As Australia continues to burn more and more attention is being paid to Rupert Murdoch and Newscorp and its actions in attacking responsible climate change abatement policies and enabling climate denying politicians.
News this week included the leaking of an email sent by a News Corp employee castigating the company for its activity in suppressing activity against climate change and in trying to divert blame for the Australian bushfires to arsonists, or Greenies, or anyone. The employee was not someone involved in the preparation and presentation of news, but someone from the Finance Department.
The email was in response to an email from management detailing bush fire initiatives taken by News Corp. Her response as recorded in the Guardian:
This does not offset the impact News Corp reporting has had over the last few weeks,” Townsend wrote. “I have been severely impacted by the coverage of News Corp publications in relation to the fires, in particular the misinformation campaign that has tried to divert attention away from the real issue which is climate change to rather focus on arson (including misrepresenting facts).
“I find it unconscionable to continue working for this company, knowing I am contributing to the spread of climate change denial and lies. The reporting I have witnessed in the Australian, the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun is not only irresponsible, but dangerous and damaging to our communities and beautiful planet that needs us more than ever now to acknowledge the destruction we have caused and start doing something about it.”
The email landed in the inbox of all News Corp staff, and was leaked to the Guardian by multiple sources, but not Townsend herself.
And this was News Corp’s response:
[Executive chairman Michael Miller] issued a statement on Friday afternoon saying Townsend had resigned in December and was due to leave the company shortly. Miller said News Corp did not “deny climate change or the gravity of its threat”.
“However, we – as is the traditional role of a publisher – do report a variety of views and opinions on this issue and many others that are important in the public discourse on the fires,” he said.
He said he respected Townsend’s right to hold her views but “we do not agree with them”.
The response was treated by ridicule. John Birmingham in the Brisbane Times had perhaps the most acerbic response excluding those dominated by expletives. He said this:
We in the news media, or what’s left of it, cannot simply treat climate-change denial as we would disagreements over tax or health policy.
Even serious and violent disagreements over social and economic policies can still be legitimate differences.
But there is nothing legitimate about climate change denial. It has the backing of a trillion-dollar industry sector, but no actual credibility.
There are no experts to hear from. No counterpoints to be made.
It is all lies in the service of profit and power.
One day it will probably be a crime.
Until then, however, those of us who work in the media need to take a hard look at our practices and ask ourselves whether we are really serving our audience.
False equivalence will kill us all.
There was also Ketan Joshi’s twitter thread which was similar but has swearing. Follow this tweet for the thread:
But the most surprising and most newsworthy response came from Rupert Murdoch’s son, James Murdoch. From Lachlan Cartwright at the Daily Beast:
Rupert Murdoch’s younger son and his wife issued a rare public rebuke of the family’s media empire and its promotion of climate-change skeptics during Australia’s bushfire crisis.
In a long-simmering rift between factions of the Murdoch family over climate change, Rupert’s younger son, James, and his activist wife, Kathryn, are attacking the climate denialism promoted by News Corporation, the global media group, and also by the Fox News Channel overseen by James’ older brother, Lachlan.
“Kathryn and James’ views on climate are well established and their frustration with some of the News Corp and Fox coverage of the topic is also well known,” a spokesperson for the couple exclusively told The Daily Beast as wildfires rage in Australia.
“They are particularly disappointed with the ongoing denial among the news outlets in Australia given obvious evidence to the contrary.”
The extraordinary public rebuke from Kathryn and James—who is the CEO of Lupa Systems, a private investment company he founded—comes as Australia has been ravaged by the worst fires seen in decades. The blazes have claimed 27 lives and destroyed thousands of properties across multiple states, with an estimated 1 billion animals feared dead. News Corp Australia dominates the country’s media landscape, publishing more than 140 newspapers and employing 3,000 journalists in print, broadcast, and online.
James is on the board of News Corp. Oh to be a fly on the wall of the next Board meeting.
But as Australia continues to burn we need to become more forthright and staunch in our opposition to corporate climate change denial. Right now they are one of the biggest problems that we face.
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