Saturday 30 October 2010

The tourist abuse scandal and shoddy journalism

As a Maldivian living abroad, I try to keep up with all the happenings back home as much as I can. It got a little boring after a few months since nothing has really changed. The political scene is still a giant comedy festival and the recently-concluded Dhivehi League was like watching paint dry. So monotonous. Well, I was expecting another slow news day when I saw it. The oh-so popular video that has been making headlines all over the world. As a result, we Maldivians are now stuck in a very uncompromising, extremely uncomfortable and a very unfamiliar position. We're like a deer caught in headlights.

It was bad enough that the idiots who caused all this trouble were Maldivian, born and bred in Maldives, you know, "Paradise on Earth", "The sunny side of life". I mean, people who live there aren't even supposed to have the capability of such heinous acts, aren't they?

What upset me most was the crappy and utterly BS journalism which followed. And for once, the journalists are not Maldivian. Pieces like this one, published by AFP news, and this one by a poor excuse of a journalist from The Guardian. Yay, let's not blame the foul-mouthed cretins! They were squeaky clean innocent!

If you bothered to follow the links, you may have able to decipher a disturbing pattern; the journalists have made it a meal of highlighting the fact that Maldives is an Islamic country. Eh? Just read some of the comments for the article from my second link. The general consensus is that "The Muslims are at it again!". Much emphasis is also made on the fact that the perpetrators called the Swiss tourists "infidels". Really now, any Maldivian who watched the video would tell you that that was probably the least offensive term used against the unsuspecting couple. The idiots spewed much worse, I assure you!

The worst thing about this fiasco is that, somehow, they've turned this into a religious thing. The perpetrators weren't religious, neither by their appearance nor language. Practicing Muslims would never use such foul language since we're prohibited from doing so, we aren't allowed to speak behind people's back either. They even mocked the Islamic religious rituals, for God's sake! 

But of course, why let the facts get in the way of a good story, eh? It's so much easier to remain as bigots, reveling in the fact that we're threatened by global warming, calling us "Saudi on sea". Some of the comments on The Guardian's article are so laden with ignorance that I wonder how they manage to walk and breath at the same time. What a sad, pathetic bunch of losers. Here's a suggestion; stop talking about things you've no clue about. You sound ignorant enough already.


5 comments:

maldivesresortworkers said...

exactly

Anonymous said...

talk about ppl who bring the 'anti-islamic' cry into any topic of this world.
http://www.randomreflexions.com/2010/10/29/vigilantly-stupid-everywhere/

Imma said...

anon: I know, sad isn't it? These bigots are taking advantage of a national travesty to manipulate people. Makes us wonder why they need to make up a bunch of lies to spread their propaganda...

Anonymous said...

anonymous: im sorry but the randomreflexions blog post about the incident does not make mention of religion. perhaps you have not read it completely. talk about bigotry.

Imma said...

Oh really? My mistake then. I'll hold my hands up and admit that I didn't even bother to follow that link. You see, I've long since decided that the knuckle-headed rantings of that particular author is not worth wasting my life over.