally, increasing diversity in management and creating anti-racist policies and procedures.

“This should include anti-racism training in newsrooms to deepen understanding systemic, structural, covert and overt racism.”

The latest study is part of a larger report, which is due to be released in 2021.




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