When I was
a kid the ABC was on at my Nanny’s house when we were visiting during dinner
time and a small T.V was perched in the corner of a tiny kitchen and we would
complain because we wanted to watch A Country Practice. It was my favourite
show as a child, apart from Grizzly Adams. I gave Neighbours a good look in
when Kylie Minogue actually said something about gender stereotypes in a pair
of overalls fixing cars and she didn’t have to follow that message up with a
daily Instagram account with gratuitous shots of her arse in a thong for the
sake of sales. It wasn’t a confusing
message to girls and young women. It was clear and important. There wasn’t so
much of a choice in terms of viewing back then. There was a lot more Australian
content that got viewing time that was actually watched by a good proportion of
the population. We also tuned into the Henderson Kids and enjoyed something of
a home grown drama that was family friendly. Most kids I knew watched those
television shows because there simply wasn’t as much of a clash with international
content. We still watched American sitcoms sometimes too. Family Ties was an all-time
favourite of mine and the Muppet show was a staple for sure. To a large extent, the programming took place
so that Australian content was protected against too many clashes with American
television shows. These days, people don’t give a toss about such clashes. It
is the ultimate bunfight amongst content from all sorts of streaming options.
I’m glad my
Nanny insisted on the ABC. She wasn’t even a highly educated lady. She was smart
enough though. It was more circumstances that had her working from a young age
and Tertiary studies weren’t really ever going to be on the agenda. The ABC was not just for the elite and higher
classes. It was good content with an Educational bent with something for
everyone. I spent many hours as a child watching Play School for example, as
did my own children later on. The current affairs component was hard hitting
and vital. The arts and culture was largely focused on Australia and most
importantly to ensure this subjectivity, it was owned by our Government.
Today I
feel sad. I realised a shift in the ABC as more of a certainty then a suspicion
today, that has been slowly creeping in. At first I couldn’t put my finger on
it. Today I can. More and more, it seems
to me the ABC has really suffered under government budget cuts. I was eating my
breakfast with our two Labradoodles. They get me with forlorn eyes and the look
of a dog that might break into a million pieces without being offered at least
a good proportion of one piece of toast. I was tuned into ABC morning breakfast
and a promotion for a dance show coming out of the US was on offer. The dancers
were very able, very skilled, acrobatic and I’m sure hard working to have
trained their bodies to that kind of elite capacity. The television show is cookie
cutter teen dance, schmaltzy script and pretty standard contemporary, tightly
in sync choreography. It’s not breaking any rules, comes from a highly disciplined
system of learning and doesn’t say a heck of a lot about culture or innovation.
I’m thinking the ABC now relies on these kinds of highly commercial cross promotions
from the point of view of financial stability. Australia is so very rich in its
Arts Culture. We are leaders in the areas of Dance, Disability Arts, Film Making,
Theatre, Music, Visual Arts and Literature. In choosing this content there are a
million and one dance practitioners and innovators on our home soil that missed
out, not only on a good chance to promote themselves or their programs but on a
chance for people to have a culturally enriched moment over a cup of a coffee
and morning meal. Having been fortunate enough to work amongst artists in Melbourne
and to see a lot of theatre and live performances I know of some amazing work
that is happening. What’s more it’s happening with communities that benefit in more
ways than one. It’s happening in financially depressed areas, with people who
have a disability, with young people facing homelessness, with indigenous
communities, with old people who never give up on that beautiful connection between
mind and body and expression. It’s happening in schools, in Youth Theatres, in
Nursing Homes and at the Arts Centre, in the Opera House or in a tiny little
theatre nobody has ever heard of. Yeah, no I don’t really want to sign up to a
dance class run by an American owned tv show that is touring and selling something
we have seen so much before. Many Australian Artists feel they need to leave
our home soil and become expats in another country to open up their options for
Arts experience. In some ways this means narrowing their creative options to
fit this cookie cutter but highly marketable model of Arts participation.
Actors for example might need to travel to the UK or USA and fit within a
system that has to take less risks in the face of what sells and a selling
model that encourages the viewer’s palate towards a very highly commercial
model that sells much merchandise and other products too. Artists who stay here
often live on the poverty line, despite being absolutely magical in their
creativity and experimentation. Artists who stay here, often need two or three
jobs to stay afloat. Many artists I have employed leave the craft of directing
or performing for a more secure job in Arts Administration, simply because their
Arts work does not pay the bills! How can they possibly compete with that
commercial sector? They are creatively and socially and psychologically in
front, they are often connecting their art to those that need to belong, they
are bringing communities together rather than turning the Arts into a cherry
picker climb the ladder, cut throat race to the top. Some of them take their
work to other countries too, proud of what we grew here in our beautiful country.
Some go abroad to collaborate or decide to bring performers from one country to
us rather like a very rich cultural exchange.
The people
who do this work can barely pay rent. It’s hard going. If they weren’t such
great people, they wouldn’t do it. We should reward heart. We should reward
innovation. If the ABC is at the point where it has to pander to some of the
most commercially bland work, I’m sad about that.
I would
love to see an ABC television show and online forum that is about the Arts in Australia
that is a permanent space by which people can apply to show or discuss their
work from all sectors of the Arts or even better a place where ABC content
providers go to first in their quest to present the most meaningful content.
How can
they do that without money. They can’t. When the liberal government made cuts to
the ABC, possibly in fear of media bias towards the Labour government, I honestly
don’t think they thought too much about anything other than winning. What are
we losing though? Are we willing to lose our soul? Our culture? Our best
practice journalists and artists and hosts? How many good, hard hitting journalists
are going to want to sign up for a slot on the ABC if it’s simply starting to
become a propagation tool for US sales.
Come on, we
know better than that.
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