Pederasty (radio program)

Last updated

"Pederasty" is a program broadcast on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Radio National network on 14 July 1975. Hosted by Richard Neville and produced by Allan Ashbolt as an episode of Lateline (unrelated to the later ABC TV series), the show featured a "frank" interview with "three men in their thirties who admitted sex relations with boys, and a teenage boy who said he had been involved in such relationships since he was 12". [1] [2] [3] The ABC's official description of the program was: "Pederasty, as described by the Penguin English Dictionary, is the homosexual relationship of a man with a boy. The subject usually creates feelings of revulsion and disgust within most people. The issues raised by such relationships are discussed by three pederasts". [4]

One letter to the editor published in The Sydney Morning Herald described the adult men interviewed as "chuckling" as they described "waiting outside playgrounds to seduce young boys". [5] Another commented that Neville "clearly let it be seen that he held that male adults who committed such acts on boys corrupted or exploited them, and he tried to get the men to admit this". [6]

A tape of the program was turned over to police by Fred Nile, who objected to the content. [2] Peter Nixon of the then-National Country Party also called for a public inquiry into the ABC in the program's aftermath. [7] Ashbolt told The National Times that "“we can discuss on Lateline ideas that three years ago would have been regarded not only as heretical but subversive." [8] Asked about the program, ABC chairman Richard Downing initially commented that he had not heard it himself but that the ABC's general intention is to "try to inform people about what (is) happening so that they might be forewarned and forearmed". [2] Later, he added: "In general, men will sleep with young boys and that's the sort of thing the community ought to know about". [9] The ABC's ultimate response was to introduce guidelines around the use of "four-letter words" and "crude expressions" while rejecting any new guidelines on program content, with Downing commenting that he wanted ABC staff to be "adventurous and imaginative (but not) titillating". [10]

In 2016, Liberal senator Eric Abetz asked the ABC in Parliament if they were considering an apology for "Pederasty". Their response was: "No. The ABC considers child abuse is a legitimate news and current affairs subject and it will continue to cover it where relevant in accordance with its Editorial and Charter responsibilities." [11]

Related Research Articles

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is Australia's national broadcaster. It is principally funded by the Australian taxpayer and is administered by a government-appointed board. The ABC is a publicly owned body that is politically independent and accountable such as through its production of annual reports and is bound by provisions contained within the Public Interest Disclosure Act 2013 and the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013, with its charter enshrined in legislation, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983. ABC Commercial, a profit-making division of the corporation, also helps to generate funding for content provision.

Frederick John Nile is an Australian former politician and ordained Christian minister. Nile was a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council from 1981-2023, except for a period in 2004. Nile was re-elected at the 1991, 1999, 2007, and 2015 state elections and served as the Assistant President of the Legislative Council between 2007 and 2019. Nile lost his seat at the 2023 New South Wales state election, after four decades of being in parliament.

<i>Media Watch</i> (TV program) Australian media analysis TV program

Media Watch is an television programme from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) dedicated to the analysis and critique of Australian media, including its corporate and political interconnections. The program's most recent host is Paul Barry, with Linton Besser due to begin hosting in February 2025.

Donald William Burke is an Australian television presenter, television producer, author and horticulturist. He is best known as the longtime host of Burke's Backyard, a lifestyle program produced by his wife's company CTC Productions, which ran for 17 years from 1987 to late 2004 on the Nine Network. He was also responsible for the creation of garden makeover program Backyard Blitz, starring former colleague Jamie Durie.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neville Wran</span> Australian politician (1926–2014)

Neville Kenneth Wran, was an Australian politician who was the Premier of New South Wales from 1976 to 1986. He was the national president of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) from 1980 to 1986 and chairman of both the Lionel Murphy Foundation and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) from 1986 to 1991.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stan Grant (journalist)</span> Australian journalist (born 1963)

Stan Grant is an Australian journalist, writer and radio and television presenter, since the 1990s. He has written and spoken on Indigenous issues and his Aboriginal identity. He is a Wiradjuri man.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alan Jones (talkback host)</span> Australian right-wing commentator and former radio broadcaster

Alan Belford Jones is an Australian former talkback host, coach of the Australia national rugby union team, and rugby league coach and administrator. He has worked as a school teacher, a speech writer in the office of the Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, and in musical theatre. He has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Queensland, and completed a one-year teaching diploma at Worcester College, Oxford. He has received civil and industry awards.

Vivian Alvarez Solon is an Australian who was unlawfully removed to the Philippines by the Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) in July 2001. In May 2005, it became public knowledge that she had been deported, although DIMIA knew of its mistake in 2003. Solon's family had listed her as a missing person since July 2003, and until May 2005, did not know that she had been deported. The circumstances surrounding Solon's unlawful deportation have caused much controversy in the Australian media.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maxine McKew</span> Australian politician

Maxine Margaret McKew is an Australian former Labor politician and journalist; she was the Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government in the First Rudd Ministry and the First Gillard Ministry.

Irfan Yusuf is an Australian social commentator and author of the memoir Once Were Radicals: My years as a teenage Islamo-fascist.

The following lists events that happened during 1975 in Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tony Jones (news journalist)</span> Australian journalist and TV presenter (born 1955)

Anthony William Jones is an Australian television news and political journalist, radio and television presenter and writer.

Emma Alberici is an Australian journalist and former foreign correspondent who was the chief economics correspondent for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's television network.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cory Bernardi</span> Australian politician

Cory Bernardi is an Australian conservative political commentator and former politician. He was a Senator for South Australia from 2006 to 2020, and was the leader of the Australian Conservatives, a minor political party he founded in 2017 but disbanded in 2019. He is a former member of the Liberal Party of Australia, having represented the party in the Senate from 2006 to 2017. He is the author of The Conservative Revolution.

Peter Lloyd is a journalist and was senior producer for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's news and current affairs program Lateline. He was previously the ABC's South Asia correspondent based in New Delhi, from where he reported across all ABC national and international radio and television news and current affairs programs.

Richard Clive Neville was an Australian writer and social commentator who came to fame as an editor of the counterculture magazine Oz in Australia and the United Kingdom in the 1960s and early 1970s. He was educated as a boarder at Knox Grammar School and enrolled for an arts degree at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Australian political magazine The Monthly described Neville as a "pioneer of the war on deference".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1979 Sydney Ghost Train fire</span> 1979 amusement park fire in Milsons Point, New South Wales, Australia

The Sydney Ghost Train fire at Luna Park Sydney in Milsons Point, New South Wales, Australia killed seven people on 9 June 1979. Inadequate fire-fighting measures and low staffing caused the fire to completely destroy the amusement park's ghost train.

Allan Campbell Ashbolt was an Australian journalist, producer, and broadcaster.

<i>Q+A</i> (Australian talk show) Australian television series

Q+A, formerly Q&A and also referred to as Qanda, is an Australian television panel discussion program broadcast on ABC Television. The show, which has run continuously since 2008, as of 2023 broadcasts on Monday nights at 9:35 pm. Its format is similar to Question Time on the BBC and Questions and Answers on RTÉ.

The Star Entertainment Group Limited is an Australian gambling and entertainment company. The company was formerly known as Echo Entertainment. Star is Australia's biggest listed casino group.

References

  1. ↑ "Police get complaint over ABC program". The Sydney Morning Herald. 15 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  2. 1 2 3 "Tape of program for vice squad". The Sydney Morning Herald. 16 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  3. ↑ "Radical giant of Australian broadcasting". The Sydney Morning Herald. 15 June 2005. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  4. ↑ Inglis, Kenneth Stanley (1983). This is the ABC : the Australian Broadcasting Commission, 1932-1983. Carlton, VIC: Melbourne University Press. p. 381.
  5. ↑ "ABC head asked to resign". The Sydney Morning Herald. 23 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  6. ↑ "Pondering an odd omission". The Sydney Morning Herald. 24 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  7. ↑ "Parliamentarian calls for public inquiry into ABC". The Age. 23 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  8. ↑ Cater, Nick (2013). The lucky culture and the rise of an Australian ruling class. Sydney, NSW: HarperCollins. p. 215.
  9. ↑ "ABC Licence". The Sydney Morning Herald. 19 July 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  10. ↑ "Guide for ABC on 'crude' language". The Canberra Times. 22 September 1975. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  11. ↑ "Senate Standing Committee on Environment and Communications, Answers to Senate Estimates Questions on Notice, Additional Estimates Hearings February 2016, Communications Portfolio, Australian Broadcasting Corporation" (PDF). Australian Parliament. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.