The ABC has been accused of censoring coverage of Lidia Thorpe’s foul-mouthed outburst outside a Melbourne strip club.
Senator Thorpe was filmed unleashing a vile spray of insults on a group of men outside Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club, in Melbourne’s north, at 3am on Sunday.
The rogue senator was heard insulting the patrons of the Brunswick adult establishment, telling one man ‘you’ve got a small penis’ and another man ‘you, you are marked’.
ABC TV did briefly mention the strip club tirade during its Afternoon Briefing program on Tuesday but coverage appeared to be lacking on its digital platforms.
The public broadcaster is facing scrutiny for its ‘failed bias’ for not reporting one of the biggest stories in politics this week.
The ABC (pictured) is under fire for its lack of coverage of Senator Lidia Thorpe’s late night foul-mouth outburst outside a Melbourne strip club where she hurled vile insults at patrons
Senator Lidia Thorpe (pictured) was filmed unleashing an extraordinary spray of insults at a group of men outside Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club at 3am on Sunday
In a post shared to Twitter on Tuesday, One Nation leader Pauline Hanson accused the ABC of ‘protecting’ Ms Thorpe by not reporting on the incident.
‘Why does the ABC website remain silent on Lidia Thorpe’s strip club incident?,’ Ms Hanson wrote.
‘Lidia Thorpe is a Senator caught using racially charged, sexually explicit, abusive language outside a strip club, so how can the national broadcaster fail to report this on their website?
‘The ABC has reported on similar incidents involving other politicians, but not Thorpe. Is she being protected?
‘This kind of biased failure is exactly why I have proposed that the taxpayer-funded ABC be required to act in a fair and balanced manner.
‘The ABC should explain why they have failed to hold Thorpe to account. If they can’t, then we should cut their funding, let them stand on their own two feet and see if the people are still interested in their biased reporting!’
Ms Hanson has also called for Ms Thorpe to be investigated by police over her behaviour and vile speech.
She said she believes no one, including Ms Thorpe, is above the law and urged Victoria Police and the Australian Human Rights Commission to look into whether action should be taken against her.
Sky News Australia host Chris Kenny labelled ABC’s lack of coverage of a significant story regarding a federal senator as ‘astonishing’.
‘Lots of Australians won’t even know about it… if you only get your news from the ABC, the national taxpayer-funded broadcasting corporation that’s supposed to be comprehensive and unbiased,’ Mr Kenny said.
‘If you relied on them you would not know about this episode, they simply haven’t covered it, not on the TV news, not on their radio news, not online they’ve censored it from the public domain.
‘They covered the story when she claimed to be the victim but they haven’t covered her latest foul-mouthed abusive display that got her a lifetime ban from the strip club.’
One Nations Leader Pauline Hanson (pictured) accused the ABC of ‘protecting’ Ms Thorpe by not reporting on incident
Ms Hanson said the national broadcaster failed to hold Ms Thorpe accountable for her actions in a Twitter post on Tuesday (pictured)
The ABC’s flagship online platform, abc.net.au/news, still has no reports regarding Ms Thorpe’s behaviour.
Daily Mail Australia contacted the ABC for comment.
The latest article published by the national broadcaster about Ms Thorpe appeared last month when she was knocked to the ground by police after trying to interrupt an anti-trans rights rally.
The former Greens politician was banned for life by the Melbourne strip club over her behaviour early on Sunday morning.
In an official letter – seen by Daily Mail Australia – Maxine’s Gentlemen’s Club told Ms Thorpe she was ‘no longer welcome’ and gave the Senator a warning not to ’cause further embarrassment’.
Footage of the incident, filmed by a witness and first published by 7News, shows Senator Thorpe pointing her finger at the men in a heated exchange.
At one stage, Senator Thorpe walks up to one of the men and says in a menacing tone ‘you, you are marked’.
One of them calls her a ‘racist dog’ to which she responds ‘f*** you’ before a friend holds her back.’
She tells the men: ‘All I want to say to the black brothers there and anyone that we’re fighting…
‘Any black man that stands with the f***ing white little c*** like that – yous (sic) can all get f***ed too!’
One of the men asks: ‘How the f**** does someone get in parliament like you?’
She hits back: ‘We’ve been repressed all our f***ing life in this country and you let this little dog speak…’
The ABC has previously reported on matters concerning Senator Thorpe and was the first news outlet to cover her undisclosed relationship with ex-Rebels president Dean Martin.
