Independent senator Fatima Payman has used a speech at an event in Bankstown to criticise “media moguls” such as Rupert Murdoch, whom she claimed “only wants what benefits his agenda … causing further division, marginalisation and fearmongering in our society”.
The 29-year old senator was a guest at the 10th anniversary celebrations of independent Muslim media outlet Amust, where she made the keynote address, describing mainstream media as being “driven by the interests of big corporations” and “about as multicultural as a beige wall”.
“[It] can sometimes feel like an echo chamber repeating the views of the powerful while silencing the voices of everyday Australians,” she said. “Sometimes the news feels a little too cozy with the powers that be. [It is not] told in a way that truly reflects our lived experiences.”
“Like many of you, I’ve faced challenges in navigating mainstream media as a Muslim woman in politics,” she continued. “Too often we are misrepresented or reduced to stereotypes.”
She quoted problematic headlines of late, including one from Sky News: “‘Guidance from Allah’: Senator Payman brings religion back to politics”; and News Corp: “‘Exiled’ Labor senator’s donations to Barbie-hating Islamic TV studio revealed”.
In July this year, Payman quit the Labor Party and moved to sit on the crossbench as an independent over the issue of Palestinian statehood.
She had been “indefinitely suspended” from the Labor caucus after she crossed the floor in the Senate to vote in favour of a Greens motion to recognise a Palestinian state.
The first-term senator said she was torn over the decision to quit but had a clear conscience in announcing her resignation from Labor.
“Unlike my colleagues, I know how it feels to be on the receiving end of injustice,” Payman said at the time. “My family did not flee from a war-torn country to come here as refugees for me to remain silent when I see atrocities inflicted on innocent people.”
During her address at the Amust event on Sunday, the West Australian senator reflected on the occasion, saying: “After seven months of toeing the party line, trying to enact change from within, I came to understand a brutal reality.”
“I realised that the Labor party I campaigned for and chose to serve with was not the same brave, visionary party of the good old days. The genocide in Gaza is not an abstract concept, it is a brutal, daily reality for millions of people.”
“The stories we hear are not just tales of suffering … They are reminders that we cannot afford to be complacent, that we cannot afford to remain silent.”
On Wednesday, she posted a video on her socials, urging the Albanese government to back the UN resolution this Friday. “How many more empty statements will this government put out until they realise it isn’t enough?” she said in the video.
“Forty-thousand people have been massacred. Twenty-thousand children, boys and girls are digging through the rubble of their homes in search of mum and dad. Parents in Gaza do not drop their kids off at school. They drop them into mass graves.”
“Have you not seen the footage live streamed around the world or do you just not care? Because if you do care, then show it. You play the semantics of your media statements and act like you’ve achieved something. It has achieved nothing for 11 months. Now you have your opportunity to actually do something.”
During her keynote address over the weekend, she also praised independent media, calling it “the truth-teller, the accountability partner, the one who stands tall when the big voices of politics or corporations try to drown everyone else out.”
Payman believes that independent media will offer readers the “right to think freely, to question the narrative, and to make your own choices based on real information, not just the stories the government or big corporations want you to hear.”
“Without independent media, we risk getting stuck in a cycle where the powerful protect their own interests, and the rest of us are left with empty promises,” she said.
When she delivered her first speech to the Upper House in September 2022, Payman was the first person to ever wear a Hijab in Parliament. In her speech, she spoke about the need for Australia to pursue “a humanistic, optimistic immigration.”
“It is a country that offers so much to so many,” she said. “People travel from all parts of the world in the hopes of calling Australia home. My family and I also had that same hope.”
“At times and even in this very chamber, xenophobia has raised its ugly head, fear mongering and divisive sentiments have been shared about our immigrant population.”
“Let us not settle on multiculturalism being just a brand we associate with and take pride in as a nation, but rather fully embrace it by caring for one another, by accepting each other for who we are and what we can become and by ensuring all voices are heard at the table.”