Keith Windschuttle's appointment to the ABC board is not the final victory of the conservatives in the culture wars. It is not, despite the faux outrage displayed by left-wing pundits and the Friends of the ABC, the final victory by conservatives in the culture wars.
Instead, it is an admission of defeat. Having him on the board of the national broadcasting will do little to redress the bias of the ABC's coverage of news and opinion.
By stacking the board full of conservatives -- a board that has little influence to change the broadcaster's day-to-day policy -- advocates of reform can wash their hands, thinking the job has been done.
After 10 years in government, the Coalition has not managed to budge the ABC's culture one bit. Assuming that we will continue to have a government-owned broadcaster funded by taxpayers, it is clear by now that the only way to improve the ABC is a massive change -- ommercialisation, a cull of the middle management, and the genuine embrace of a diversity of opinions. At the moment, the opinions expressed on the ABC range from soft pink, to hard red, to deep green. While there are some notable exceptions, the point is they are exceptions.
Those who most vigorously pursue the cause of the "independence" of the ABC can't appreciate that most of the time the ABC only ever gives coverage to one side of politics. If government is truly to be "held to account", why is it that the ABC only attacks governments (Labor and Liberal) from a left-wing perspective?
The claim that commercial broadcasters are "right-wing" and therefore a "left-wing" ABC is required for "balance" misses the point. The national broadcaster must be balanced -- it is not its mandate to undertake some self-appointed role of addressing bias in the media.
Why, if the Government truly wants to reform the ABC, does it restrict itself to board appointments? As Windschuttle himself has argued, the ABC has "built a house culture that even the appointment of a board now dominated by conservatives has been unable to displace". It is unclear what the addition of one more conservative would accomplish.
There is every indication that Mark Scott, the incoming ABC managing director, will do a good job. A government intent on supporting him could have contemplated board appointments that will support him.
None of this is to say that, personally or professionally, Windschuttle is unsuited to being on the ABC board. His record as a journalist, media commentator and media academic is formidable. He has been a working journalist, and a frequent contributor to newspapers and magazines around Australia and the world. He has written a series of books on media and communication.
Windschuttle's contribution to Aboriginal history has been controversial, but it is not, as his critics allege, divisive. Windschuttle's scholarship is not in dispute. Instead, what has been attacked are the conclusions that he draws from the evidence. By uncovering failures in the academic discipline of history he has done the field a service. Others are free to contest his interpretation; however, to denigrate his role as a leading scholar denies his importance.
The real culture wars are far more subtle than the popularised issues of saying "sorry", the republic, and the treatment of asylum seekers. At stake are bigger questions about our history, who we want to be, and the role of government.
The ABC board has little to no effect on the everyday lives of Australians.
The real culture wars are not ones that can be placed on a pithy bumper sticker. The culture wars are about the values that exist in our education system, our universities, our courts and our public institutions. Increasingly, conservatives are being marginalised in debates on these values.
For example, in Victoria, the Bracks Government's proposed charter of rights would allow unelected judges, not the parliament as the representative of the people, to make decisions about our laws. This is a major challenge to our democratic heritage and yet it has hardly been discussed.
Most of the teaching of Australian history in our classrooms and lecture halls either ignores or is positively hostile to the contribution that Europeans have made to this country since 1788. And the arguments about Keith Windschuttle's history are evidence of the fact that few people are willing to examine both sides to the story of our history.
There's no reason Keith Windschuttle shouldn't be on the ABC board. The fear is that his appointment is a distraction from the much bigger issues that are really at stake in our culture wars.
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