Fine Line

1. Fine Line A Text Revision Lecture

2. Episode 1 • Topic explored – The Interview • Key Theme – how should journalists treat their subjects? • Frank Walker – Trinity Grammar • Persuasive techniques “the art of persuasion.” • Determination • Quote “It takes a little bit of a mongrel, I suppose, in a human being.”Sally Loane

3. Episode 1 (cont.) • Liz Jackson – match fixing – interview gains trust outside • Feels no guilt in manipulating subjects this way • ‘Cop It Sweet’ – Jenny Brockie • Police in Redfern – seduction and betrayal – Kate McClymont • Closeness between journalists and interviewees • Who does the journalist owe allegiance to? Brockie feels ‘uneasy’ • Quote “…your job isn’t to save them from themselves.” • “the business of winning trust…always carries with it the possibility of betrayal.”

4. Episode 1 (cont.) • Toni McCrae, John Cleary and the Jim Cairns ‘confession’ • 2003 Cleary interviewed Cairns previously Federal Treasurer (1975) • JunieMorosi was an influential member of his staff - supposed affair • McCrae never asked Cairns about the affair • Cleary got the story from Cairns and refused to edit it out after finding out about perjury • Quote “.. Sometimes decency and ethics in journalism can appear, from the outside, to lead you right into the gutter” Fanning to Cleary

5. Episode 2 • The Interview • Pauline Hanson interviews – Fanning and McKew discuss interviews with Hanson • McKew’s ‘hostile’ interview with Hanson – Hanson was ‘diminishing the process’ • Hanson uses inaccurate statistics and ‘facts’ • Fanning says she ‘never intended to be fair’ wanted to expose inaccuracies in Hanson’s public statements • Audience reaction • McKew tells about not knowing her audience

6. Episode 2 (cont.) • Virginia Trioli interviews Peter Reith • Children Overboard affair • Reith went on the attach to stop Trioli interviewing him – he made it seem as if she was calling him, and the navy, liars • Some of the audience sided with Reith • Audience does not like aggression in female interviewers • Hysteria in public about refugees • Trioli caught on back foot

7. Episode 2 (cont.) • Sally Loane and Philip Nitschke • Euthanasia – Crick Case bowel cancer – none found • Loane aggressively attacked Nitschke • Loane admits that she “crossed an objectivity line” • Personal experience of suicide in family • ‘Don’t strive to be objective, strive to be fair’ – SydDeamer • Kerry O’Brien – allegations of bias against him – favouring Labor politicians • He gives himself 10 out of 10

8. Episode 5 • Theme – Taboos • Sexism in Aboriginal communities - McKew at Aurakun • Went to Cape York to report on self determination movement and found violence and sexism • Agonised over report – didn’t report on it and regrets it • Tony Koch interference in black communities - “a blind desire to address the problem immediately”. • Seagulls • Andrew Rule – Geoff Clark • Fanning says that the story probably “did more than any other to break the taboo • around reporting of the abuse of Aboriginal women and children by Aboriginal • men.” • Clark accused him of racism

9. Episode 5 (cont.) • Ray Martin and Wilcannia – went to report on school • Found abuse in community • Background is Hanson – Martin says reconciliation ‘had been dear to him for many years’ • Elders consulted before story told • Teachers had to leave their jobs • Peter Charlton – Terry Lewis • The Courier-Mail paid Lewis$30,000 for his exclusive story. • Charlton says cheque “changes everything” and was “easily the worst thing” he’d ever done • Jennifer Byrne – Chequebook Journalism • Witches of Warwick

10. Important Quotes – Episode 1 • “I actually don’t have a big problem with knocking on someone’s door…and offering the opportunity for them, if they’re in the news, to put their side of the story…” (Peter Lynch) • “You are trying to work out what it is that might persuade people that they want to tell the story that you want told.” (Liz Jackson) • “If you start doing that you start being a player…It’s certainly not in the public interest.” (Jenny Brockie) • “I thought about it… but very quickly said no.” (Toni McRae) • “…the ethics and the decency coincide as closely as possible.” (John Cleary)

11. Important Quotes – Episode 2 • I had never intended to be fair to the woman; I had only wanted to appear to be so.” (Ellen Fanning) • “I’m a journalist. I’ll question anything until I get the truth.” (Virginia Trioli) • “…I think still you have to strive to be objective, I really think you do.” (Sally Loane) • “I’ve tried very hard to walk a straight line…and I suppose I am my own biggest critic.” (Kerry O’Brien)

12. Important Quotes – Episode 5 • “I saw the much bigger issue of racism…” (Maxine McKew) • “Indigenous people in communities call us - politicians, journalists - seagulls, because we fly in, shit on them and leave. And that’s what you’ve got to avoid.” (Tony Koch) • “The basic ethics is you have to treat everybody the same.” (Andrew Rule) • “You are on the edge of a dilemma. At what stage do we say, “We’ll turn a blind eye to that domestic crime…to the fact that these kids are being abused, and are being raped.” (Ray Martin) • “It was easily the worst thing I had ever done, and I don’t ever want to go through that kind of experience again.” (Peter Charlton) • “I would prefer never to interview anyone who had received any money at all.” (Jennifer Byrne)