What makes the Afrikaans tabloid Son such a runaway success? And why are the tabloids in general doing so well, while the more established broadsheets seem to be struggling to increase or even uphold their circulation?
One cannot answer these questions without taking into account the far-reaching, liberalising changes that have taken place in South Africa over the past 10 years. If we had had a Son earlier, it would have fared equally well. Probably much better, had the successive totalitarian National Party governments allowed it to be published.
But of course the warped morality and twisted ”Christianity” of the equally authoritarian Dutch Reformed Church and the puritanical Broeders would never have tolerated tabloids. The Son’s innocent page three girl would not even have made it on to our printing press in Paarden Island.
Picture this scene in the office of the Groot Sensor: ”These ous at die Son must be communist agitators. Just look at this topless girl (nogal nie ‘n sleg paar tiete nie, Koos) they want to put on page three. A coloured, magtig! And this while they also have white readers.”
It comes as no great surprise that most of the criticism towards the Son has come from members of the previous establishment and, of course, the Dutch Reformed Church. Since the Son was launched just over two years ago, most of the complaints we received were from dominees and elderly white parishioners, who most probably never read the Son anyway.
Why then is the Son so successful? Here is how a reader, R van Rooyen of Knysna, puts it in the letters column of the new daily edition: ”Eerstens wil ek hartlik dankie sê vir ‘n koerant soos Son! Hy verstaan, dink, voel en praat die taal van ons mense. Dis ‘n koerant waarna oud en jonk uitsien [I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for a paper such as the Son. It understands, thinks, feels and speaks the language of our people. This is a paper that young and old look forward to].”
That probably sums it up pretty well.
Son tells the story as it happens. Not in the language of the taalstryders, dominees and those longing for the days of political and cultural Afrikaner domination, but the way our readers speak. Our lingo is a ”seamless” Afrikaans — the language of any race and colour. The Cape editions speak a mixture of Capey and northern suburbs Afrikaans. In the other editions, we also use the local Sefrikan vernacular. Yuppies make up an important part of our northern readership.
Son has four weekly regional editions: Cape, Eastern Cape, North and Central. A daily Son was recently launched and appears Monday to Thursday. This version is more newsy — and the page three girl more demurely wears a bikini.
We focus on the issues and interests of our readers. And of course we entertain them. Our stories are about people, so-called celebrities as well as ordinary people. Our slogan is ”Son sien alles [Son sees all]” — and we do this on behalf of our readers. We expose politicians, bureaucrats and common or garden skelms, swindlers and crooks. We regard ourselves as champion of the underdog and ordinary South Africans. We mistrust powerful people. Whoever they are. And we are irreverent. Often tongue in cheek.
”Is Aristide ‘n drug lord?”, reads a headline. ”Bendes saai dood [Gangs sow death]” another. Or, ”Help, ek sterf van tik [Help, I am dying from the drug tik]”. ”We expose a ‘Seksmonster-pa‘ [We expose a ‘sex–monster’ dad]”.
Our story on ”Double life van dominee” caused quite a stir. Lizette Rabe of Stellenbosch University in her internet column hysterically accused Son of having a ”licence to kill”, after the gay lover of NG dominee Laurie Gaum, Douw Wessels, committed suicide. He killed himself after publicly accusing Gaum of being a ”sedelose [immoral] fake”. The Son broke the story of Gaum and his gay lover by publishing private pictures and allegations of promiscuity in which Wessels was the main source. Wessels overdosed on sleeping pills the week after the story was published.
Sensasionalist? Of course. We are a tabloid. But we also have a social conscience. Our other tag-line is ”Die Son gee om [The Son cares]”.
The headline of last week’s weekly Cape edition — ”Winter van ellende [Winter of misery]” — focused on the hardships shack-dwellers endure during the winter rains. The northern edition led with ”Sexy ma vir hoer gevat [Sexy mother taken for whore]” — a story about a mother being innocently thrown into a vangwa by cops. We have investigated the vitamin and Aids quack Matthias Rath.
Rabe and her fellow feminists and puritans accuse us of ”bad tabloidism”. Really? In the Cape alone well over one million people read the weekly Son — about half of them women. In addition, the latest Audit Bureau of Circulation figures revealed that the Son was the country’s circulation winner last year. Thankfully, the days of Big Brother (or Groot Griet) are over. Within our Constitution and our laws we have freedom of choice.
Viva die regstaat. Voertsek skynheiligheid (Viva the constitutional state. Sod off hypocrisy).
Ingo Capraro is editor-in-chief at the Son