A few different debates kicked off from yesterday’s edition of Crikey. First of all, what’s the extent and potential harm of the relationship between the Liberal Party and News Corp? Is it a relationship that can ever be disentangled? Secondly: can we really justify trashing dockless bikes? And if so, how does that moral framework apply to keying cars that have been parked poorly? Asking for a friend.

 

Re: Greg Barns’ “Dutton calls on News Corp to help him weaken the AAT”

Leon Knight writes: Way past time those three publications [The Herald Sun, The Daily Telegraph, The Australian] in particular had their wings clipped severely. There needs to be a law that can be used to prosecute media that attacks our judiciary and organisations that protect the freedoms of us all — such behaviour is so close to treason the difference doesn’t count.

Bref writes: As Murdoch’s Fox blows the Trump horn in the US, so Murdoch’s News Corp is the propaganda machine for the LNP. Neutering corporate and government oversight regulatory bodies has been the hallmark of the LNP for decades. Punitive anti-union regulations and Dutton’s latest push to “tighten” security through even greater spying on citizens are the other side of the LNP coin.

Paul Munro writes: An important contribution, thanks Greg. The influence of News Corp is notably through nudging its malleable allies in the LNP. It shapes so much of the agenda through the remainder of mainstream media, especially the ABC. Apart from the colonisation of the ABC board and leadership by News Corp ex-staffers or Turnbull cries, the prevailing ABC approach to achieving “balance” in current affairs presentation is to take the lead from the daily News Corp party line and serve it up to whoever happens along for interview.

In relation to visa processing, it seems that thus far few people understand the mooted plan to outsource the function to a for-profit provider like Serco. Visa processing operates across a relative maelstrom of human, social, security and political interests… What a sorry state we are becoming when we seem ready to tolerate the privatisation of a regulatory service of such permeative influence across so many dimensions critical to a fairly governed and balanced society. Please keep applying a blowtorch to these “small government” evangelists and their acolytes in the LNP, not forgetting they have counterparts in the ALP.

 

Re: Bernard Keane’s “Is there a moral and economic imperative to vandalise share bikes?”

Paul Dwerryhouse writes: “The externality is the mass dumping of (dockless) bikes in Australian cities imposing visual pollution, hazards for pedestrians and clean-up costs for local councils that have to collect the things.” Bernard, I walk 14 kilometres each day, from Melbourne’s inner suburbs to the Docklands and out again for work, and dockless bikes do not come even remotely close to presenting a hazard to me in the way that cars and motorbikes, both moving and parked — legally or illegally — do on a daily basis.

Thanks for your article, though. I now feel empowered to run my key along the side of any vehicle — which, themselves, are all dockless — that endangers my life or is parked poorly.

David Edmunds writes: I love the idea that bikes could be left unencumbered for the use of citizens. It is a travesty that some citizens cannot just leave the bike somewhere safe when they have used it. It is not asking a lot. Throwing a bike, or almost anything else, off a cliff is the height of stupidity.

I think it is ridiculous to criticise the business model. It is analogous to criticising an enterprise that suffers from unsightly graffiti or broken windows. It is not the fault of the business, just the immaturity and irresponsibility of some citizens.

AR writes: Have a look at a recent photo essay in the Grauniad on the abandoned hire bikes of China: a symphony of steel and colour.

David Francis writes: All I hear, Bernard, is the wail of the baby being thrown out with the bathwater. I don’t know why the Sydneysiders have a problem with share bikes. Here in Adelaide you see the odd one or two that have been abandoned, but that’s it. There are teething problems with them, not a conspiracy. 

 

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