alex4pt

“Cyclist With Baby” Debate Missing the Point

Regardless of what this cyclist did, or why, or what the helmet laws are — the Herald Sun used a photo taken in traffic. To use a mobile phone like this, while driving a car, is a serious offence, and they subtly acknowledge this by crediting the photographer as ‘Supplied’.

Only 5 commenters out of the 173 pointed this out, and the Herald Sun is to be begrudgingly congratulated for at least approving these comments.

The photographer/motorist was not discussed in the original article - then after an edit, ‘Melanie’ was credited. Was she driving her car when this photo was taken, or perhaps she was a passenger? Is the driver of the car at the time able to corroborate this? This is not discussed or asked in the article.

By publishing this photo, the Herald Sun encourages other motorists to take photos of any road user they feel is doing the wrong thing. This in turn makes the road less safe for everyone using it, motorists, cyclists, pedestrians.

I lose track of the number of motorists I see using mobile phones on the road, either texting at the lights or talking while driving — often in the bizarre ‘pizza box’ position, where they talk into the base of the phone, using its loudspeaker. 

With a readership of 470,000 per day in 2011 (Crikey), this is a bigger problem than whether or not one person is cycling with an infant in an unsafe manner, or if a motorcyclist is riding on a freeway while wearing a barbeque, etc.

At the end of the article, they originally quoted the Police as asking for persons with more information to contact Crime Stoppers. Do police issue fines for traffic infringements, based on the evidence of one photo? I don’t think they do, but it’s good enough for the Herald-Sun. No doubt the plods had a quiet word with them on that one. 

Now they ask for people to contact the news desk ‘confidentially’ to dob the cyclist in. Objectivity well and truly out the window, or, out with the bath-water.

When half of their paper is taken up with advertising from car dealerships and classifieds from individuals selling their cars, perhaps we should no longer expect balanced reporting on road use and safety from the Herald Sun.

This whole farce should be dragged across the coals on Media Watch. Ask not, “Is this Victoria’s most irresponsible woman?”, but, “Is this Victoria’s most irresponsible newspaper?”.

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Victoria Police on mobile phones

Crikey - Herald Sun Circulation statistics, 2011

Pizza-talking motorist, unroadworthy vehicle, in traffic