Get Up! launches ad attack on News Corp with paper used to dispose of dog excrement
Activist group Get Up! has taken aim at publisher News Corp Australia over some of its recent election coverage in a new online video, labelling some of the recent front pages “misleading crap”.
This latest advertisement, “Thanks Rupert, but Australians can choose their own government”, features a man using a copy of News Corp’s Queensland masthead The Courier Mail to clear up dog excrement.
The attack from Get Up! comes following several uncompromising front pages from News Corp’s tabloids taking aim at Labor PM Kevin Rudd.
“We buy newspapers to read journalists reporting the facts, and they should be on the front page, not aggressive editorial campaigns,” said Sam McLean, national director of Get Up!.
“These sorts of front pages are pretty insulting to the millions of Australians who buy News Corporation’s newspapers and the hundreds of talented journalists, editors and photographers who work for these papers,” he said.
GetUp says it is currently fundraising to screen the ad on the commercial television networks in the lead-up to the September 7 election.
In the last 2010 federal election Get Up! drew criticism for accepting a $1.12m donation from the Labor aligned Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union to fund a TV ad targeting opposition leader Tony Abbott’s policies.
Get Up! has always maintained it is a non-partisan organisation. Its website describes itself as an: “independent, grass-roots community advocacy organisation which aims to build a more progressive Australia.”
At the time of posting, News Corp Australia has not responded to requests for comment.
Nic Christensen
Strange, but no mention of Fairfax’s huge Labor bias? I guess we all choose to believe what we want to believe. “Sigh”.
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They are right Australians will chose their own government and we don’t need any newspaper/ media or silly getup Ad to make up our minds..
ALP/Union own incompetence and corrupt behavior will be the decider in this election, it has been a long 6 years. Our lives are ruled by their policies or did they think we didn’t notice the chaos they have created.
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Are you serious John B?
u can not compare the blatantly biased coverage of the ALP in the News Ltd press to Fairfax..
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I have said it more than once online to Rupert Murdoch, he should shut up and retire….cannot stand his obvious corruption in reporting, cannot stand him. He is erroding our rights, our freedom of speech and our right to the truth, truth being something he knows nothing about!
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John B – ummm, in case you don’t realise it, Fairfax has a major shareholder called Gina. Gina Rinehart. She gives Tony Abbott orders, and he says “yes maam.”
Fairfax is most certainly not biased towards Labor.
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The Daily Telegraph and Courier Mail are hardly representative of Rupert’s total media influence in the country… is it really Rupert’s influence or just the choice of strong editorial tone from a couple of his editors?
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I cannot believe that… HE DIDN’T RECYCLE
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John B,
Where did you get the idea Fairfax is biased in favour of Labor? Regular columns by Peter Costello, Amanda Vanstone, Gerard Henderson, Paul Sheehan – do you think they’re Labor supporters? And wasn’t Fairfax also the springboard for writers such as Miranda Devine? You should rethink your belief, it’s not reality.
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GetUp! having its last gasp before being dispatched to history after Sept 7. The dog excretia is a good metaphor for GetUp! and its leftist ratbaggery. I note they say nothing about the rabid left bias of Fairfax and the ABC. The Canberra Times, for example, has been openly supporting The Greens during this campaign and is trying to get the ACT’s only Liberal defeated and for The Greens to win their Senate seat and thus control the Senate.
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How about the ABC’s political bias? If Murdoch wants to rename the Daily Tele the Daily Conservative, he can, it’s a free country, but the ABC has a duty to be neutral. If the ABC were neutral, it would run stories about decreasing funding to the ABC… but they won’t. They have to be politically biased, it’s part of their DNA. A big fat, Big Government propaganda machine.
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Jeez GetUp! who didn’t think this thing through? The guy who picks up the paper, delivers the proposition and then bins the rag is obviously a paying subscriber. Doesn’t that make him a dickhead? Doesn’t that subvert the message’s cred?
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@ Mish2. I think you missed the point of the article.
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Interesting that Get up claims that Australians can decide their own election, and immediately starts telling us what is worth reading and what to use to wrap up our dog shit.
Where is the dignity? why do they (Get Up) think that we need to have this spelt out to us as if we were Kindergarten children?
Newspapers have been party political for centuries, most of us are able to spot a paste up a mile away. I think the notion of Get Up or anything like it, is a good notion, but I am as wary of groups purporting to be the friend of the people, as I am of Men such as Derryn Hinch, who when supposedly campaigning for a social “fair go, ” will loudly and clearly state the bleeding obvious.
Whenever I hear statements such as “I believe that women should be safe to walk the streets at night without being molested” I immediately think, who doesn’t?
BTW, I am not a newspaper, so I can state the bleeding obvious as part of my personal opinion. ….. In spite of my Labor leanings…… Rudd is a Dud.
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With the Murdoch Press now targeting a much younger market, the 5 to 10 year olds with its comic approach this leaves the older more matiure market to sign on to the onlone version. Clever marketing ploy what? Sorry, what do you mean it isn’t!
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Who subscribes $8 a week to a home-delivered newspaper to pick up dog crap – does this guy light his cigars with $100 notes as well?
And he put in the red general waste bin instead of the yellow recycling bin.
And he should have bagged it first so he doesn’t get dog crap smeared on the inside of his bin and the garbo’s truck.
And he could have put the dog crap in the garden and used it as fertilizer.
So irresponsible on so many levels.
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@Huh.. I think you missed the point of my comment we the Aussie silent majority can think for ourselves with our own experiences, and no media outlet what ever their biases can tell us who to vote for or what to think we can manage that quite aptly on our own and will vote accordingly.
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I just feel sorry for the poor dog crap. What did it do to deserve THAT fate?
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I want to know how much donation this ad gets. Can we ask the question?
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@ Price: you’re right – Murdoch could call the Tele the Daily Conservative (and he should) but he hasn’t. Instead it purports to be a general newspaper when clearly it isn’t one anymore
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The add is flawed in that the guy paid for his newspaper….and not only that since he is getting it delivered he will be paying again tomorrow….and the next day….and the next….if you don’t like the stories don’t buy the newspaper…
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