Shahid Afridi – Pakistani media’s latest victim?

The Pakistani cricketer is the latest target of the Pakistani media after assaulting a fan at the Karachi International Airport but is it justified.

In Pakistan, the media tends to have more freedom than most when it comes to adding opinions into their stories. Whilst other nations have shows with bonafide experts presenting their arguments under the moderation of a host, Pakistan has shouting matches
between two people who probably have a fake degree. That is not to say the foreign media is perfect, far from it, just take Fox News as an example.

However, one has to take a look at each incident in isolation in order to determine whether the actions of every party were justified or not and even then there is plenty of grey between the black and white.

A bit of background before we jump into the nitty-gritty here; the Pakistani cricket team returned home from Bangladesh after lifting the Asia Cup trophy. Shahid Afridi, who was awarded the Man-of-the-Match award for his performance in the final, arrived
at Karachi International Airport and was met by an army of fans.

The cricketer’s mood seemed off as fans continued to hound him before he finally snapped and attacked one of the very people who came to welcome him home, beating him to the ground and swearing all kinds of obscenities at him before being pulled back.

That is the story going around in the media these days, and to be honest from that alone, one can do nothing but blame the former captain for losing his cool and losing the respect of his fans.

Yet, as with everything, there are two sides to a story. Afridi only reacted the way he did after his daughter was trampled on by one of those very eager fans. A fact that the media seems to be oblivious to and when they do acknowledge the fact, they do
so in a very off-hand manner, as if it holds no importance.

Pakistani media sensationalism at its best.

If one wants to take a balanced look at what happened then they need to understand this. It was not a cricketer attacking a fan; it was a father reacting to someone hurting his daughter. Nothing more, nothing less and that is something the media in this
country should be reporting and not the tabloid journalism that has become so common.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=17330

Posted by Musa Afridi on Mar 27 2012. Filed under Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry