Monday, November 24, 2008

Quality of Hong Kong Newspapers - and Readers?

There are only 4 articles on the front page of South China Morning Post this morning. One is essentially a quarter-page photo of a wedding. The groom is famous for being the son of a very rich man, the ex-husband of a daughter of another very rich man, and the boyfriend of numerous celebrities. The bride is a former Miss Hong Kong. The short article in large font emphasized the price of the groom’s mansion and the cost of the wedding, which was said to be "sweet and moving."

The title of another article “Recession keeps HK golfers playing at home” says it all. I wonder how the editors of the newspaper decided that these are the most noteworthy news of the day.

Most of the “major” newspapers in Hong Kong seem to focus on either the rich and famous, or the infamous - murders, suicides, scams, depravities, ...

When criticized, newspapers often claim they simply print what their readers want to read. If that is the case, what does it say about us HongKongers? I really would like to believe we are better than that.


3 comments:

tabbycat said...

Unfortunately, I think that we're *not* better than that. The sales of tabloids such as Apple Daily are evidence of that.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I was a bit shocked on seeing this on the SCMP.
One of the very few newspapers that still earns my respect is Mingpao. Two recent incidences that impressed me were the stance they have on the medium of instruction in schools, and the other one was on the CUHK Student Union post's on "obscene publication" - Mingpao took it to the court to seek legal clarifications. I have actually invited the Editor to speak to school educators on "Between ethics and law". Ann

StephenC said...

Yeah. There are certain things I don't like about Mingpao. But it does have a bit more courage and independence than the rest.