Isn’t it time for good news to be good news
With the Channel 4 ‘spin’ of telecasting the ‘Killing Fields of Sri
Lanka’ programme last week, we were once again reminded that relating
only one side of the story can be as convincing to an audience, wishing
to hear only that side of the story. Watching it on ‘You Tube’, the
question I, as an ordinary Sri Lankan citizen asked throughout its
craftily-spun-rolling was, where then is the LTTE in all of this? They
were always featured as the victims but for a few passing references to
just a few of their crimes, there was very little mention of them.
One-sided affair
It was as if this was a ‘clapping of hands with one hand’, where the
sole agenda is to get a legitimately elected government of my country
and its armed forces on its knees for effectively wiping out a group of
terrorists, or their representatives who were once ‘friends’ or were
‘friends of friends’ of yours. It was as if there were no terrorists or
terrorism against the Sri Lankan state, citizens of this country and
even on a leader of India, Rajiv Ghandi, involved in this story. For
someone who has only little knowledge of the over 25 years of unleashing
of bloody terrorist attacks by the LTTE, it would seem as if the Sri
Lankan government was hell-bent on killing its own innocent Tamil
civilian citizens, when the truth is far from that.
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Destruction caused by the LTTE bomb
blast at the Central Bank on January 31, 1996. File photo
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At one point I wondered, if it would not have been tactically
advantageous for the LTTE terrorists to shell the hospitals located
within the ‘No-Fire Zones’ themselves, to achieve the very objective of
attracting the sympathy and involvement of the ‘international
community’. This could have been a ploy to discredit the government and
its fighting outfit. I wondered why that possibility was not even
suggested to the viewers. It was to me a portrayal of a totally
one-sided affair and not at all ‘unbiased reportage’ of the end-stages
of the defeating of what was termed by the international media
themselves as the ‘most ruthless terrorist group in the world’.
Hell on earth
For those UN and Amnesty International ‘officials’, featured in the
programme, who have been party to only a limited period of this bloody
conflict, I can only say ‘You should have lived through what I and 20
million others like me, had to live through as Sri Lankans during those
over 25 years’. To us, it was ‘hell on earth’ when our brothers and
sisters were indiscriminately murdered by the LTTE suicide bombers. It
was sure hell to see many lives of our young being sacrificed while
fighting ruthless terrorists on those battle-fields. There will be
testimony on both sides of the fence of mothers, fathers, brothers and
sisters and sons and daughters of those who have been victims of the
traps laid in LTTE killing fields at various locations, at various
times, in various forms and the kidnappings and summary executions
carried out during those over 25 years.
For these spin doctors and those who chose only to be associated with
one part of the story, such news goes to achieve their singular
objective of wanting to place another obstacle in the way of a nation,
that so yearns to heal its wounds and move on to achieve a better future
for all its citizens.
Our brethren
I, for one am someone who does not hold any political party
affiliations or blind loyalties. I was part of an entirely voluntary
effort working at the interim camps in helping Tamil civilians in the
immediate aftermath of the defeat of the LTTE and met and interacted
with them on several occasions and assisted in solving some of their
immediate problems. There were many others who did very much more and
helped ease their plight. At no time did we associate the LTTE’s inhuman
ways with any of the innocent civilians, in those camps. To us they were
brethren who had undergone much suffering.
Just this week in the Deep South where I live, we eagerly wait to
welcome and interact with 10 Tamil students and their teachers on a
Peace Secretariat, US AID and Rotary Club sponsored programme. They are
here for a week, will visit schools and have fun meeting their
counterparts. Several children here are gearing to horn their Tamil
speaking skills to be able to interact with their brothers and sisters
from the North. I am told that the visiting students are doing the same.
There are yet many other ongoing programmes in the North and the East
and in the rest of the country to help rebuild the lives of these very
people depicted in the film. There are committed counsellors, doctors,
engineers, government employees, members of the armed forces, volunteers
and other well-meaning persons, who are chipping-in to assist our Tamil
brethren to heal their wounds and regain hope and ability to build a
better tomorrow.
We are healing
It is certainly the summation of the work of the leadership, such
individuals and events that will bring us together to cement real peace
within our nation. Attempts of ‘spin doctors’ and their sponsors with PR
funds, who seem to be hell-bent on creating more and more rift and
division among us, will certainly not help the process.
The good news is that in spite of all of this we are healing, and we
are fully aware that it is not an easy road ahead.
On a recent web-forum a fellow Sri Lankan Asoka Weerasinghe of Canada
had had this to say:
“Graphic footage of the murder of Tamil civilians in a powerful
documentary should move the world to seek justice”, wrote Chris Cobb.
“I myself was reviled by this documentary as was Chris Cobb. But my
revulsion was for a very different reason. This was a video when
challenged by independent experts as not being authentic footage, was
admitted by Channel 4’s Callum Macrea who directed it, that it was put
together with photographic stills, LTTE (Tamil Tiger) websites, video
clippings, from official Sri Lankan Army video footage and satellite
imagery, contrary to what we were made to believe were completely shot
by a simple mobile phone in the killing fields. I also noted that it was
Channel 4’s News team, Nick Paton Walsh, producer Bessie Du and
cameraman Matt Jasper who were deported from Sri Lanka on May 10, 2009,
as they alleged were arrested for false reporting on the Tamil Tiger
terrorist war and subsequently deported.
Suicide bombing
It is also clear that the motive to air this video to be seen around
the world is to insist that Sri Lanka has to be tried for war against
humanity and war crimes during the final few months of the war, when we
know that the Tamil Tigers did kill over 100,000 innocent unarmed
Sinhalese and Muslim civilians, men, women, pregnant mothers, children
and infants for 27 long years and hijacked the right-to-life of 21
million people who were just scared to step outside their homes for the
fear of being bombed to smithereens by the Tamil Tigers. They were the
terrorists who perfected the art of suicide bombings with suicide body
packs, and executed 388 suicide bombings by the time the war ended on
May 18, 2009, which also assassinated two heads of state Rajiv Gandhi of
India and President Premadasa of Sri Lanka”.
Ethical practises and the precepts or commandments followed by
rational and good media, just do not jell well with efforts such as that
of Channel 4. They take bits and pieces of images, thought-lines,
comments and commentaries out of context, out of time lines and thread
them together to tell stories to audiences who want to hear it that way.
Ground realities, rationality and facts are ignored as a rule and the
sources are always secondary at best and tertiary most often.
There is no doubt that we live in an imperfect world and there is so
much of wrong-doing that needs to be exposed. It is also true that the
role of the media in that pursuit is of vital importance. Human freedom
and expression would never be the same if not for the presence of fine,
rational media men and women, who often take huge risks on their own
lives to bring to us, the realities of the world as they are.
Have what it takes
Yet it seems that the objective and the rationale behind covering
'bad and sad news' while being in the comforts of the studios using the
best of technology and doctoring skills, working with editing machines
and with third and second party materials, without an understanding of
what really goes on in the places or the situations they are reporting
on, seem to pass on today as 'hits' of stories as they are touted.
What we need today is a new dictum where bad news is not considered
good news. We need to focus more on the good and encourage more and more
of that good to happen more often around us. There is no merit in
rubbing on wounds that are healing. One needs to amputate only cancerous
growths and not healthy tissues.
Once again, I as a citizen of Sri Lanka want to observe and impress
upon the many friends and well-wishes around, that we as a nation have
the resolve, will, energy and whatever else it takes to heal our wounds.
We only need you to encourage, constructively criticise, support us and
cheer us along the way. It is with such effort that 'good news will
become good news'. [email protected]
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