It is ironic that the Southern Cross Bioethics Institute should release a report on 26 April 2005 which reported that 71% of Australians wanted greater public discussion of abortion. The press, however, has yet to catch up with its own rhetoric. On 12 May the Telegraph refused to accept a paid advertisement which showed a 21 week old spina bifida child in utero who was being operated on by a surgeon, Dr Joseph Bruner, with the intention of helping the child’s quality of life. The photograph showed Dr Bruner’s finger holding the tiny hand of the young child, who was later safely born and named Samuel Armas. According to the Telegraph, such a photograph is too graphic to be set before the delicate sensibilities of 21st century Australians.
Mind you, it is permissible to show the gruesome results of terrorist bombers on the six o’clock news, but one cannot pay for a newspaper to print a most heart-warming photograph of a surgeon operating to save life. In 2004 the ABC screened the programme My Foetus which showed the abortion of a seven-week foetus. That, apparently, is edifying, but an operation to help little Samuel Armas is not. ‘Political language,’ said George Orwell, ‘is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.’
The press parrots a message of truth and freedom, but in reality it imposes its own brand of distortion and censorship.