Fortunately, we have had ABC TV’s 7.30 Report to set the record straight.

A segment that went to air on Tuesday night seemed keen to paint Bathurst as a city tearing itself apart in the lead-up to a postal plebiscite on same-sex marriage.

Presenter Leigh Sales introduced the segment by calling Bathurst a “town divided” over the issue before cutting to a piece that featured interviews with locals who supposedly represented the spectrum of views within our town.

That’s not the town we’re living in.

Certainly, there is a range of opinions related to the postal plebiscite, just as there is a range of opinions with regard to same-sex marriage. But this is hardly a town divided.

Jut what the 7.30 Report was trying to achieve is difficult to determine.

Gauging the sense of an entire city based on just a few select interviews is always going to be hard, but that’s still a valid form of story-telling when covering a complex issue.

But it was the choice of Bathurst for their little study that really raises questions about the editorial process in this case.

Clearly the 7.30 producers wanted to get out of the capital cities to get a feel for the thoughts of “real Australia” on the plebiscite, but just how representative could Bathurst really be?

Despite 7.30’s efforts to paint us as just another hick town in the bush, the Bathurst we know is a modern, cosmopolitan and open society that values peace and respects the opinions of others.

Many people who posted to the Western Advocate Facebook page following the screening of the segment labelled it a stitch up more interested in fabricating division than presenting Bathurst for what it truly is.

We’re certainly not Sydney, but nor are we beyond the Black Stump.

If 7.30 wanted to know what “country” areas thought of the same-sex plebiscite, they should have been looking far further afield.

While a three-hour drive from the ABC’s Ultimo headquarters might have seen like a trip to the end of the Earth, Bathurst is the gateway to the west of NSW and beyond.

If there are towns deeply divided on same-sex marriage then Bathurst is not one of them. Rather, we are a city united against a gross misrepresentation on national TV.