The sobering face of diversity

By Milica Pesic, Executive Director, Media Diversity Institute
July 2005

The day after the terrorist attack on London, the front page of The Sun, one of the most xenophobic British tabloids, carried photos of two young women, one white and one Arab, Christian and Moslem, with one caption, ‘Pray for All of Them'. The message couldn't have been clearer: regardless their religion, ethnicity or skin color, they are equal in being the innocent victims of someone's madness.

Those familiar with The Sun's approach to foreigners, particularly immigrants, asylum seekers, Roma and Moslems, were pleasantly surprised. The most popular tabloid which sells millions of copies a day [1] usually runs rather different stories accusing East-European asylum seekers of stealing and barbecuing the Queen's swans, portraying Roma/Gypsies as invaders of the island, ready to cheat and milk the British Government endlessly, or presenting Moslems as ‘all the same'- radical, conservative, fundamentalist Islamists.

The Sun's reporting on the terrorist attack took the same approach as all the other leading media in the UK. The city which won the bid to host the 2012 Olympic Games only a day before the attack for - among the other reasons - being the most diverse, multi-cultural, multi-ethnic place in the world, had to pay the price for its open-mindedness. The city where all sorts of religious fundamentalists head to, aiming to benefit from Londoners' admiration for freedom of speech and for praising individualism and diversity, has been - ironically - a victim of intolerance, narrow-mindedness and hatred. And instead of revengefully turning on all Moslems, the UK media, including the tabloids, turned - at least immediately after the tragedy - into heralds of tolerance.

It is hard to say at this point what made chronically intolerant, xenophobic British tabloids turn to responsible reporting – the seriousness of the situation or something else. Whatever it was, their way of reporting on the ‘Islamic terrorist attack' is a good starting point for any discussion on how journalists approach diversity and – related to it – what the role of the media should be in mirroring diversity which, like it or not, is the reality of any society on this planet.

For media analysts it would be interesting to compare coverage of 9/11; the killings of the gay politician and of the Dutch liberal film maker Theo van Gogh; the recent Spanish train terrorist attack; and London 7/7 by the media in those countries. Usually, in this kind of situation, the media turn to (often tasteless) patriotism packed with propaganda which could be bad or good, but it's always far from responsible journalism. And this author believes that responsible journalism – fair, accurate, in-depth and engaging - is a necessity in any situation, let alone when the reporting could contribute to further tensions, deeper disputes or even armed conflicts within or across the borders, as the recent history of Rwanda or former Yugoslavia has shown.

Why Does Diversity Matter?

It matters simply because it exists. We talk either about race, ethnicity, religion, age, gender, physical abilities, political views, social and economic status or sexual orientation. All or some of these human qualities make an individual or group different from another individual or group. This is what makes us different from each other, unique. Not better of worse, just different. And this is what makes societies where we live diverse, consisting of unique individuals, unique communities, where the same person or group might be the majority for belonging to one diversity category, but could be the minority for belonging to some other diversity category.

As a single mother I am a minority, or as an agnostic in a predominantly conservative Orthodox Christian (with a very recent communist past) Serbian society, I am a minority. At the same time being a Serb makes me a member of the majority ethnic group in a country with some 30% non-Serb citizens. In other words, ‘we are all a bunch of minorities' as one former Editor-in-Chief of The Los Angeles Times put it when explaining why his paper turned towards a growing Latino readership. Therefore, he suggests, we should try to see the world from the perspective of minorities. With all our differences we make our societies heterogeneous, colorful, multicultural, diverse. Our differences instead of being a source of disagreement – as has often happened through history – could be a source of agreement.

Again, no matter how different we are, in fact despite our differences, we do have a lot in common. We share many of the same principles and have common interests. We are all members of the communities in which we live and work; we all wish to be considered useful members of our communities; we all want to live in peace and all want to have good lives; we all want to be respected, to be counted on. We all want to contribute to the society we work and live in. And we all want to be heard and seen. And this is where the media come in.

When last year the prominent UK magazine Prospect published an article by its editor headlined “Too Diverse?”, a heated debate within the media followed lasting for months. Has Britannia embraced its diversity? Has it gone too far in doing so? Is multiculturalism taking over Britishness? Should integration be more encouraged? Where is the balance between multiculturalism and integration? The media took part in the debate, each contributing what had been their understanding and their approach to the very visible diversity in British society. And as often happens after the debate, most were just more deeply entrenched in the ditches than they were in before the debate started. But the issue is still here and will most probably be re-opened once the first shocks of the 7/7 have gone, and once – in, what could definitely be called the British tradition – heads are cooler.

The question of ‘multiculturalism versus integration' has been debated in many societies for different reasons. In post-communist countries it was a part of the democratic or ‘democratic' processes. Or, as in the case of the Balkans, it was seen as a reason for war. Though this author would rather say that ethnicity and religion were more of a pretext, a cover-up for the war, while the main reason for it was getting political and economic power in the region. In the West, this debate was imposed particularly after 9/11 in North America as well as in the EU. And it is still going on. And again, the media is an important part of it.

The Role of Journalists: Public service versus commercial media

When in 2002 the famous BBC launched its new brand image for TV – politically correct images of people from around the world dancing all sort of dances, including young black, wheelchair-bound men dancing hiphop – the BBC Controller at the time, Lorraine Heggessey, explained that the change was introduced because she wanted the channel BBC1 to ‘make viewers feel it was in tune with their lives'.

The popular British broadcaster promised at the same time that by 2010 its staff would reflect the ethnic make-up of the country's population: 10% of its employees would be from ethnic minorities (ethnic minorities comprise just under 7% in the UK ). Of course hiring a journalist from a minority doesn't necessarily mean that he or she would bring stories from his or her community, but there is a suggestion that having a colleague in the newsroom from ‘another' group makes a mainstream journalist more sensitive to the issues the new member of staff represents. The idea is that the new member of the team could be a good source of information on the communities little known to the mainstream journalists or which are traditionally reserved towards mainstream journalists.

Mirroring the society it serves has been an important principal for years not only for the BBC but for other British TV channels as well. Like other national stations in the UK, the BBC has had Black and Asian presenters for some 15 years. In contrast, the very first black presenter on French TV appeared only last year.

But no matter how hard the BBC has tried to be a broadcaster where all members of the society would recognize peoples and views like themselves, not many think it has been doing enough. “Simply recruiting staff from ethnic minorities without attempting to nurture and accommodate racial and cultural diversity does not work,” says Joy Francis of The Creative Collective, a London-based NGO which specializes in bringing more journalists with ethnic minority backgrounds into the UK media. Francis sees the BBC as still having ‘a hideously white face'.

And again, like many news organizations in the UK and the USA, the BBC has a special guide for the producers. It's a kind of diversity checklist with detailed tips on how to report on members of diverse communities – ethnicity, race, gender, age, asylum seekers, homosexuals and lesbians, people with non-typical appearances. Satisfying common as well as specific interests of its audience is one of the crucial principals of public service broadcasters. To strike a balance between the two is a matter of professional skill as well as political sensibility. The more the audience sees a channel or newspaper as reflecting the audience's views, the more they will trust it. This in turn brings credibility to the channel or paper and hence gives more power to those media to change the social attitudes and to make an impact.

As already mentioned – the commercial media in Britain and overseas do not follow the agenda of public service media. For most of them, diversity is reported only if it brings in additional income. Take the case of the previously mentioned LA Times: 40m Latinos living in the area could be – and are – a great source of profit. This is not a problem as long as reporting on this group is fair, accurate in-depth and engaging - the principles of responsible journalism already listed in this article.

This inclusive journalism contributes to the building of the bridges between mainstream and minority communities. It strengthens the minorities' feeling of belonging and strengthens unity, which are two important principals of a stable and open society. Unfortunately, when tabloids turn to topics related to members of minority communities, it is usually to misrepresent or stereotype them, or to turn them into scapegoats, conveying the message ‘our lives would be much better without them .'

Examples are numerous. “So, this is how they thank us?” was The Sun's headline (2002) for an article on a fire in a detention center for asylum seekers in the UK. The very first sentence, “The luxurious £100m facilities couldn't be better (…) but asylum seekers still burned it down,” says it all: asylum seekers are to be blamed for the damage. The fact is that the damage could have been prevented if the anti-fire system in the center had been working; that's what we learned from other media. The Sun didn't bother to pass this ‘little' piece of information on to us.

In 2000 The Mirror ran the headline “Girl, 20, gang-raped by asylum seekers”. Lead: “A woman walking home after a night out (…) raped by three men – thought to be asylum seekers.” So, thought to be asylum seekers. But those who read the actual article – which doesn't happen often with tabloid readers – would find that the perpetrators were unknown. Where the sub-editor found asylum seekers is something just he or she knows. Asylum seekers and Roma or asylum-seeking Roma are the British tabloids' favorite diversity topics. They're labeled as ‘cheats', ‘bogus', ‘phony', ‘benefit-seekers', as people who basically come to the UK to milk the government, and all together gives a very unpleasant picture of British ‘gastarbeiters'. In reality, as Home Office figures show (quoted in The Guardian), foreigners bring 10% more money to the UK than they take from its government.

It is hard to say why UK tabloids – and not only tabloids and not only in the UK – are so hostile towards Roma in particular. At the recent public discussion “British Media: Scapegoating Gypsies”, organized in London by Media Diversity Institute, speakers who were experts on the issue played with typical headlines from European newspapers. Wherever the word Gypsy appeared, they had replaced it with terms such as ‘women', ‘Jews', ‘Moslems' and ‘Blacks'. Suddenly it looked like what it really was - open racism. And the question follows: why do we tolerate racism towards Roma!? Isn't racism always racism!? Yesterday it knocks on your door, tomorrow on mine!?

From Developed to Developing Societies

In so-called developed democracies, the rules are clearer and more respected and therefore, either through the legal system or professional codes of conduct, responsible journalism is encouraged. However, as shown earlier, this doesn't mean that there is no xenophobia, racism, nationalism and other isms and phobias in their media.

In so-called developing democracies (or democracies still-to-emerge, to use the euphemism), the situation is much gloomier. A single article insensitive to ethnicity or religion - the two most sensitive diversity subjects - can cause conflict, demonstrations, and fights, resulting in dozens of deaths. Take the case in Nigeria, where an article referring to the Prophet Mohamed in, for some readers, an inappropriate way, caused the killing of some 200 people in the north of the country. Or the case of the Rwandan radio station Radio des Mille Collines, where presenters were openly inviting members of one ethnic group to kill members of another. Which they did, of course, in their thousands. Or the case of former Yugoslavia , where most of the leading media took sides in the conflict. No one, including the notorious TV Serbia, directly invited their audience to go and kill someone, but the way Serbian national TV was portraying ‘others' and ‘the other side' was suggestive enough. As Prof Vojin Dimitrijevic from Belgrade put it at the time: “By dehumanizing others - as TVS does - you suggest it is OK to kill them.” And they did. Some 250.000 people were killed during the Balkan war, with the media significantly facilitating the killings.

The war in the Balkans is over, but not the hatred. Nor is the hate speech in the Balkan media, mainly towards Roma, gay people and AIDS sufferers.

MDI's monitoring of the most popular papers in the region, six years after the conflict, showed that the common image of an ethnic minority is still “one of an un differentiated whole: presented through collective groups rather than individuals. Widespread, deeply-rooted stereotypes and prejudices that govern the common understanding of minority-majority relations are reflected in the press” (‘Media Monitoring Manual', by Snjezana Milivojevic, MDI).

MDI has also monitored the papers in the South Caucasus, a region with several unsettled conflicts, all of them ethnic. The 2004 research looked at the quality of coverage of five diversity categories – ethnicity, religion, refugees, internally displaced people and homosexuals. Among 6000 articles only 3,4% were related to the five categories. Only a fifth of the articles about minority groups were accompanied by a picture and only one in five articles on the topic appeared on the front page. And even though we are talking about a significant percentage of people - 40% - minority groups in South Caucasian region got little chance to speak for themselves; even when reported, they were not quoted. Only one quarter of the stories about minorities quoted members of the minorities themselves.

Training

MDI's studies confirm the low media standards and journalistic practices which contribute to intolerance towards minority communities. What is hard to say is why that is and what makes journalists do the job that way. Or, more of a known question: what came first, the chicken or the egg? Are the media, as some claim, just reporting the facts (and racism and intolerance are the facts) or do they, the media, by (negatively) stereotyping members of minority communities, create an image of them which most of the audience accept uncritically?

Whatever the case, education is needed. The MDI experience shows that training at least sensitizes journalists to the issues related to diversity. At its best, it brings about changes which some describe as revolutionary. This was the case of Georgian National TV. After a Reporting Diversity consultant spent several months working with both management and journalists, the channel introduced five minority language programmes – a pioneering move, unique in the whole South Caucasus region.

Unfortunately, training for journalists alone is not enough. No matter how much they'd like to take another view on diversity issues after being ‘exposed to the RD treatment', they can't do very much if their bosses have different attitudes. That's why training for what we call media decision-makers is needed too. And crucial to this training are two elements: the legal responsibilities the public service media have in this respect and the business case for diversity in regards to commercial media. In other words, the public service media should learn about their legal obligations regarding representation of different communities, while commercial media need to be convinced that diversity brings profit.

Take the case of the UK daily paper, the Leicester Mercury. In the region where the paper is published, about 38% of the population is made up of ethnic minorities. According to its chief editor Nick Carter, more than 460,000 (out of 900,000) people see at least one copy of the newspaper during the course of an average week. “We reach more people on our patch than any national title or any local radio station,” says Carter. “It means we have the clear potential to play a central role in helping the varied faith communities of Leicester to understand each other and how they fit into the development and future of our city. We believe it is absolutely in our long-term interest to do what we can to promote harmony and understanding between all our communities so that they can live and work together to improve the prosperity of our city and county for the mutual benefit of all,” said Carter when commenting on reporting after 7/7.

Helping journalism educators on different levels develop their own Reporting Diversity Curricula is a serious and necessary task in societies with a poor diversity awareness. This helps new generations of journalists learn the basic lessons of the profession before they start.

Conclusions

•  Reporting Diversity is not just another form of specialized reporting (like ‘today we learn financial reporting, tomorrow showbiz…'). It is the very essence of responsible journalism in democratic (to be) societies. It is about inclusion, it gives all members of a society a voice, so that responsibility for that society's future is based on joint decisions, not on a decision made by a small group or by one person.

•  Fair, accurate, empathetic and in-depth reporting is vital in promoting understanding between different groups. Only thus can we begin confronting irrational prejudices and challenging extremist political agendas.

•  Reporting Diversity is one significant means of conflict resolution – in the 21st century of information – (news) media can (and do) create dialogue and peaceful solutions in situations of latent, low-intensity or open conflicts when ethnicity and/or religion are the cause or pretext for the conflict.

•  It can help or contribute to strengthening the human rights of minorities or marginalized groups, who are important segments of a civic society.

•  By focusing on the most deprived communities, it can contribute both to the education of the members of those communities about their rights and how to lobby for them; as well as putting pressure on those responsible for improving the status of those communities and therefore reducing poverty in the society in general.

•  Reporting Diversity is NOT JUST ABOUT POLITICAL CORRECTNESS (as it's often seen in developed democracies). That's where it starts. It ends where it stops the sort of reporting that causes or contributes to the killings.

Let me finish with this: if you don't report or badly report on health, education, gender, youth, trafficking or corruption, you are considered a bad journalist. But if you report unprofessionally on ethnic, racial or religious issues, you are risking human lives. Full stop.

[1]The Sun regularly sells more than 3.3m copies a day to Britain's 60m people. In comparison, the serious ‘broadsheet' papers sell far fewer, such as The Guardian which typically sells about one-tenth of that number, near the 340,000 mark.