Friday, July 22, 2005

And How Does Al-Jazeera Report the Tube Shooting?

Most people read only a couple of paragraphs deep into news stories; some only read the lead before moving on. That's why journalists tend to pack so much information into the first paragraph of a breaking story. For example, this is the lead for the tube shooting story at MSNBC: "Hours after chasing down and shooting to death one man on the subway..."

So how does al-Jazeera serve their mostly Arab audience? Like this [emphasis added]:

Police have confirmed that they shot dead a man in an underground train station in south London.

The man was shot apparently while trying to board a train on Friday morning at Stockwell station in south London.
Just a peaceful man trying to take the tube into work when the British Gestapo murdered him for no reason. In the sixth(!) paragraph it's mentioned that he "ran" onto the train.

This isn't just a matter of style, this is how propaganda is done.