An article of 800 words by Steve Finn - Published in the Phuket Gazette, January 2006

UP UNTIL December 26th 2004, Patong Beach was, to the majority of people in the U.K just another long-haul destination that popped up occasionally on one holiday programme or another.

When the tsunami stole ashore on Boxing Day though, all that changed. Patong Beach, along with all the other places hit by the worst natural disaster in living memory, became firmly established on everyone's radar.

Every media outlet in our country seemed to have a correspondent on the ground incredibly quickly. Those of us not in Thailand at the time were, at least initially, grateful for the flow of information from those that were there. Of course, when the immediate sensation died down a little, our media reverted to type and the coverage became far more intrusive and voyeuristic.

What we get now, almost exclusively, are cheap shot sensational articles written by reporters eager to earn a buck but with absolutely no regard to the consequences for local people and the damage done to businesses that already have all the problems they can handle.

In January, we in the U.K were treated to what would have amounted to a good story about a young girl orphaned by the wave. I began to read it with interest and then was staggered to come across a reference to 'sex clubs' that 'boasted of the young age of their prostitutes'.

Why are such references needed in what was a very good human-interest piece? If they were accurate, or even close, they would not be quite so offensive. The fact is that I could not, after many visits to Patong going back to 1997, identify where they were wagging their moralising finger at. Unfortunately neither could they, because I asked them to, and yet the damage remains done.

There are so many examples of this type of reporting that it would be pretty tedious to list them. The fact is that our 'intelligent' newspapers will attract a readership of around one million people every day. Their readers have come to believe that the articles such a newspaper is happy to print will be factually accurate and reasonably evenhanded.

The reality is that many people who read such sensational drivel will perceive it as the truth, and instantly become an expert on a place that they could not find on a map. The media have a duty to report, it's what they do, but they also have an obligation to report facts accurately, and to keep their personal opinions to themselves.

What angers me more than anything about this style of reporting is that they always seem to find a way of weaving children into the story, and of painting every man in Patong as a paedophile waiting to pounce.

And why can we not have a report on a man who has 'a wife'? Why must she always be a 'young Thai wife'? What has her race or her age to do with the story? Absolutely nothing, and yet it is always there.

There is something about 'old' western men and 'young' Thai women which vexes our media, and presumably their audience, mightily. They will, of course, assure us that they are not being morally censorious, but they can't seem to break the habit. What makes them believe that they have any sort of right to go to another country and tell people how to behave? Or have the right to an opinion?

The opportunity for good news stories are legion, why do we never see them reported? Is it really true that bad news sells and good news does not? The reaction to, and the recovery from, the events of 26th December 2004 in Thailand has been remarkable and is a good story in itself. Where is the coverage?

The Andaman Lions Club are attempting to raise some 20 million baht in order to secure the future of children affected by the tsunami, if our newspapers had any interest in effectively helping people whose lives have been wrecked they should report these projects and the many others like them.

The fact that they don't says much. The interest a newspaper editor has in my country, it would seem, is in selling more newspapers at the expense of all else. They will print what they believe they can get away with. What they can get away with and the truth are often different, sometimes very different.

Attempts by such people to seize the moral high ground are rich indeed. They arrive in a country in pursuit of a story, take what they came for and leave nothing behind except people, mis-quoted and deceived, who will never trust journalists again and think a little less of British people generally; guilt by association. Shame on them.

Ends

Word Count: 800

E-mail: steve(@)s-p-f.net