How Melbourne’s newspapers ignored the Asian Cup and let down the Muslim community

A few days ago, on Australia Day, I read this letter in Melbourne’s The Age newspaper.

I, too, was lucky enough to have experienced “all the fun and excitement on and off the pitch” by attending the seven Asian Cup matches played at Melbourne’s superb rectangular stadium (AAMI Park).

In those two weeks I never felt prouder to be a Melburnian. It was Melbourne at its best. The Asian Cup matches were a joyous celebration of our vibrant diversity. A colourful, noisy space where immigrant communities were able freely to celebrate their heritage and concurrently deepen their sense of belonging to their new home. As a bonus, they also showed us repressed natives how to support a national football team with their passion.

This was also the case in other cities hosting the Asian Cup. In the nation’s usually soporific capital, Canberra, rivals the Iran and Iraq fans created something extraordinary and were rewarded with a match that has now become legend. ABC Grandstand commentator Tim Gavel was so impressed he tweeted.

Crowd atmosphere at Canberra Stadium is something I haven't experienced in 25 years of calling football at this ground .

— Tim Gavel (@TimGavel) January 23, 2015

In his letter to The Age, Sedat asked for recognition of these crowds and their behaviour by authorities to promote dialogue and trust in Australia.

Unless you have been living in a cave or have the comprehension skills of a five-year-old, you can understand why he would make such a request.

The Asian Cup kicked off at the same time as the tragic Charlie Hebdo killings and a month after the Sydney siege. Australia’s Muslims, who were already under constant scrutiny are now subject to even more intense scrutiny. Especially in the media where you get the impression that every son and daughter is a potential ISIS recruit (only a sermon away from breaking “terrorist” bad) and where asinine cultural commentators finger moderate Muslims for the actions of a lunatic fringe.

I have bad news for Sedat. It’s too late. The “authorities” that disseminate news and information to the Melbourne public failed you spectacularly. The Age, the paper that published your letter failed you. The Herald Sun, also failed you, abjectly.

The evidence is damning. Here was their chance to capture the joy, excitement and fun of the Asian Cup, to advertise to a broader public the happy faces of Melburnians from the Middle East enjoying the football and celebrating their national heritage, be it Iranian, Palestinian, Jordanian or Saudi Arabian.

I specifically looked at the News section of the Herald Sun and The Age from January 9 (the day Asian Cup commenced) to January 26 (a few day after Melbourne hosted its seventh and final game). Unlike online content, or your Twitter or Facebook feed, the newspaper is the last bastion of total editorial control. Space is finite, serious thought is given to what is put in the paper and where. This is the NEWS, this is what’s happening in your town. If you want sport, go to the sports section.

This is what I found.

The Case Against The Herald Sun

Below is the pathetic sum total of the Herald Sun‘s Asian Cup coverage as human interest “News” story. Their sports affairs reporter, Peter Rolfe, getting hysterical about “feral fans” on January 9 and a story about who should pay the Bahraini’s $25,000 security bill on January 16.

I’m afraid that is it.

Meanwhile, across the road from the Asian Cup, at the Australian Open the Herald Sun had no problem filling its pages with a surfeit of human interest stories and loads of photos of happy, smiling tennis fans like the piece below by Peter Rolfe published on January 22.

Where is Peter Rolfe’s piece about the happy, smiling fans supporting Iran or Palestine at the Asian Cup with accompanying photo?

Here is an example of a photo that was NOT published in the Herald Sun.

Happy Palestine fans. Photo: Nasya Bahfen

Does the Herald Sun have an interest in promoting dialogue and trust with a maligned community? Based on the evidence presented, the answer is an overwhelming NO. They’ve got papers to sell, an agenda to set and fear to breed. Hell, why confuse the feral football fans/feral Muslims narrative.

Front page Herald Sun, January 16. On the same day Jordan played Palestine in Melbourne.

 The case against The Age

Disappointingly, The Age, despite it having a more progressive, sophisticated readership also ignored the Asian Cup as a News event. Apart from two pieces on the opening day of the tournament about a “slew of VIPs” attending a soccer conference and a football juggler performing at the opening ceremony, the only other stories to make it to the news section was a piece about expat South Koreans supporting the North Koreans and a small piece from Fairfax’s China correspondent on their long suffering fans. Actually, there was another piece. Martin Flanagan’s lovely piece about an Uzbek expat couple published on Saturday January 17. But for some strange reason this human interest story which really belonged in the news section was relegated to the sports section.

Just like the Herald Sun, The Age wasn’t shy in putting a slew of Australian Open stories in its News section and on the front page. Here is an example from January 20.

But where was The Age when Iran’s boisterous fans created the best atmosphere ever heard at AAMI Park, in fact at any sporting venue in Melbourne, two day earlier on January 18?

Boisterous Iran fans. Photo: Nasya Bahfen

Where were the photos of Melbourne’s happy Palestinians who turned out en masse for the match against Jordan? Where were the pieces that Sedat wanted his fellow Melburnians to read? You know, the ones that promote dialogue and trust in Australia.

Front Page The Age, January 21.

Conclusion

A few days ago, The Age‘s senior sports reporter, Michael Lynch, who has been doing a fine job on the Asian Cup in the paper’s sports pages, wrote this on the embarrassment of Melbourne not bidding to host a semi-final.

Quite simply, the previous Baillieu/Napthine government and Melbourne Major Events made a massive miscalculation and, with the benefit of hindsight, completely misjudged the grip the Asian Cup would exert on the sporting public.

The board of Melbourne Major Events (VMEC) not only includes Collingwood AFL President Eddie McGuire, who suggested the Asian Cup would be a lemon, but also Fairfax CEO Greg Hywood, publisher of The Age.

Did the same misjudgement which afflicted VMEC also afflict the editors at The Age? Or does it point to a deeper, much more serious malaise of who controls the message when it comes to our migrant communities. Melbourne’s Muslim and Middle Eastern communities had a great story to tell during the Asian Cup, especially at this difficult time. They were ignored.

Then again why publish the thoughts of the average Aussie Palestinian, or Aussie Iraqi, or Aussie Iranian, when you have an AFL celebrity footballer/multicultural ambassador who means well but is well and truly out of his depth.

Nic Naitanui was rapt at the gradual growth of the AFL’s multicultural program. The West Coast ruckman agreed that its role in the community was as important as ever given tensions that have arisen following recent terror attacks in Paris and Sydney and the global rise of militant Islam.

“At this particular time, it couldn’t be more needed in our community,” Naitanui said.

“I liked the sentiment behind the ‘illridewithyou’ stuff that happened after the stuff that happened across the road from the Sunrise studios [in Sydney’s Martin Place].

“I didn’t know too much about the Islamic community until I had been a part of the program and spent time with [Richmond defender] Bachar [Houli] and heard a bit about their culture.

“That integration, social inclusion, getting everyone in the community aware of what everyone’s about and what their beliefs are and then teaching them the Australian way, it’s all part of it. But there’s no better way to bring it together than through footy (AFL),” he said.

Well, Nic, the Islamic community brought it together at the Asian Cup with the sport they love. You and many others just didn’t read about it.

I’d like to thank Nasya Bahfen, senior lecturer at Monash University, community ambassador with the 2015 Asian Cup and AFL multicultural ambassador for the Asian Cup images.