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News Corp’s fossil fuel advertising dressed as news should be illegal (independentaustralia.net)

submitted 2 weeks ago by Joshi@aussie.zone to c/australia@aussie.zone

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LAST WEEK, News Corp’s newspapers The Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, The Courier Mail and The Adelaide Advertiser caused controversy by publishing front page “exclusives” and “special reports” alleging that more gas is needed to avoid electricity blackouts in the future.

If readers turned the page and read the fine print, they would learn that this so-called “news” was actually not news. It was an advertorial (a fancy word for an advertisement), paid for by – you guessed it – the fossil fuel industry.

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[-] Joshi@aussie.zone 11 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

This is deliberately misleading. I'm not sure why you think it can't be outlawed, numerous laws exist regarding false and misleading advertising which is exactly what this is.

It is not reasonable to expect even a majority of people to pick up on this kind of deliberate deception.

Making this kind of deliberate deception illegal would not be limiting freedom of speech, opinion pieces and clearly labelled advertising are one thing, a front page story with no indication that it is not news is another.

[-] RaymondPierreL3@aus.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

@Joshi
You sound very angry. The first question you need to ask yourself is : What it the truth? And whether a journalist's opinion or perspective is - just as your toot is - truth or not. In fact, our own personal truths are a collage of what we have accepted as truth based on our experience and that of others we trust for one reason or another - nothing more.

So your truth may very well be someone else's lie. What makes you, or anyone else, judge and jury? It might all boil down to the majority view in which case we're talking about the tyranny of the majority - is that kind of world you desire? Where would you draw the line on what is legal or not? And on what basis would you make that decision? Nothing is black & white.

I think we should stop the thread here and agree to disagree my friend.