Rupert Murdoch’s media empire has become highly critical of the ABC, after the government-funded network aired a Four Corners episode calling out Fox News.
The now infamous episode of Four Corners delved into the alleged biased reporting done by Fox News during the Donald Trump era, the episode included allegations it was propaganda.
ABC journalists spoke to various former Fox News’ employees about the right-wing media outlet, who all shared stories of biased reporting. They even included an interview with Gretchen Carlson, a former Fox News’ employee. (She famously exposed chief executive Roger Ailes as a sexual predator and then Nicole Kidman played her in a movie.)
Carlson said: “They allowed the former president to dictate what news they put out to the American people.”
The ABC also didn’t shy away from Murdoch’s personal life and discussed how Murdoch’s support of Trump, allegedly, caused his son James Murdoch to leave the family business.
While, arguably, the Four Corners episode didn’t shed light on anything that hadn’t already been widely discussed by the more left-leaning media, it seems to have got Murdoch’s attention.
The Sydney Morning Herald has reported that Fox News has threatened legal action over the Four Corners episode, as the network found it was very one-sided. Interestingly, ABC has said they asked Fox News to participate to offer their perspective but they chose not to.
SMH, reported that a Fox News spokesperson said: “The episode clearly violates the basic tenets of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s published standards by exhibiting bias and a failure to maintain any level of impartiality in the presentation of news and information.”
However, perhaps what is most interesting is that since the episode aired, according to The Guardian, News Corp has published over 45 articles criticising the ABC.
But it isn’t hard to see a pattern, headlines from Newcorp include: “ABC, A Propaganda Vehicle on Public Dime,” “ABC’s Four Corners: Cutting Corners in pursuit of the big dud story” and “Bitter ABC Don’t Do Balance” and many, many more.
Clearly, subtlety isn’t Murdoch Media’s strong point
