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One indigenous language vanishes every two weeks, and Quechua, once the tongue of Peru's mighty Inca Empire, was one of those heading to extinction. That is, until last December, when the first ever Quechua language television news service went to air on the platforms of TV Peru and National Radio, the public broadcaster. According to one presenter it is a 'space that breaks all the paradigms of discrimination and inequality toward those who are speakers of indigenous languages'.
Josh Bornstein compared the ABC to the victim in an abusive relationship, desperately trying to ward off the next blow by anticipating the criticism of its enemies. Certainly, enlisting Andrew Bolt to participate in a documentary on Indigenous constitutional recognition seems like a pre-emptive defensive move against the accusations of bias that are routinely levelled against the national broadcaster. For Bolt the arrangement is win-win; for the ABC it's yet another example of self-sabotage.
Tony Abbott's suggestion that the ABC should be patriotic in its news reporting is not compatible with its Charter obligation to truth and impartiality. But it is a reminder that the ABC has muddied its own waters by taking on the running of the Government's Australia Network international television service, which gives patriotism priority over truth.
The ABC's efforts to compete with commercial media restrict the diversity of its content and help to make the case for it to be sold off. It might do well to withdraw from audience ratings surveys in favour of juries or another mechanism better geared to measure the content diversity that is its reason for being.
There is credible speculation new part-owner James Packer will use his influence to kill innovation at Network Ten. The authority should respond by enforcing broadcast licence conditions, to ensure Packer's return to significant media ownership is in the public interest and not his self-interest.
SBS television has been called many things, including the 'sexual broadcasting service', because of the risqué foreign language films that it shows. SBS radio is the ultimate melting pot, a symbol of an inclusive Australian multiculturalism in which different languages and cultures are respected.