Are they little angels or migrant hordes?
Of all the British newspapers, perhaps the most hypocritical is the Daily Mail. As with other papers today, the Mail seeks to have it both ways, lamenting the death of a child they wish had stayed in a warzone.
But the Mail’s methods are a special case and a class apart.
Visitors to its website MailOnline this morning will have seen two stories. One was headlined:
“We can’t cope with this tide! Europe’s despairing leaders bring back border controls with free-movement zone on brink of collapse”
The second:
“Father of migrant boys washed up on Turkish beach arrives at morgue to say farewell to the family he lost as it emerges he ‘tried to hold onto his sons after boat capsized but saw them washed away‘”
(Click to enlarge)
Aside from the usual over-the-top tone and creepy use of someone’s grief, the thing to avoid here would have been the water metaphors.
Papers often speak of a ‘wave’ of migration, of migrants ‘pouring in’, or as today, a ‘tide’. Might this not seem insensitive when children (and hundreds of adults) are drowning in the sea?
The placing of these two stories together ironically exposes the key contradiction in the Mail’s coverage: using the emotions of the father of a drowned family, while still describing them and their countryfolk as a tide or wave ‘engulfing’ Europe.
It gets worse.
When posted on the Mail’s Facebook page, the first story was headlined:
‘Europe abandons open borders in face of migrant hordes‘
Nice!
But just hours later they were sharing tributes to the boy who drowned, under the headline:
‘God be with you, little angel’
So which is it? Are they little angels or migrant hordes?
Or do they switch from being one to the other only when they die?
The Daily Mail ought to make up its mind. Otherwise it will be open to the charge of just doing whatever pulls in advertising revenue. Perish the thought!
Adam Barnett is a staff writer at Left Foot Forward. Follow MediaWatch on Twitter
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17 Responses to “The Daily Mail’s hypocrisy on refugees knows no bounds”
Godfrey Paul
The parents of that child had been resident in Turkey for over a year. Turkey is NOT a war zone, It is a stable country and member of NATO. That makes them economic migrants NOT refugees.
The parents chose to take their children into the open sea in an unstable boat with no lifejackets. The parents are clearly negligent and to blame for this tragedy – No one else.
Giselle Martinez Evans
Turkey hates Kurds – they are treated atrociously there. You are so wrong.
Kevin
Godfrey Paul what an awful human being you are. You should be ashamed of yourself. You do realize that Turkey borders Syria right????? And that the war is happening all along the border. You do also realize there is a large humanitarian crisis developing in Turkey – or are you so ignorant as to not read about anything before posting your thoughtless comments.. Are you saying that if your family was on the potential brink of starvation and threatened with a violent conflict on your doorstep you wouldn’t try to get out and find something better and safer??? You disgust me with your disdain for these poor people. You prob wouldn’t last a day where these people have come from without crying for your mum! Someone should put you out there and see how long you last. .
mr_fatty
Would freeloaders – you are implying that they are good-for-nothing freeloaders – be desperate enough to take such appalling risks?
“Negligent” my bottom! Are you not perceptive enough to see total desperation? You seem to be a very callous man.
jacko
Unlike you, Adam Barnett, the Mail tells both sides of the story.