The worst form of tabloid journalism

We’re in Uganda for the Citizen Journalism in Africa in-country training. Yesterday, we had a session covering the difference in the kind of news coverage between mainstream media and citizen journalism. Participants had a look at two Ugandan newspapers, to assess the kind of stories that are covered: the Daily Monitor, and the Red Pepper — seeing these are the only two newspapers readily available at our hotel.

As we looked through the two papers, I found myself utterly shocked by the Red Pepper. This is a sensationalist tabloid, rather like the Voice and Die Son, which we get in Cape Town. But it’s way worse than anything I’ve seen before.

Die Son and the Voice are sensationalist and often use offensive and insulting language, or publish nauseating pictures of victims of crime. But the Red Pepper goes several steps beyond that.

Yesterday, the paper carried a story about a school teacher who’d been having sex with a 12-year old pupil. So far, so ordinary. But the story went into great graphic detail about how that sex took place, using extremely crude language. The story was not written to convey horror and outrage at this abuse. Rather, it descended into pornography — it seemed designed to titillate readers rather than shock them. To top it all, the young girl’s photo was published — poor consolation that her name was withheld — there she was for all the world (and her friends, family, schoolmates and neighbours to see).

Through its coverage, the Red Pepper shamefully abused that poor girl all over again.

This morning, on my way to breakfast in the hotel, I passed the newspaper stand. The Red Pepper today has a front page story about a young man who was killed — allegedly by his brother, using a panga. While the Daily Monitor carries this story as a brief paragraph, saying the two fought over money. But the Red Pepper has it as a front page splash, saying the two fought over a woman (but they put it way more crudely than that). And there, on the front page, is a full colour picture of the dead man, his throat slit open.

I was so nauseated I could hardly eat my breakfast.

Some weeks ago during the xenophobic violence in South Africa, The Times published on the front page, a shocking photo of a mob burning a man to death. I would rather they hadn’t but I can buy the argument that the photo was justified, in order to make South Africans aware of what was happening. Arguably, that photo could be seen to be in the public interest. But the photo on the front page of Red Pepper today is about a dispute between two individuals. There is no public interest or other higher justification for publishing it. It’s completely gratuitous.

A week is a long, long time

There’s an old saying, that a week is a long time in politics. Tell me about it! What a week it’s been — in politics and in finance. I went on a short trip to Europe, and by the time I got back to South Africa, everything had changed: in politics in South Africa, and in finance around the world.

In South Africa, Jacob Zuma’s court case had been thrown out, and Thabo Mbeki had been forced to resign.

I saw headlines about the Zuma case while I was in London — and of course I immediately turned to the Internet to get all the details. How strange — the Zuma faction had been making all sorts of noises about how the judiciary was counter-revolutionary and could not be trusted — and how they were praising the judge for ruling in their favour. Not only that, but the judge had apparently agreed with the argument that there was a conspiracy against Zuma.

A friend who’s a former banker in London pulled out the Financial Times — there was Zuma, right on the front page, dancing his victory dance, and singing his favourite song, “bring me my machine gun.” “This is not good for South Africa,” said my friend. “This newspaper is read by all the bankers and financial investors. How do you think they will react to see the next president of South Africa singing such a warlike song?”

The judgment in the Zuma case motivated and empowered his supporters to move against Thabo Mbeki, gathering enough support within the ANC’s top structures to force him to resign. Sad for Mbeki, and shocking for South Africa, but overall a good sign for democracy.

I’m not happy that Zuma’s now a shoe-in as president. But the axing of party leaders and the downfall of prime ministers and presidents is what happens all the time in working democracies. Similar scenes have played out in Britain many times, for example — Margaret Thatcher was ousted in a similar way, and at the moment Prime Minister Gordon Brown faces a growing challenge to his leadership.

I missed Thabo Mbeki’s resignation speech, as I was on the plane to Entebbe, but here in Uganda people are commenting about how impressive it is that Mbeki bowed to the will of his party, and resigned. Mbeki may have had many failings as a president, but his stepping down gracefully has to be commended. What a contrast to the likes of Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Kibaki in Kenya, and Uganda’s own Museveni, who’s been in office forever.

In the world of finance, too the ground has shifted. Two sundays ago, I was with some friends in the City of London, the financial district — we walked past the Lehman Brothers building — an imposing skyscraper, looking down on the street with its darkened glass façade. How confident, stable and arrogant it looked. The next day, Lehman Brothers, one of the oldest banks in America, was bankrupt — and almost all of the employees in that huge building out of a job.

Sometimes, when my life as a freelancer seems insecure and risky, I wonder whether I should have gone for a more stable, secure job — something in government, or banking maybe. So much for that — the events of the past week or two serve as a powerful lesson — in life, nothing is certain, there are never any guarantees.

First published on Citizen Journalism in Africa on 23rd September 08

In support of Zapiro

At present there’s quite a heated debate going on in South Africa over a cartoon that appeared in the Sunday Times last Sunday.  The cartoon depicts Jacob Zuma, the president of the ANC and the man most likely to be the next president of South Africa. Zuma is seen undoing his trousers, while people representing the ANC, SACP, Cosatu and the ANC Youth League are holding down a woman, representing the justice system. The men are urging Zuma to rape the woman.

The cartoon has led to an outcry, with a range of views being expressed in  blogs and letters, and calls to radio stations. Some people have called for Zapiro, probably South Africa’s most famous and respected political cartoonist, to be fired. Some of these critics have objected to the implied reference to Zuma’s trial for rape, saying this is unfair, since he was found not guilty. Others have objected to the rape imagery, saying either that it makes light of rape, or that it is insensitive given the high levels of rape in South Africa.

Some of Zapiro’s critics have likened the cartoonist to David Bullard, a columnist for the Sunday Times who was fired a few months back, after a column of his which praised colonialism and made some disparaging remarks about Africans.

I’m not a knee-jerk supporter of the Sunday Times or of any criticism of public figures — I think the standard of journalism at the Times has been dropping.  Over the last month in particular, it has carried a couple of front page stories, making serious allegations and splashed with enormous banner headlines, that seem to have been poorly sourced and researched. But I do think the Zapiro cartoon can be defended.

Firstly, I think that the critics misunderstand the nature of metaphor, and of political cartoons. Zapiro is not depicting a literal rape. The cartoon uses the shocking, awful, violence and violation of rape as a metaphor — to comment on what it is that Zuma and his supporters are busy doing to the rule of law in South Africa. Secondly, the cartoon doesn’t make light of rape. Just because it’s called a ‘cartoon’, doesn’t mean it is trivialising things or trying to be funny. Its message is very serious.

I certainly don’t think the comparison to David Bullard is fair. Bullard’s remarks were racist, attributing negative qualities to an entire group of people. Zapiro’s cartoon crticisises specific public figures and organisations, for specific actions. That criticism might be overly harsh, but it’s not racist, and so does not overstep the boundaries of free speech in my view.

Yes, Zapiro’s cartoon is very shocking. It elicits a visceral response – it’s like a kick in the stomach. But let’s just think about the situation it’s referring to. Supporters of Jacob Zuma have lately been making some very disturbing comments about the judiciary. Some have gone so far as to call our top judges — judges with impeccable credentials — ‘counter-revolutionary’.

These comments, which are being repeated over and over again, are steadily undermining faith in, and respect for, our judicial system and thus for the rule of law. The rule of law is the bedrock of democracy. If that goes, society descends into chaos or tyranny. It is very dangerous territory that Zuma’s backers have dragged us into, and that I find that infinitely more worrying and disturbing than this cartoon.

First published on Citizen Journalism in Africa on Sept 10, 2008

A reflection of reality?

Long ago, I became very tired of reality shows on TV. But I’ve found myself watching a few episodes of the latest series of Survivor .

If you don’t know Survivor, it works like this: a group of people are dumped in the middle of nowhere, with almost nothing, and they have to try to survive while scheming and plotting against one another. The contestants are divided into two teams, or ‘tribes’, and they compete against one another in a series of challenges. The losing tribe each week has to vote one of their number off. When there are only a few people left they start competing as individuals, until the last person left wins a million US dollars.

I normally find these types of show very irritating. First of all, they’re fake. The group of people are not all alone on a desert island or in the jungle — there’s a whole team of camera people and producers and even medics there, though the viewer just doesn’t see them. I think they’re also a cop-out. Why bother trying to create an interesting drama, a clever and thought-provoking script, and paying top actors, when you can just get a few people to eat live bugs and gain a huge audience? It’s TV scraping the bottom of the barrel.

A few series ago it got even worse when the producers tried to spice things up by dividing up the tribes racially — whites in one, and blacks in the other. They came under a lot of criticism for that, understandably.

But I’ve found this latest series of Survivor rather intriguing. This time round, they’re conducting another social experiment. One tribe has been given everything they need — furniture, food, shelter and fire. The other has nothing. And guess what — the tribe with all the advantages has been winning all of the challenges, week after week. And each time they win, they get more food, and more luxuries. The ‘have-nots’ go home each time with nothing.

It’s a fascinating parallel of life in the real world. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And it’s all too clear why. The ‘have-not’ tribe is hungry and weak. They don’t even win the challenges that require more brain than brawn — after all, how can you think clearly when you’re starving? Because they keep losing, they get depressed, lose their confidence, and fight amongst themselves. It’s a vicious circle.

In the real world, all too often, the poor (countries and people) get blamed for their predicament. They’re told they’re lazy, inherently inferior, and so on and so forth. What’s interesting about the Survivor set-up is to see how arbitrary it all is. Both tribes have a mix of people from different ethnic and educational backgrounds, and with a good gender balance. Yet because of a random selection according to the rules of this particular game, one group was set up for success, and the other for failure.

In its own rather silly way, Survivor reinforces the findings of Jared Diamond, who in his book Guns Germs and Steel, set out to investigate why some societies in history managed to advance technologically and materially, so much more than others. His conclusion was that it has nothing to do with inherent biological differences but can be traced back to the natural resources available in different parts of the world. Societies which had access to plants and animals suitable for domestication (and good climates and fewer natural diseases), tended to advance much more quickly.

Survivor turned up another fascinating insight into human nature last week, when the winning tribe were faced with a predicament. As usual they won the challenge, but were given a choice. They could either keep their comfort (their camp with all its luxuries), or could choose to retain immunity and not have to vote off one of their members. But they couldn’t have both.

They chose to keep their comfort, and sacrifice a team member. The harmony and unity they seemed to possess through their successive wins just crumbled at this first hurdle. So much for team spirit. Material comfort won over solidarity. I wonder if the remaining members had any trouble sleeping in their comfortable beds, after that. Sadly, I don’t think so.

First posted on Citizen Journalism in Africa on August 30th.