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Category: Children [REMOVE]
- Beeld inflames tense situation
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Beeld’s article “Klag kom ná k-woord” (05/03/2010, p. 5), by Hilda Fourie and Sonja Carstens, violates children’s rights and sensationalises violence by children. The article revolves around a classroom fight, access to cell phone footage of which has been provided. It is not clear what journalistic purpose this serves and seems salacious. The story identifies the children involved and the school they attend, while criminal charges have been laid. There is a race component to the story, yet insufficient care has been taken to minimise harm.
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- Threatening murder is not okay
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The recent tragic death of five children has stirred up outrage in many South Africans, including children, who have been protesting outside the Soweto magistrate’s court. Many of the images of children ‘baying for Jub Jub’s blood’ have escaped comment, other than to note that there have been threats to his life. In contrast, the Sowetan included an editorial on Friday (12/03/2010, p. 18) on children threatening violence against Jub Jub.
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- A refreshing look at love in the time of HIV
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In a time when reporting on HIV and AIDS is in desperate need of fresh angles to avoid fatigue of the subject, it is exciting to come across an article once in a while that reports on the matter with an amazing human element. One such article was “Love in the time of HIV,” City Press (21/02/2010, p. 25) which was nominated for a MAD OAT Glad for reporting on the challenges HIV-positive teenagers face when they reach puberty.
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- Varied Views on Child Abuse Case by the Media
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Three very distinct reporting styles in covering one story of the 6 year-old boy abused by his foster parent, shows how one story can be perceived through different lenses. The Sunday Times (17/01/2010, p. 8), the Daily Sun (19/01/2010, p. 4), and The Star (18/01/2010, p. 2) have all given their own rendition in covering this story and have given it precedence in their publications.
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- The Times praises child hero
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The front-page article “Girl, 11, saves friends from deadly blaze” published in The Times (10/02/2010) is about an 11 year-old girl who saved a number of fellow orphans from a blazing building. The story by Teneshia Naidoo is one to be glad of.
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- World Cup clean-up impacts homeless children
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The Mail & Guardian report “Rounded up and shipped out” (22/01/2010, p. 4) by Niren Tolsi stands out for the way it highlights children’s rights in the midst of the World Cup fever. The report gives a voice to street children, who are rarely made visible in media reports, and provides insight in the complex nature of the challenges they face and how government chooses to address these in the build up to the World Cup.
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- Cape Times identifies child witness
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The article, “Boy imitates mom’s murder” (Cape Times, 04/02/2010, p. 6) is one to be mad about. The story talks about how a three-year-old boy witnessed his father shoot and kill his mother and two other men before hijacking three cars.
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- Children have agency as The Times show
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Children are often reported on in a very limited way as “innocents” or silent “victims” . However, The Times article (“Pupils still waiting for school”, 20/01/2010, p. 5) by Zandile Mbabela gave children a voice and portrayed them as active citizens rather than passive recipients of adult behaviour. For this, The Times deserve was picked as the MAD OAT Glad for the week..
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- Back to School… An opportunity wasted?
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The first day of school always gets media attention, with coverage of how children react to going to school for the first time. The day offers the opportunity to cover children taking a big step in their lives. Past coverage has included many images to show children’s reaction to this event. In the interest of children’s rights in the media, various print mediums were examined during the first week of schools opening for 2010 (13-17 January 2010), to explore the coverage dedicated to the event.
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- Children’s Views Not in the News: Portrayal of Children in South African Print Media 2009
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Monitoring conducted by Media Monitoring Africa (MMA) in 2003 as part of the Empowering Children & the Media (ECM) strategy showed that only 6% of all news included children. The latest data to emerge from the ECM reveals that representation of children has improved, marginally, to 8.4% of all news monitored in 2009. The monitoring shows that not only are children’s issues frequently sidelined, but un-careful and unethical reporting often leads to further violations of their rights.
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