I want The Spinoff to do well, but I don’t want it funded by taxpayers

Liam Hehir writes:

A lot of my readers really, really hate The Spinoff. In part, that’s because it has been such an effective media operation for so many years and it reflects a left leaning sensibility and demographic. Because of its effectiveness, I’ve been approached a number of times about what it would take to get a right wing version going.

The thing is, The Spinoff gained its initial reputation not by shouting its political preferences from the rooftops, but by producing work of quality and depth. Its left-leaning nature was incidental to its content, not the driving force behind it.

I’ve enjoyed a lot of the journalism from The Spinoff, but also have groaned at a lot of it. I admire the business acumen of Duncan in seeing a market opportunity for it, and building up something successful. I don’t think it set out to be a left woke media outlet – that is just the natural order for the staff it hired.

State support for media is a delicate matter. A healthy society requires a diversity of voices, and public funding can, when prudently managed, help achieve this goal. However, public funds should probably only be directed towards journalism that serves the fundamental purpose of informing the public without bias or comment, essentially, the more mundane but essential forms of journalism that focus on factual reporting and not the propagation of virtue and the prevention of vice.

Consider, for example, The Side Eye, a cartoon series published by The Spinoff with support from NZ on Air to the tunes of tens of thousands of dollars a year until 2023.

The series had a lively aesthetic and often addressed things in the news. It did so, however, as what amounted to state-funded political advocacy. The series advocated for the orthodox liberal view of things with an unwavering predictability that left no room for counterargument or genuine dialogue.

A great example.

I’m happy to have taxpayers fund areas of journalism such as making sure all local courts and local councils have a reporter covering them. But The Spinoff received many millions of dollars from taxpayers for projects that resembled political advocacy or had little public interest.

Some of the projects funded were:

• $500,000 for 6×15 minutes series about a road trip
• $400,000 for 5×10 minutes about kids growing up in takeaway shops

Most of these shows got under 10,000 views per episode. It was a huge transfer of money from the many to a few.

So I wish The Spinoff well, but I don’t wish to fund them through my taxes.

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