Never let it be said that staff at the ABC are idle during their extended Christmas break. As the producers of Q+A excitedly tweeted on the weekend, they are already planning for 2024. And they want to hear from YOU about how their fantastic program – which, incidentally. has abysmal ratings - can be made even better.
#QandA: We would like to hear from YOU! We're wrapping up our 2023 season soon and we're already looking ahead to 2024! What did you enjoy this season? Who would you like to see on our panel in 2024?
— ABC News (@abcnews) November 3, 2023
Hit the link and let us know: https://t.co/Gr8OKfE1Tqpic.twitter.com/4ZFxEfipeW
Nothing says sincerity like the national broadcaster telling you that your opinion matters. They want to know what you liked seeing in 2023, which panellists you would like to see next year, what subjects should the program cover and so on. It is about giving you a sense of ownership, you see.
Let me clarify that. The producers are seeking your opinion, but they have disabled replies on the tweet in question to ensure others cannot read what you have to say. They do not want to hold this session in the public square, because raw feedback can be too frank for their liking. Worse, it could lead to a pile-on at their expense. And the program does not condone such behaviour, except when it is directed against the token conservative panellist, in which case it is to be applauded.
Instead users must click on a link that takes them to a survey form. Their responses will be carefully collated, edited and rewritten in ABC vernacular. The findings will then be presented in a report which no-one will read, let alone act on. Nonetheless this otherwise pointless and expensive exercise ticks a box, and ABC managing director David Anderson can say hand on heart when he next fronts senate estimates that the program ‘actively’ seeks public feedback. Aside from a couple of token variations nothing will change, and the show will continue to indulge the usual luvvies and activists, just like it has since its inception.
In terms of being a serious talkback show, Q+A fails miserably. But like its sister show The Drum, it serves a useful purpose in demonstrating the sanctimonious absurdities of the talking head class and their self-interested agendas. If anything, that and the contrast with reality make for mildly amusing entertainment, provided you forget we fund this circus.
No subject this year was better in that respect than the Indigenous voice to parliament referendum. Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was on the “wrong side of history,” proclaimed Ten News presenter Narelda Jacobs during her appearance on Q+A in February. “What is he going to say the day after the referendum when the Australian public overwhelmingly support First Nations people wanting to have a voice in parliament,” she sneered.
“I feel that if the No vote wins, suddenly on the BBC and CNN, Australia’s going to start to look like apartheid South Africa,” lamented filmmaker George Gittoes, adding that this nation should instead be a “rainbow country”.
Panellist and Guardian Australia columnist Ben Abbatangelo posited that regardless of the result, “we’re still going to be confronted by a very slow and pervasive violence”. And even if the Yes vote were to succeed, he warned, “the Commonwealth … will still be jointly controlled by fossil fuel companies and increasingly, in the Northern Territory as well, the US military”. Host Dan Bourchier did not challenge either of these ridiculous claims.
Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care Ged Kearney used her Q+A appearance to vilify what would be more than 60 per cent of the voting population, declaring that in the event of the No vote succeeding, “the big winners out of that will be those people that want the status quo … or at worst, are the ones that are being hateful”.
And who could forget host Patricia Karvelas parroting the Yes campaign’s sophistry, claiming indignantly that “Indigeneity isn’t race”. Panellist and Indigenous man Wesley Aird was dumbfounded. “How could it not [be],” he asked. Karvelas could not answer him. Ironically, she previously boasted during the same program that she was a “stickler for facts”.
Nothing says avant-garde better than an artist defending censorship of the arts. “Freedom of speech … doesn’t give you the right to be abusive,” declared English singer Billy Bragg in March, during his, at a rough guess, fifty-sixth appearance on Q+A. “I think that sort of abusive language has no place in children’s books whatsoever.” Of all things, he was referring to author Roald Dahl’s use of the word ‘fat’ in his books.
Chair of the Australian Republic Movement Craig Foster demonstrated during the first episode of this year that he was the equal of his predecessor in the prediction stakes. “The research says that Australians are in favour of...decolonisation,” he said in response to a question about the likelihood of Australia becoming a republic. “Decolonisation of thinking and moving and walking together.”
For miners in the Hunter region who worry what the Albanese government’s goal of net zero emissions by 2050 means for them, fear not. “We absolutely can do this,” enthused Climate Council member and economist Nicki Hutley when asked by host David Speers if coal communities could transition. According to her, they just need to have “the right infrastructure”, apparently. “So, Upper Hunter, particularly, making sure you’ve got really good roads so that people can get to and from if they need to, and trucks to and from the city – hopefully electric trucks, of course.” Who knew transitioning was a doddle?
It would just not be Q+A without aggrieved minority panellists whining about the evils of whiteness. Consider, for example, journalist Antoinette Lattouf, author of the book How to Lose Friends and Influence White People. “We still have networks or programs that look like a neo-Nazi’s wet dream,” she claimed. How edifying.
And finally, Larissa Baldwin-Roberts, CEO of GetUp. Appearing last month on the program and proudly donning a Palestinian scarf, she refused to acknowledge that the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” was a call for genocide.
Last night on @QandA, Larissa Baldwin-Roberts wore a scarf depicting the entirety of the land “from the river to the sea†as being Palestinian land, with no recognition of the existence of Israel. pic.twitter.com/UalMY6VZ0Y
— NSW Jewish Board of Deputies (@NSWJBD) October 24, 2023
“I don’t believe that it is hate speech,” she said. No of course not, Larissa. It merely puts into verse Hamas’s goal of eradicating Israel and liquidating every Jewish inhabitant down to the last man, woman and child. You are the worthy winner of the Q+A prize for rank disingenuousness.
For many years the program’s defenders have either denied outright or played down its disdain of mainstream views. Writing in 2015 following an internally commissioned review of Q+A, veteran journalist Ray Martin claimed the show was largely objective in its outlook.
“The impression is that Q&A is a left leaning, politically overcharged, sometimes biased TV discussion, he wrote. “On rare occasions, the program is guilty of each of those complaints. I suspect it’s usually an unwitting mistake.”
I suspect someone was in denial. Questions and Answers? Querulous Arsehattery more like it.
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