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Comment by morkalork | Hacker News Reader

Media in Canada is in pretty dire straits right now. It looks like one of the last left-ish leaning papers (Toronto Star) is about to be gobbled up by post media. A huge swath of broadcast news media is owned by just one company, Bell which predictably leads to stories like "Top Bell Media executive urged CTV to avoid ‘negative spin’ on coverage of parent company". Plus the current batch of conservative leaders (PP, Danielle Smith, Ford..) all have an axe to grind with what they portray as leftist and woke media. Particularly the CBC, they'd love to see that dismantled. Then there's all the wonderful personalities involved like Conrad Black.

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> all have an axe to grind with is portrayed as the leftist woke media

Are you calling the media woke, or are you saying that Conservative leaders are calling the media woke?

Sorry if not clear. I mean how it is being portrayed by conservative leaders, not a label I give it myself.

Thanks for clarifying!

So, would this law make the Star even cheaper, for acquisition, as it reduces the reach of the Star?

Important to note that the CBC is state-funded and even the previous leader of the ultra left-wing party, Tom Mulcair, has recently accused the CBC of having a heavy left-wing bias.

I don't know about heavy but CBC is definitely left-leaning. I feel like that should be curbed with some watchdog for media impartiality (not sure how it could be implemented?) instead of doing away with it entirely. The reality is (at least in Quebec), we don't have much to replace it.

This is also a new development in journalism at CBC, older journalists tend to value reporting over opinion pieces, whereas younger journalists feel like it's their "duty" to push their opinion onto the readership which is an extremely toxic ideology.

Right, who could forget PP asking Elon Musk to get the CBC flagged as state media in the same class as Xinhua and Russia Today.

Great job missing Tom Muclair who was the one mentioned in the comment.

I would like to see the CBC dismantled. The CBC no longer fulfills its mandate of serving the general public.

Your comment, "Top Bell Media executive urged CTV to avoid ‘negative spin’ on coverage of parent company" equally applies to CBC and the current government or leading political party.

This doesn't mean it should be dismantled it means additional laws should be put in place to make this type of thing illegal for the politicians to do.

The CBC is the only chance left for some sort of even keeled news in Canada.

Otherwise maybe some YouTube personalities might make a showing - I'm sure the farmer into the middle of Alberta will watch that.

If the CBC is worth keeping, it can build a sustainable business and generate revenue and profit by creating content people want to consume like any other successful business, and without anti-competitive government handouts.

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