The ABC and SBS provide tangible social benefits to Australia and contribute hugely to our cultural and intellectual life, writes Loz Lawrey. But because they aren’t profit-driven, they don’t fit nicely into conservative ideology.

Does the language used by those who speak for the Abbott government make you ill? Physically nauseous? Rhetoric can do that. You’re probably what they call a “leftie”, the term conservative neoliberals use for people who don’t subscribe to their dog-eat-dog worldview.

Those of us tarred with the “leftie” brush tend to see the world through a different prism to those on the far right, where belief and ideology often carry more weight than evidence-based analysis. We tend to care about our fellow-citizens and demand measured decision-making based on documented fact. Our aspirations encompass fairness, social justice and inclusion for all.

These concepts, which we regard as absolute necessities in a healthy democracy, are often dismissed by the right as cheesy socialist idealism, the naïve language of dreamers.

On social media platforms, when progressives and conservatives try to communicate, what begins as civil discussion quickly breaks down and turns into mutual vilification. This is why we tend to gravitate to groups of the like-minded, where our views are supported and encouraged. We like our feathers stroked, not ruffled.

Consensus is an impossible dream as long as those trying to reach it hold opposing views of the world, or the world they would like to see, and base their arguments on differing and often contradictory premises.

It is clear that any debate about the future of our government-owned media group the ABC and the hybrid-funded SBS is constantly subverted by diametrically-opposed and irreconcilable views of what these organisations actually are, what their purpose is and what they should be doing.

The conservative view is that they are businesses in pitched competitive battle with other privately-owned media outlets. So the argument from the right tends to go: “They’re businesses, so the government should privatise them. It’s not the job of government to run businesses”.

This very limited vision implies that the ABC and SBS exist solely for the purpose of making money. Naturally, those running the privately-owned broadcasting media share this perspective – they see the taxpayer-owned platforms as stealing their viewers, listeners and readers. In other words, as their competitors, stealing their income.

The progressive viewpoint is that the ABC and SBS are not businesses by any definition. They are community service-providers. They are not profit-driven organisations, but rather were created to serve Australian society by educating, informing and entertaining our citizens. They are, and should remain, taxpayer-funded services. The fact that some taxpayers are disengaged and unappreciative of the benefits of properly-funded public broadcasting shouldn’t play into this debate.

It’s as simple as this: the ABC and SBS provide tangible social benefits to Australia by their very existence and contribute hugely to our cultural and intellectual life.

The social awareness that becomes a possibility when governments support the arts and the exchange of ideas is an asset to the country as a whole, whether people choose to avail themselves of that awareness or not.

This is why all taxpayers should be pleased to contribute to the funding of healthy independent public broadcasting. It quite simply makes our country a better place, a place with a raised awareness and hopefully, a heightened social conscience.

It could be argued that the function of taxpayer-owned or partly-owned media has nothing to do with profit-making, rather that the charter of these organisations is to raise the consciousness of the nation by teaching our children and involving our adult population in an ongoing national conversation while keeping us informed. In other words, smartening-up the country and acting as a cultural facilitator. Making things better, and making Australia a better place to live in for ALL its residents, bar none.

Profit-driven media share no such lofty aspirations. Here the focus is on attracting passive viewers to absorb and assimilate the endless stream of mind-numbing advertising which is commercial media’s bread and butter.

So here it’s about dumbing-down, not raising up. It’s not about serving the consumers, it’s about using them to extract financial profit. People who submit to exposure to privately-owned broadcasting allow themselves to be mentally herded like sheep, to be manipulated by a form of social engineering controlled by money-men.

Image by @KieraGorden on twitter.com

It’s true that neoliberal rhetoric tends to reduce every issue to the level of money: “Does it make a quid?” If it does, it’s seen to be of value.

So when progressives say “This is a wonderful organisation that delivers measurable social dividends for the Australian community”, the conservative response tends to be: “Yes, but does it make a quid?”

The Abbott government sees government itself as a business, hence the ongoing obsession with budget surpluses. If a surplus is achieved, money has been made and the “business” has proven itself successful. A budget deficit implies business failure. In the mind of the Coalition, “government” means “corporation”.

Opponents of the conservative regime paint a different picture of what government should be: a system-operating body that exists to serve the people who installed it by responding to their needs domestically and representing them fairly and equitably on the world stage.

In this context, what does a little debt matter when good outcomes are being achieved? Surely good outcomes, not financial gain, are the objective. Success and failure are measured on a different scale altogether, a scale which measures social benefits rather than profit margins. Clearly, in this view government is not a business, rather the clerical administrator of the nation.

Taking care of the nation’s affairs is not the enterprise of a business. Sure, the books need to reconcile and balance, but that is not the end in itself. A nation has no need to turn a financial profit. It’s not about the economy (although that needs monitoring), it’s about the people.

The schism between worldviews highlighted by the Abbott government’s assault on public broadcasting, underpins every argument between the political right and left and sabotages all attempts to find consensus on desirable outcomes.

Perhaps we need to revisit our definition of “government”. One accepted definition is that government is the system by which a state or community is governed. This means that those “in government” at any time are there to administer the affairs of the nation by maintaining law and order, funding infrastructure as needed and serving the needs of its citizens by acting in the public interest, while upholding social justice and human and civil rights.

No argument there from either side, you may say. But this is where perspective comes into play and rhetoric can skew the debate. The two sides of politics have differing interpretations of what it means to govern. The perspective of those on the right begins from the premise that people are stupid and that to govern means to control the populace, while those on the left start from the assumption that we’re not stupid and that to govern means to serve the populace.

With regard to the ABC and SBS, perhaps both sides need to align their assumptions before engaging in the funding debate. What is shocking to many ABC supporters is that those who are baying the loudest for its blood see it as a burden on the taxpayer rather than the iconic avatar of Australia’s consciousness that it has always been.