Thursday, July 14, 2005

The third headline


One of the jokes doing the rounds in the pre-web era of b-boards and newsgroups was about the three headlines that told the story of Ben Johnson's fall from grace:

  • First headline: "Canadian sprinter wins the Olympic Gold Medal".
  • Second headline: "Jamaican-born Canadian sprinter fails the dope test".
  • Third headline: "Jamaican-born sprinter stripped of his Olympic Gold Medal".

Are we seeing the third headline in this news story?

3 Comments:

  1. Anonymous said...

    My Son, The Fanatic
    White Teeth
    Maybe to an extent East is East -

    Each of these movies pointed towards the possibility that something like this might happen in that society.


    I am afraid in this particular case you can't separate the 'origin' from the doer's action - it is all so tied together.

  2. Anonymous said...

    Tilotamma, I understand the media's tremendous need to box people into convenient categories. "Terrorists with Pakistani origins" is one such category, and it is also a convenient category, that allows people to disregard and forget about the other influences ('origins') on the terrorists. Acceptance of this simple category allows other people (and their agendas and ideologies) to be let off the hook.

  3. Anonymous said...

    Abi, recently there was a case of a killer doctor from Melbourne, I think, of Indian origin. In that particular case, I wonder: could we separate the "origin" from the doer's action, was it all tied together?