‘Getting Murdoched’: How the Murdoch media attacks its targets
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What does “getting Murdoched” mean and why is it important?
I'm Daniel James, and you're listening to seven AM. For decades, Rupert Murdoch's Meteor Empire has helped shape politics and public debate, and in doing so, has often left lasting consequences for some of the people caught in its sites. From politicians to public figures to everyday people. The consequences can be devastating. Journalists Matthew Rickardson and Andrew Dodd have a name for what happens when the attention becomes a campaign. They call it getting Murdoch'd. Today, co-author of their new book, Getting Murdoch's, Matthew Rickardson, on the people who found themselves on the receiving end and the media culture that could outlast Rupert Murdoch himself.
It's Friday, August fourteenth. Matthew, thanks so much for speaking with us on 7am. Um you've witnessed up close and you've even experienced it. So what exactly do you mean by getting burdocked?
Getting Murdoch is when a person is the kind of subject of hostile attention from the Murdoch media, usually based on what you say or you believe that doesn't accord with what they say or believe. You can get monstered by one media outlet owned by Murdoch, or you can get monstered by What Stephen Main calls the full Murdoch Symphony, the tabloid newspapers, Sky After Dark. And since the late nineteen eighties, um, Rupert Murdoch has owned around about two thirds of the daily and Sunday newspapers in this country. Now, newspapers are not as influential or as large a part of the media ecosystem these days as they were, but they all have online editions, they all have kind of reach into social media and so on.
And so it is fair to say that Murdoch, along with the ABC, has the biggest media footprint in the country.
Okay. So let's talk about some of the targets of some of these prolonged campaigns, some of whom People would remember, like Britney Higgins and Yasmin Abdulmajid, Scott McIntyre. What what are the stories out of all the people that you've spoken to for this book that stay with you the most?
Well, um the Britney Higgins story has stayed with us. I mean, um, it has its origins back in 2019 when she claimed and then was proven in a civil court to have been raped on a minister's couch in the federal parliament.
How did the Murdoch media target Britney Higgins and what were the consequences?
Um When I say it's a complicated story, it's because it's spawned a kind of almost a cottage industry of legal actions. And what we were interested in, not to the exclusion of the other, but to investigate how one newspaper, and in particular one columnist at one newspaper, that is the Australian the newspaper and the columnist is Janet Albrexon. have focused inordinately on the Britney Higgins case.
I I think at the Australian we have done such a tremendous job of making sure that we have covered this case from just about every angle that we could. because it seemed to us that much of the media were not interested in hearing from other women in this case that believal women only appro applied to Brittany Higgins.
What happens in the process as she writes about a hundred and twenty three articles over a two and a bit year period is that most of the articles are very critical of Britney Higgins and treat Bruce Lerman and his claims and so on very lightly.
From the moment that this case started I was never and I don't want this to sound callous, but I was never terribly interested in what happened that night. I was interested in whether it there could be a fair trial. And I think the moment that it became trial by media, trial by parliament, trial by just about every institution in this country that coalesced against the presumption of innocence. Including a Prime Minister at the time who got up in Parliament and said that he was apologising for things that had happened that night.
The effect of that is to tilt the scales very heavily against Brittany Higgins and in favor of Bruce Luhrman. And then at a more human level, there's a question of what impact that coverage has had on Britney Higgins. And we we interviewed her partner, David Shiraz, and he told us that it has had a profound impact on her mental health.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What does “getting Murdoched” mean and why is it important?
0:01–2:39
2
How did the Murdoch media target Britney Higgins and what were the consequences?
2:39–5:07
3
Why was Yasmin Abdul‑Majid singled out by News Corp and how did it affect her life?
5:07–6:48
4
Can the Murdoch empire be held accountable through regulation?
6:48–9:13
5
How much of the Murdoch‑style campaigning is driven by Rupert Murdoch himself?
9:13–11:18
6
What role does the Murdoch media play in today’s social‑media feedback loop?
11:18–13:22
7
What solutions do the authors propose to curb the “Murdoch‑symptom” in journalism?
13:22–16:02
8
What are the key take‑aways and why does this book matter for the national conversation?
16:02–18:21