Wake Up Australia: The ABC’s Naked Contempt for Ordinary Australians

The ABC no longer bothers to hide its feelings about the country that funds it. The contempt is not subtle; it is naked and broadcast openly by presenters and reporters who seem to regard ordinary Australians as impediments to their vision of a better, more enlightened nation. A public broadcaster that once prided itself on reflecting Australia has instead become a platform for hectoring it.

Laura Tingle embodies it perfectly. Her commentary carries the unmistakable tone of someone who has grown tired of the country around her – tired of its voters, tired of its history, tired of its stubborn refusal to conform to her ideological preferences. When the electorate makes choices she dislikes, she speaks not with curiosity but with irritation, as if democracy itself has malfunctioned. Her delivery is that of a person convinced she is surrounded by people who need correction. The contempt is not hinted; it is declared.

Sarah Ferguson expresses the same attitude, only with sharper edges. Her interviews with conservative figures are less discussions than punitive ceremonies. Guests are interrupted, lectured, and spoken over, not because Ferguson is probing for truth but because she is asserting cultural authority. She interrogates as though she is disciplining a misbehaving subordinate. What viewers witness is not journalism but a kind of ideological performance art in which Ferguson demonstrates that she – and, by extension, the ABC – is morally superior to the people she interrogates. Her disdain is ritualised, and it is unmistakably naked.

Patricia Karvelas adds her own strain of sanctimony, speaking as though her audience consists of morally defective pupils who must be reformed through relentless nudging. Annabel Crabb, wrapped in her perky charm, still cannot resist the anthropological posture: the suburbs are curiosities to be studied, not communities to be taken seriously. Their attitudes are dressed up in humour or enlightened language, but the message is always the same – the real problem with Australia is Australians.

Paul Barry enforces these boundaries. Media Watch has drifted from accountability into ideological policing. Commercial outlets, conservative voices, and dissenters are shamed; the ABC is handled with kid gloves. Barry’s contempt is not incidental – it is the organising principle of the program.

And then there is Louise Milligan, the broadcaster’s most militant voice. Her pursuit of George Pell was driven less by journalistic neutrality than by crusading fervour. When Pell – later exonerated by a unanimous High Court – was sent to prison, Milligan’s triumph was barely concealed. An innocent man spent more than a year behind bars, yet the ABC’s champion of moral certainty offered no public reckoning when the case collapsed. Her silence was not oversight; it was emblematic. Naked contempt does not apologise.

This is the ABC’s worldview in miniature: a sense of superiority so ingrained that the public is no longer viewed as a partner in democracy but as a flawed mass requiring instruction. The broadcaster has ceased to reflect the nation; it seeks to reshape it in its own image, dragging reluctant Australians toward a cultural position they never voted for and do not share.

And then came Bondi.

In a moment when the country was raw, grieving, and united in horror, the ABC again reverted to instinct. Rather than acknowledge the shock gripping millions, it drifted into euphemism, deflection, soft language and fastidious contextualising – as though the public’s immediate, visceral reaction were something to be corrected rather than understood. While Australians were confronting the brutality of what had happened, the ABC seemed almost embarrassed by their emotion. Its response was detached, sanitised, intellectualised. The country was in mourning; the broadcaster behaved like a tutor managing overexcited pupils.

Bondi did not just expose a tragedy – it exposed a chasm. On one side were millions of Australians experiencing grief, fear and solidarity. On the other was a broadcaster whose first instinct was cultural positioning. At the very moment the public needed clarity, the ABC delivered condescension.

Australians can live with criticism. They can live with scrutiny. What they should not have to live with is a taxpayer-funded institution that holds its own citizens in such open disdain. Until the ABC remembers that its mandate is to serve the nation – not scold it – it will remain what it has become: a broadcaster that mistakes its superiority for insight and its naked contempt for courage, all while expecting the rest of the country to keep paying for the privilege.