Somehow the ‘journalists’ at Pittwater Life appear unable to conduct basic, first-week-of-journalism-school fact checking. I think their 35,000 readers (allegedly) deserve better, yet Pittwater Life co-publisher Nigel Wall disagrees; adamantly.

I attempted to speak to the Journalist who wrote Neil Evers recent profile spread in Pittwater Life. She directed me to the publishers, Nigel Wall and Lisa Offord.

After 2 emails and voicemails left over the span of a week, Nigel Wall phoned me – only to offer racism, banal excuses, and letting slip that he and Mr Evers are on a first name basis with each other – and had already discussed “all of those anonymous people out there, that won’t even put your names by your comments” as the reason he and his staff were unable to perform even the most rudimentary functions of their roles as ‘journalists’.

When I explained that I am a single person, that my name is JD Cooke, and how to navigate to the ‘Who am I?‘ tab on my blog, and that I was literally speaking to him in real time, having reached out to him, form my personal email – literally at no stage being anonymous, Nigel Wall began to offer excuses that as ‘sub-editor’ he reworded the sentences in the piece to offer greater ambiguity; I terminated the call.

Pittwater Life are not a MEAA members, and Nigel Wall is (so far) the least Culturally aware non-Aboriginal Person I’ve has the displeasure of speaking with this week – and I’ve had a week of it.

If, like me you found anything troubling in Neil Evers recent bio, you can inform the Australian Press Council directly here:
https://presscouncil.org.au/complaints/make-a-complaint

At the end they give you one of these, which is worth holding on to.

Hopefully Media Watch pick up the story sooner rather than latter.

Racists seem to love the GuriNgai, but can’t manage to reflect on why this is.

I suspect many racists on the Northern Beaches and Central Coast don’t want to face the reality that the ‘Black Friend‘ they know, isn’t anymore Aboriginal than they are, and they know so little about us, that they believed whatever the GuriNgai in front of them happened to say that day. So Culturally daft the they allow this to go to print:

Nigel – if you have to ask a source how to do your job, you’re not a journalist. From what I’ve seen of your ‘work’, and based on our too long conversation today, it appears you’re a propagandist for a racist Cult, and this is why Aboriginal People are upset, obviously. You may believe you have zero responsibility to your readers, the community, and especially the Aboriginal People directly harmed by YOUR negligence; but like anyone who has accepted the claims of these so-called GuriNgai, you are dead wrong.

https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/fullscreen/68453882/pittwater-life-october-2023-issue

JD Cooke (duh).