Don't believe everything you see on Channel Seven News

I know this news is a couple of weeks old, but I've been meaning to post about it for a while.

For those of you that missed it, the story goes down like this:

• On 14 June 2004, Channel Seven news did a story about airport security. See video of the story here, courtesy of Media Watch. In the story, they claim they hid a box cutter in a handbag and successfully walked onto a flight with it. The footage shows a knife being placed into a handbag and then that handbag on the plane.
• The Aust Federal Police decided, well, that's a CRIME, and the young Channel 7 producer who allegedly took the knife on the flight, Anna Szymanski, gets charged.
• She denies the charge!!   
• What was Channel Seven News' defense? "YOU CAN'T PROVE SHE TOOK THE KNIFE ON THE PLANE."
• The Judge agreed and the case was dismissed. ...
  " the evidence was "not enough to establish inferentially, beyond reasonable doubt, there was a box-cutter in the bag" when it was on the aircraft, Mr Keady said."

So... the lesson is, just because you see it on CHANNEL SEVEN NEWS, doesn't mean it really happened. Remember that folks. And Channel Seven News are the first to admit it. In fact, they are proud of it. Seven news director Peter Meakin said he's "proud of the story".

Funnily enough, if you search the Channel Seven News website for the name "Szymanski", it returns zero results. So I guess they aren't THAT proud.

Fortunately, the rest of the news gathering organization scanned by Google DID think it was newsworthy and you can read the full story here.

And journalists wonder why they always rate so low in surveys about public trust?

Comments

[Tony]

Dosen't surprise me in the least. Have you seen some of the crap that Today/Tonight and A Current Affair have been advertising in their "current affairs" shows.

Even just watching the promos shows you that there isn't a lot of current issues being done or "hard-hitting" journalism going on. All they are after is ratings and sensationalising everything and copying each others stories.

Is it any wonder i never watch the news on TV anymore and get most of what I hear about on the net. Not exactly sure that's reliable either but it's a better choice reading headlines in RSS than sitting for an hr to see nothing interesting.

[Michele]

A newscaster faking a story? NOOOO! If it's on TV it's real! now newspapers just lie about everything but if they have video - it's 100% believable!

My 2 cents from Myrtle Beach

[Des Paroz]

This is funny given today's Dilbert comic - I linked to it on my blog.

What scares me most is that of the commercial stations in Australia, the 7 networks news to me is generally the most credible.

Looks like its ABC or nothing from here on in.

Or blogs and podcasts.

Maybe we need to be doing a daily 15 minute podcast of a news roundup and discussion of key topics.

Man, if only there were time.

[Phillip Molly Malone]

Hmmmm... Hmmm... Martin Di Stasio with that report!
Thats my response (refering back to a famous line in frontline by the Working Dog boys and girls (i.e. Rob stich, etc).

Molly

[Cameron Reilly]

yeah FRONTLINE. Great show. They were ahead of their time, lampooning news shows.

[Bob M]

I thought that was an interesting story too Cameron. The Australian had another good take on it by David Salter (former EP on Media Watch) here too:

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16294660%255E7582,00.html

[Cameron Reilly]

Thanks Bob, great link. I love these quotes:

"These programs - ACA and its doppelganger on Seven, Today Tonight - are the toxic sludge at the bottom of the media barrel. They practise catch and kill journalism of such escalating vileness and crudity that there's surely a case for calling a halt. Their only genuine purpose is to make money, and lots of it. At a conservative estimate this unspeakable drivel delivers about $50 million a year to each network.

Herewith a random selection of promo lines from last week's ACA and TT segment lists: A restaurant so filthy it has to be seen to be believed! The woman who was too sexy for television! Australia's No.1 psychic catches out the con artists! The dance drugs killing our kids - a special report every parent should watch! Unfair speed cameras! Thinking yourself thin! and, gleefully devouring a discarded runt of their own litter, Hinch was wrong!"

And this:

"What ruined that model? The supposedly beneficial forces of the free market. ACA and Today Tonight hunt for the same broad demographic in the same timeslot. Classic market theory holds that such direct, head-to-head competition should raise standards. The truth is patently otherwise. A puerile ratings war has tumbled them both down into the gutter. Both programs are so transfixed by the nightly audience figures that their content choices are driven entirely by crude, lowest-common-denominator factors."

That's what Chomsky et al have been saying about the MSM for decades - that "market forces" have turned them into money-making machines mostly interested in "what sells" and not on "what the people need to know".

[Noeleen]

I had to send the following letter to Sunday Sunrise after their stupid comment that Pauline Hanson wasn't jailed for "free speech" but for being guilty of electoral fraud.

You can have it is you like......

" I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard the Sunrise hosts agree that Pauline Hanson was sent to jail for electoral fraud.

Are these people so naïve that they don’t know of the Tony Abbot’s committee designed to connive a way to get rid of Pauline anyway they could because what she was saying was too familiar with the general population?

Pauline Hanson did not fraud the electoral commission. She was set up by those in power who can do anything they like to get rid of those who disagree with them.

She was released from prison because she was found to be innocent of the charges made to get rid of her. She still has had no recompense for what they did to her.

Is that what you call free speech?

These political thugs have still not been brought to justice for what they did and never will because those in power will always dictate to those struggling to tell the truth. It happens every day.

You call this democracy? You call this freedom of speech?

I think the Sunrise team must be slow risers. Go to bed earlier, guys.

Get some more sleep and be more aware of what you’re saying because the Australian public is not as stupid as those in the media who twist the truth to suit themselves.

Bet you don’t read this one! And do you know why? Because you people are part of the problem. You inferred that an innocent woman was guilty of something that she didn’t do instead of accusing those who had her put away to shut her up.

Noeleen Wood
Tamborine Qld
0755436473 "