MEDIAWATCH: 3 reasons why BSA case against Sean Plunkett is garbage
What is broadcasting – and who decides?
The Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) upholds standards broadcasters are obliged to abide by, and the Broadcasting Act gives it the power to sanction them for serious breaches.
Last Wednesday, Sean Plunket – founder and boss of alternative streaming service the Platform – read aloud a letter he’d had from the BSA telling him someone had objected to Plunket describing Māori tikanga as “mumbo jumbo” earlier this year.
At the time Plunket had called the complainant “a plonker” for approaching the BSA, because he believed it had no authority over its online content.
But this week the BSA said The Platform is “an online broadcaster of a nature we consider clearly falls within BSA jurisdiction”.
The BSA letter was marked ‘confidential’ and ‘not for broadcast’, but Plunket aired the details live on The Platform, before condemning “Orwellian bureaucrats coming for us”.
“It is a hill I’m prepared to die on,” he told listeners.
Yawn.
Watching Sean Plunkett fight the BSA is like a death cage match between the Nazis + Daleks – you’re not sure who to cheer for.
This insanity is garbage for 3 reasons.
The first is the nonsense reason he’s being pulled up. The claim is he called Tikanga mumbo jumbo.
FFS, this is the least terrible shit he has said!
Plunkett is a radioactive hate grifter who has in the past attempted to claim images of starving Gazans were faked, has claimed Māui dolphins were “the Down syndrome kids of marine mammals” that “deserved to die”, has asked if anyone felt sorry for Harvey Weinstein and infamously claimed he was concerned about a mass outbreak of anorexia in Gaza.
And let’s not forget these great moments:
On 12 April 2023, Plunket claimed on The Platform that former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had been hiding her new speaking engagement from the public. After Ardern and The Spinoff confirmed the speaking engagement story was false, Plunket apologised and removed references to the fake Ardern ad from his and The Platform’s social media. He also encouraged his followers to delete any mentions of it as well.[37]
In September 2023, Plunket claimed on The Platform that there were rumors that the media company Stuff had received financial support from the Māori iwi (tribe) Ngāi Tahu, which he claimed contributed to Stuff’s alleged embrace of wokeness and critical race theory. Plunket’s claims were disputed by Stuff’s owner Sinead Boucher, who stated that the company did not have a financial relationship with Ngāi Tahu and suggested that the rumors were motivated by misogyny.[38]
Pinging Sean on calling Tikanga, ‘Mumbo Jumbo’ is like arresting Pol Pot for jaywalking.
The second reason this is garbage is the insane overreach by the woke coven of the BSA itself.
The BSA are a group of noddy do-gooders who are picking the weakest bullshit to try and pull Sean up on.
Sean described Māori Tikanga as ‘mumbo jumbo’ which is the sort of dumb thing your drunk uncle who listens to Reality Check Radio says when half pissed at Christmas lunch because he’s banned from Christmas Dinner.
It’s a waste of time complaint made by woke micro aggression policing vegans who believe all heteronormative sex is rape.
That’s not to say the BSA is a complete waste of skin, they have an important role to play in ensuring journalistic standards are set and maintained on mainstream media, but this over reach for the most tepid nothings on Sean is a blunder that only manages to hand the Political Right more culture war ammunition.
This entire fiasco seems to hinge one what definition of transmission is and looks like a solution looking for a problem rather than any genuine attempt to uphold broadcasting standards.
The third reason the fight between the BSA and Sean is garbage is because this is NOT the most important free speech issue in NZ right now, the Talley’s vs TVNZ issue is…
Talley’s defamation trial: TVNZ warns of chilling effect on NZ journalism
Television New Zealand has warned the country’s news industry operations – and those of individual bloggers and writers – would be curtailed if the courts find against it in a long-running defamation claim brought by Talley’s Group.
The state-owned broadcaster claimed in the High Court at Auckland that it took adequate care in reporting on food processing giant Talley’s, and it was important to both the country and the media industry that this role was protected.
Talley’s has sued over six stories broadcast by its Christchurch reporter Thomas Mead in 2021-22 critical of the Nelson-based conglomerate’s health and safety standards and misconduct in its management of workplace injuries.
Davey Salmon KC, acting for TVNZ, said in closing arguments yesterday that the broadcasters’ newsroom was one of the largest in the country, and if its usual journalistic practices were insufficient to trigger the responsible journalism defence then the doctrine would apply to no one – especially not smaller news operations or individual bloggers.
“This defence needs to protect journalism as it really is in New Zealand,” Salmon said.
…Winston screams stasi censorship, Sean declares he’s going to war, the Free Speech Union gets to pretend they aren’t a Zionist front group, but the REAL challenge to Free Speech is Talley’s attempt to punish TVNZ for being truthful about Talley’s appalling history of abusing worker rights!
Journalistic privilege gives protection between the whistleblower, the journalist and the media platform, for Talley’s to try it and breach that so they can go on a witch hunt against whistleblowers is extraordinary and should be leading every news platform because it cuts to the heart of corporate power vs the Fourth Estate.
Talley’s is NZs biggest scumbag company.
Talley’s crew hacked off by hair shaving
Crew members from a Nelson-based Talley’s ship say they feel violated after their hair was shaved to comply with company drug-testing.
AFFCO blasted over ‘petty’ t-shirt dispute
The Council of Trade Unions is blasting AFFCO’s decision to stand down five staff for wearing campaign t-shirts, as completely ridiculous.
AFFCO said the t-shirts, with the slogan ‘Jobs that count’ on the front and ‘Meat Workers Union’ on the back…resemble gang insignia.
Union says AFFCO/Talley’s is trying to muzzle free speech
The Meatworkers’ Union says Affco Talleys is trying to stop its workers talking about the company on Facebook and other social media.
Over the last three years ACC has paid out $8 million to nearly 5000 Talley’s employees – that’s more than one injury for every worker employed by Talley’s companies. 1286 Talley’s workers were injured on the job last year alone.
AFFCO Talley’s is run by fanatical anti-unionists and have so much power they can play games like attempting to force TVNZ to hand over whistleblower information so they can intimidate everyone else in the media.
Pretending that Sean vs the BSA is the biggest free speech issue in NZ is a culture war fight masquerading as a free speech issue.
Right wing rednecks getting pinged for being dickheads is not nearly as important as one of the most anti-union corporations in NZ trying to silence TVNZ from exposing them.
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“Why can’t we just ignore sean plunkett for the funny little reptile he is………..”
Exactery. 1000%. Even if it’s just for 2 weeks. “as you know”, he’s got an ego the size of a bus and a highly inflated inflated concept of his Intelligence Quotient.
I’d put him in the Army to show Him some discipline – preferably a peace keeping roll somewhere in the Gaza Strip.
Right on Killer !!!