Elon Musk’s Twitter has dropped the labels “government-funded” or “state-affiliated” from several media corporations, including the CBC.
Nevertheless, calling the CBC government-funded is merely stating the obvious. Last year, the Canadian government provided over $1 billion in funding to the CBC, or about 70 percent of annual operating costs. But as Edward R. Murrow famously observed, “The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer.”
But allowing a false impression of potential government involvement in our work to stand unchallenged is inconsistent with our commitment to accurate, fact-based journalism. It is disinformation. And it is why similar objections to Twitter’s media labels have been raised by international public media such as NPR, PBS, Britain’s BBC, Australia’s ABC and SBS, New Zealand’s RNZ and Spain’s RTVE, to name a few.
“A house divided against itself cannot stand” is a banality we’re all familiar with, but what too many Canadians can’t seem to get their heads around is that a national broadcaster supported overwhelmingly by the governing Liberals but bitterly opposed by Conservatives cannot stand, either, and probably shouldn’t. You can blame Pierre Poilievre for this state of affairs if you like. But Justin Trudeau’s Liberals are every bit as guilty.
Why all the fuss about Twitter describing the CBC as “government-funded media”? The CBC is government-funded media. It matters little if it’s 69 per cent or 70 per cent It’s a simple fact that it is majority government funded.
It doesn’t mean it’s bad quality media. It doesn’t mean that its journalists are incompetent (some of the best journalists I’ve met in my long career work for the CBC). It doesn’t mean that all of its shows are lousy. It doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t continue. It just means that it’s a government-owned creation of Parliament, not a private outfit.
You can sympathize with the CBC’s outrage at being designated “government-funded” media on Twitter.
The CBC and its defenders (including the prime minister and several cabinet ministers) have shrieked and wailed and hyperventilated all week that CBC only gets $1.24 billion of its annual budget from the federal government. The other $651 million it earns all on its own.
CBC’s Twitter drama: ‘Media needs to stand their ground’ to ‘What’s the fuss?’ – Canadians divided on news label controversy
Twitter CEO Elon Musk has once again changed Canadian public broadcaster CBC’s Twitter designation in an update Tuesday morning following a strong reaction from Canadian politicians and members of the public.
Looks like they spoke to liberal politicians, CBC employees and their families.
The case for reforming medicare is not so that we can get even with the doctors. Yet that – reform as vengeance – is essentially the basis of Pierre Poilievre’s campaign to defund the CBC. The CBC says things that conflict with Conservative Party dogma. Therefore, a Conservative government will take away its funding. It isn’t a lot more complicated than that.
Pierre Poilievre’s solution for a ‘broken’ Canada is to break more things — including the CBC
Pierre Poilievre appears to have divided this country into two nations. There’s the Canada that Justin Trudeau broke, and then there is the Canada that the Conservative leader himself wants to break.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation definitely falls into the want-to-break category. As Trudeau put it on Monday, Poilievre despises the CBC so much that he’s willing to join forces with Twitter’s mercurial new owner, Elon Musk.
“The fact that he has to run to American billionaires for support to attack Canadians says a lot about Mr. Poilievre and his values,” Trudeau said at a morning press conference.
Spoken by a tone deaf idiot whose circle line their pockets courtesy Communist China’s “Billionaires.”
CBC/Radio-Canada has paused activities on its corporate and news Twitter accounts, after the social media platform put a “government-funded media” label on its @CBC account, in its latest move to stamp public broadcasters with designations.
“Twitter can be a powerful tool for our journalists to communicate with Canadians, but it undermines the accuracy and professionalism of the work they do to allow our independence to be falsely described in this way,” said corporate spokesperson Leon Mar.
Trudeau says Poilievre ‘has to run to American billionaires’ to attack CBC
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attacked Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre Monday for urging Twitter to label CBC as “government-funded media,” the morning after the social media platform added the tag to CBC’s account.
Twitter has put a “government-funded media” label on CBC’s account in what is the latest move by the social media company to stamp public broadcasters with designations.
“Government-funded media is defined as outlets where the government provides some or all of the outlet’s funding and may have varying degrees of government involvement over editorial content,” according to Twitter.
OTTAWA – If Pierre Poilievre wants to “defund the CBC” while maintaining its French-language programming, he’ll have to overhaul the country’s broadcasting law in order to do it.
That’s according to the corporation, which has found itself in a back-and-forth with the Opposition leader over his pledge to axe the roughly $1-billion in taxpayer dollars it receives annually.
The strange death and rebirth of the Liberal Party under Trudeau
The 2011 federal election seemed to have fundamentally changed Canadian politics. And maybe it did. Just not quite in the way it was imagined.
In theory, that vote heralded the arrival of a new political era. The Liberal Party’s day was done — the broadly centrist institution that dominated Canadian politics in the 20th century was no longer fit for purpose. Canada would finally become more like its sister democracies, with a clear contest between a distinct party of the political right and a distinct party of the left. The future seemed to belong to the Conservatives and the NDP.
CBC lays it on thick to support their scandal plagued Boss.
h/t Mauser
OTTAWA – The Opposition Conservatives are asking Twitter to apply a “government-funded” label on accounts associated with the CBC, even as other public broadcasters decry the tag for not making clear their editorial independence.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre tweeted a copy of a letter addressed to the company making that request on Tuesday.
NPR quitting Twitter over label on social media account
BBC journalist: “There’s been a rise in hateful content on Twitter.”
Elon Musk: “Give me an example.”
Journalist: “I can’t.”
Musk: “You just lied.” pic.twitter.com/LONdKdZJH8
— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) April 12, 2023
