Harsh emotion, raw trauma and intense politics erupted in the wake of the Media Monitoring Project’s (MMP) study of racism in the media in 1999. Last week, a new report by the MMP in association with the Human Rights Commission (HRC) barely made the news.
The lack of attention is partly a sign that we have transcended the original problems. It’s also a case of many of the historic combatants having moved on to pastures greener than the media.
Racial identity burned brightly eight years ago when the HRC commissioned the original MMP research that, despite severe methodological problems, found coverage to be profoundly coloured by white racial identity in general, and racism in particular.
Back then, a group of African journalists mobilised a “black identity” against white counterparts whom they accused of prejudice and perpetuating negative stereotypes in the news. On the receiving side, white practitioners were initially defensive, but many later acknowledged increased sensitivity about their limitations.
Few of the original protagonists in the media or the HRC (led in 1999 by Barney Pityana) remain in their positions today. And while a survey by the South African National Editors’ Forum two years ago showed continued racial divides in newsrooms, there is not the level of polarisation that once existed.
To what extent, then, do problems of racially tinted coverage remain? Can we say that, in our transition away from apartheid, that racial identity is fading in real life and the way it’s reflected in the media?
A cursory visit to most former white newspaper newsrooms shows that whites are still disproportionately preponderant in terms of their population percentage. This is, in part, a result of black brain drain — the continuous poaching of black journalists by industry and the government.
Whatever the reason, one might therefore expect these continuing racial imbalances to translate into content that reflects the news values and perspectives of a minority that lacks the life experience and language of the majority. Some would say this manifests on occasion — for example, in the greater coverage of Leigh Matthews compared with that of Francis Rasuge in 2005. But judging by the MMP’s latest research, the issue is a bit more complicated when you get beyond the anecdotal.
For a start, the new research is both narrower and broader than the original report. It touches on wider problems than race by also taking in xenophobia — an issue that was marginal in 1999.
The contemporary study is also narrower in that it looks only at those articles where race is explicitly mentioned. In contrast, the original study also gave attention to racism by omission — for example, the absence of positive images of black people.
There are some problems with the MMP’s new approach of only looking at the cases where racial categorisations are directly expressed. It ignores racial imbalances, for example. But even so the group’s report does make some interesting observations.
One of these is the finding that most stories that mention the race of subjects are features or commentaries, rather than news. Also, they are mainly about crime, politics, economics (black economic empowerment), justice and conflict. (Surprisingly, sport did not feature much in the MMP’s research period, which was January to May last year).
Time was when the race of people in the news was taken for granted, and only blackness was registered (negatively) as visible. But that’s turned on its head today. For instance, according to MMP, contemporary newspapers:
- mention the race of a perpetrator when the crime involves white against black (while keeping to colour-blindness when the criminals are black); and
- embody, in 18% of the articles studied, a message that “all whites are racist”.
The MMP unconvincingly claims that these points foster racism — that they create the impression that it is so common for black people to commit crime that their colour is taken for granted.
That’s a nonsensical extrapolation. In fact, today’s media is commendably far from itself playing the “race card”. Gone are the days of attributing agency to racial appellation by, for instance, ascribing criminality to being black.
Ironically, the MMP not only says the absence of racial labelling can stereotype people, but it also has a problem with cases when there are racial references.
Thus, the research criticises the journalism where, in 14% of the raced-articles studied, colour is effectively, but incorrectly, cited as relevant (such as being a cause of certain actions).
Yet, as the MMP itself acknowledges, 10% of its sample are about racially motivated crimes (usually driven by white racism). Surely no problem, then, in mentioning the race of perpetrators in such instances? (Of course, even here, race is not the only explanation — else all people categorised within a race group could be expected to act accordingly.)
What the MMP could have profitably looked at are the less explicit subtexts, naming and euphemisms whereby the race of criminals is implied or inferred even when it is not explicitly identified.
Whether such subtle labelling is justifiable then becomes a separate question.
The problem is that the MMP’s critique, when there is racial referencing, is that this could encourage political correctness in the media whereby racial identity is dropped entirely even where it has some salience. This would not be in regard to stories about black economic empowerment, which are expressly about race, but rather with regard to reports about racially linked abuse, attitudes and stereotypes.
In this connection, too much media coverage today is too polite to mention race, whereas everyone knows — for instance — that certain kinds of opinions (for now at least) are still largely associated with racially defined identity, and not random sentiments from a colour-free “public”. This is different to proclaiming that all whites are racist, or all Africans are victims, but it is a reality nonetheless that the media sometimes pretend doesn’t exist.
Commendably, the MMP does call for more context and explanation — which is surely the only way to register the actual role (or not) of racial identity in any given instance.
This is a recommendation that is far less dramatic and condemnatory in tone than the group’s 1999 research. Little wonder then that most of the media have felt it to be less than newsworthy. But when reports do deal with race and nationality, there could certainly be a lot more context and depth so we can really understand how these dynamics are playing in a transforming South Africa.