It’s ironic that while on it’s front pages the SCMP vociferously advocates for press freedom and the release of Bo Lee and his fellow disappeared. The reality within it’s own pages is that of censorship, intimidation and harassment of any reader who dare criticise or question an SCMP employee. The exact type of actions that the SCMP would have its readers believe it looks to expose in others. The hypocrisy is sad.
On the 1 January the SCMP’s Kevin Kung spent 16 hours, working until 1am, on a story about the New Year’s Day Youth Rugby Tournament at HK Football Club. By his own admission he didn’t stay until the end of the tournament. A sterling effort you might think, except that the published article, a massive 250 or so words, quite simply ignores half the participants. Focusing solely on the boys rugby, reading his original story you’d never know that half the rugby played that day was by girls.
Linda Olson the administrator and driving force behind the Women’s Rugby Hong Kong Facebook group enquired politely of Mr Kung about the gender bias in his article.
“I am wondering why you only reported on boys’ rugby in the article below?
The headline makes it sound as if only boys took part.
The article itself makes no mention of the girls who played.
The video includes only brief coverage of girls rugby (the U12s team and captain).
This is unacceptable.
Nearly a quarter of rugby players in Hong Kong are girls/women and it is the most rapidly expanding demographic here.
Please ensure that your coverage is more inclusive in future..”
The article’s author Mr Kung replied and made some edits to ‘improve’ the online version of the article:
1. “Girls” was added to the sub-headline making it gender neutral.
2. A photo with caption of Gracie Hood (GH) was added.
3. An extra paragraph added to the end of the article mentioned the U19s girls’ game (but did not name the Captain as they had with the boys game) and GH being named Best and Fairest of the match.
Mrs Olson notified the WRHK Facebook group members of the changes and thanked Mr Kung for making them, at the same time providing a quantitative analysis of the gender imbalance of the SCMP coverage.
Mr Kung however had also cc’d in SCMP Sports Editor Noel Prentice who then fired off an intimidatory and threatening email to Mrs Olson which he cc’d to senior figures at the HK Rugby Union AND Mrs Olson’s employer!!!
Mr Prentice’s email is quite astounding in it’s arrogance, tone and less than full disclosure of facts.
“I take exception to you accusing my reporter and SCMP of sexist coverage when Kevin has gone out of his way to cover rugby and the New Year’s Day tournament. He spent 16 hours compiling the online and print coverage so please have some respect.
SCMP is a great supporter of rugby and we give what many consider a niche sport a disproportionate amount of coverage. (bc’s note: why, because the HK Rugby Union pay the SCMP a lot of money to write about local and international rugby). And we have also gone out of our way to cover the emergence of women/girls in the game and the opportunity they have been afforded.
We do not have the resources to give blanket coverage to any sport and all sports and events are judged on their news value.
We also strive to be fair and balanced and I would expect you to also adhere to these principles when delivering any gender bias lectures to the students of Li Po Chun United World College of Hong Kong.” SCMP’s Noel Prentice
If it takes Mr Kung 16 hours to write a 250 or so word article it does explain a lot about why the SCMP print edition is so thin and lacking in content compared to years past. Joking aside Noel Prentice’s email is factually mis-representative of Mrs Olson’s enquiry and comment; neglects to mention that the HKRU pays the SCMP lots of money to ‘support’ the writing and publishing of stories about rugby; and extremely patronising of the fairer sex “the emergence of women/girls in the game and the opportunity they have been afforded” and by assuming that boys rugby coverage is of value, while coverage of girls youth rugby has no news value.
If the original article was to quote Mr Prentice “Fair and balanced” then Mrs Olson wouldn’t have needed to contact Mr Kung and could have used the story to show how the media was covering girls and women’s rugby in the same detail as men’s rugby. That it didn’t make any mention of 50% of the tournaments participants makes it unbalanced not fully accurate and a perfect example of gender imbalance in the media – the subject of Mrs Olson’s frustration and her class.
Why Mr Prentice also cc’d Mrs Olson employer, in what appears to be a blatant intimidation attempt to damage her professional standing and work relationship with her employer – while at the same time looking to censor the use of SCMP content in an education setting – is something the SCMP failed to answer when bc emailed them asking for a comment.
Read the full email conversation here – email addresses have been removed to protect people’s privacy.
Read about women’s rugby in bc magazine and here on the Women’s Rugby Hong Kong facebook group.
