It is 2020. We are on deadline. And the professors are in charge. Seven years since the imposition of the News Media Council – and anti-democratic academics are editing our newspapers. Bookish elites – thinkers not doers – are defining news for the ordinary people. And our freedom – Our Freedom! – lies bleeding to death in the gutter of our dreams.

Brave and bold voices of moderation like Bolt, Devine, Akerman and Albrechtson – the spokespeople for the voiceless – have been hounded from journalism, leaving The People unrepresented in a New World Order governed by latte-quaffing, tertiary educated goons who each day bring down the jackboot of elitism on the face of the Oi Oi Oi.

A new strain of journalism has been imposed under this new regime, one that minimises the use of unnamed sources, messes up good yarns with context and background and insists on the immediate fixing of mistakes and the prominent publication of apologies and corrections.

“The right to stir and slur with impunity has been trampled upon by the imposition of  professionalism,” said a jaded former News Ltd columnist, now relegated to running the spell check on the subs’  backbench. “Rupert will be spinning in his grave.”

Except Rupert is not dead. Now approaching 90, his hair a shade of aubergine and his skin a shade of flakey papyrus, Murdoch The Elder lays strangely silenced in his Park Avenue apartment, surrounded by heavily armed journalism professors – stymieing his instinctive attempts to boldly split his infinitives and expose the norks of nubile 19-year-old girls.

The Murdoch empire is now under the control of the oldest son, Lachlan, who in his typically metrosexual way has capitulated to the new regime and appointed a fascist coterie of former bloggers to his editorships – all of them beard-stroking, Barthes-quoting intellectuals who  insist that published bylines give way to subtle iterations of the “implied author” and post-structuralist discourses that identify signifiers in Question Time analysis. Not even the Rugby League and AFL back-pages are safe, their editorships given over to analysis of Queer Theory and the deconstruction of the sexocratic social order.

“This all comes from Finkelstein,” said one former press gallery member, now working incognito in a Hume Highway fast-food franchise and smuggling out precious analysis of internal ructions within the ALP to a public readership starved of idle and unsourced speculation. “We warned them that forcing newspapers to prominently publish corrections was the thin end of the wedge. And here we are, with the professors in charge – cracking down on misplaced modifiers and  throwing passive case authors into solitary confinement.”

Attempts to overthrow the autocratic regime have been thwarted by a ruthless secret police cadre created by the government’s communications minister, Major General Grogs Gamut – a former blogger and now vainglorious enforcer who insists he be represented at every state occasion by Ralph Fiennes as Coriolanus.

To his left is Mr Denmore, an obscure blogger and traitor, who has bought himself a place in the regime as editor-in-chief, interviewing himself and routinely launching gagging writs to silence his many critics.

“It’s the one link with the past,” said one former press gallery journalist. “Having an editor who hides behind defamation law to suppress public debate is something that keeps former traditions alive.”

Thank heavens for small mercies.

(See also:)


9 Comments

Dan · March 11, 2012 at 10:06 PM

Another perceptive piece Mr D. I thought the mainstream media would start squealing like stuck pigs when the The Fink's report was handed down. I was right. I doubt the recommendations of the report will ever be implemented, but if they are I also doubt the sky will fall.

Seamus · March 11, 2012 at 11:25 PM

The ranting and raving from rags like the TheOz has convinced me everyone of Fink's recommendations must be implemented ASAP.

A nice piece btw, I chuckled.

Fiona · March 12, 2012 at 12:46 AM

Bring it on, Mr Denmore!

Anonymous · March 12, 2012 at 3:51 AM

One presumes that a major unforseen side effect of this…was it a coup de etat or a revolution? – is that the public is now better informed about and involved in public affairs.
Oh the horror!

fred

730rep0rtLand · March 13, 2012 at 1:23 AM

Gee, the time has flown since the News Media Council took over and dear old Piers retired from public life, sadly with dementure. Apparently he had it for several years, but nobody noticed.

It was all too much for the Devine miss M, who fled to the USA to work on a FOX gig part time, and joined the Bachmann team as a media wrangler in the 2020 Presidential push.

As we all know, Bolt went on to federal politics to take up the position as Shadow Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the Turnbull opposition.

Still with a keen interest in science, Albrechtsen entered the scientific field, as a test subject.

Not wanting to totally lose the flavour of the organisation, the Major General and the Denmore Nazi retained the young Hildebrand fellow to operate the spell check.

Syd Walker · March 13, 2012 at 4:10 AM

The Finkelstein Inquiry missed the really big issue entirely – It's what's MISSING in the media that matters most!

I develop this argument at “Come in No 12! Taking a Megaphone to Australia’s Finkelstein debate”
http://sydwalker.info/blog/2012/03/12/come-in-no-12-taking-a-megaphone-to-australias-finkelstein-debate/

Anonymous · March 13, 2012 at 10:41 PM

Without doubt, the requirement for accuracy and accountability will spell the end of 'journalism' as we know it.

Aidan · March 14, 2012 at 3:52 AM

The scariest bit of that piece was the revelation that nasty Rupe might still be around in 2020! Too horrible to contemplate.

Anonymous · March 19, 2012 at 10:13 AM

Tee hee, Mr Denmore.

7.30reportLand, hilarious.

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