A hero and a cold blooded murderer, the same difference?
What makes a hero and what makes a cold blooded murdering beast? Well in Malaysia that just depends on the choice of a verb (one little word!) that the leading newspaper’s journalist decides to place into his headline.
What am I talking about? Well before I show you the original articles, I’m just going to brief you on what I understand to be the actual ‘event’ behind the stories. Apparently one man decided he would commit/attempt robbery (because the investigation is on going, everyone is careful to use the word ‘alleged’) and he attacked the security guard. A struggle ensued, the security guard was injured and that’s when the brave dog came to the rescue of it’s owner (the security guard). It bit the robber and gave his owner (the security guard) a chance to run and get help. The police came, found the robber alive, sprawled injuries all over his body but no dog in sight. The robber died later at the hospital.
Was that clear? Now have a look at these two articles, both are leading newspapers in Malaysia:
Headline 1: Man mauled by dog found dead
Head line 2: Dog saves owner, but robber dies from injuries
Do you see the difference? In headline 1, the dog is portrayed as a killer beast whilst in headline 2 he’s a hero! All the difference due to the words, ‘mauled’ and ‘saves’! And that’s just the headline. If you read both articles you’d see how confusingly misleading not to mention defaming article 1 is. In fact they seem to have confused themselves over who is the ‘victim’. Article 2 seems to be more accurate with sensible facts and time-lines.
So why the peeve you wonder. Well the effect of it a massive one that’s why! Not everybody reads and if they do, not everyone has the logic to understand or evaluate. The point is the dog bit the robber to save his owner. The impression that is going to stick in people’s head is, the dog mauled a man to death. Now there’s going to be a widespread frenzy about how dangerous German Shepherds(yes the little hero in the event is a German Shepherd) and crazed mobs are going to want it to be put down once they find him.
Seriously, Asia needs to wake up and realise the difference a word makes! If that dog gets put down and a new wave of German Shepherd haters emerge, you know who’s to blame!
