Fourth Estate

Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks, Fourth Estate returns to the newsrooms and streets where history unfolded in real time. Sandra Sully joins Tina Quinn to reflect on the extraordinary night she became the first Australian journalist to break the news, anchoring live from Network 10 as the scale of the attacks became clear. Former Fourth Estate host Prue Clarke recalls reporting from Ground Zero as a young Financial Times reporter in New York. Then, we examine what happened to journalism in the aftermath: the jingoism that swept through American newsrooms, the treatment of Muslim communities, and the discredited Weapons-of-Mass-Destruction reporting that helped pave the road to war in Iraq — with archival reflections from former New York Times editor Andrew Rosenthal and NBC News journalist Doha Madani. Recommended Links: New Narratives 9-11 and the Liberal Media's Dark Legacy, Fourth Estate Want to get in touch? We'd love to hear from you! Email us at [email protected] or follow us @fourthestateau. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For more than seven decades, Rupert Murdoch has wielded extaordinary influence over journalism, politics and public debate across Australia, Britain and the United States. But how does that power actually work -- and what happens when the Murdoch media decides to turn its attention on you? Tina Quinn speaks with journalists and academics Andrew Dodd and Matthew Ricketson about their new book, Getting Murdoch: How Murdoch's Media Wields Power and Punishment. Drawing on more than 50 case studies, they examine the tactics used to reward allies, punish critics and shape political and public life -- and ask whether the age of Murdoch is really coming to an end, or whether concentrated media power is simply taking new forms. We'd love to hear from you. Email us at [email protected] or follow us at @fourthestateau. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When does civility stop being a virtue become a weapon? Recorded live at Gleebooks in Sydney, political journalist and author Amy Remeikis joins Fourth Estate host Tina Quinn to discuss her bestselling new book, Screw Nice, and how demands for politeness and "balance" can silence dissent, sanitise injustice and protect those in power. From media coverage of Gaza and the policing of womne's anger to protest, faith, political language and the myth of journalistic neutrality, Remeikis makes the case for speaking plainly - even when it makes people uncomfortable. We'd love to hear from you. Email us at [email protected] or follow us at @fourthestateau. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens when sex work pays better than journalism? After being made redundant from his job in the media, investigative journalist Bension Siebert began working as a sex worker — and discovered he could earn in five hours what he made in his best-paid week as a journalist. But rather than leaving journalism behind, Siebert is now using sex work to fund his own investigative reporting. This week on Fourth Estate, Tina Quinn speaks with Siebert about journalism’s increasingly precarious economics, the investigations mainstream media organisations decide are too risky to publish, and why he believes the gap between what Australian newsrooms know and what they’re prepared to report is growing. Click here to read Bension Siebert's essay: How sex work saved my investigative journalism career. We'd love to hear from you. Email us at [email protected] or follow us at @fourthestateau. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Walking away from Between the Lines in 1997 meant leaving behind what Caroline Baum considered the high point of her career. But her story was far from over. In the third and final part of our special Fourth Estate profile, we pick up with Caroline back at the ABC, where a hoped-for return to the national broadcaster as Executive Producer of Radio National’s Arts Today instead became another difficult chapter in her career. But what followed was also a period of reinvention. Caroline reflects on becoming the founding editor of Good Reading magazine, her return to television, her time as Editorial Director at Booktopia, and the twists and turns of building a successful freelance career across print, radio and television. Then came perhaps her most personal piece of work: Only: A Singular Memoir. For the first time, Caroline put into print the truth of her complicated childhood and her turbulent relationships with both her parents, confronting memories she had carried with her for decades. And now, with Life Sentences, Caroline has returned to what she has always done best: conversation. The podcast sees her speaking with biographers about the lives they spend years trying to understand—and, in a fitting full-circle moment, it is now coming to the ABC Listen app. Caroline Baum joins Tina Quinn for the third and final part of a wide-ranging conversation about journalism, ambition, disappointment, reinvention, family—and what it takes to build a life and career on your own terms. Catch up on parts one and two in the Fourth Estate podcast feed. We’d love to hear from you. Email us at [email protected] or follow us at @fourthestateau. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices