Last week saw wave after wave of complaints about a range of things concerning the SEA games that the Philippines is hosting. The first bit of news that broke was about a Php50M cauldron that was built. People thought that was excessive, which I believe is reasonable to think. Php50M is a lot of money for a structure that's just supposed to hold fire but I've spoken on this in a previous post.
The next wave of news came when several teams started arriving from other countries. Issues like the Cambodian team having to sleep on the floor of a holding room because their hotel room wasn't ready to some teams being brought to a different hotel started sprouting. Other news bits include some teams complaining about limited food options or a scarcity of water. There was even a news bit about the Singaporean team being served pork when some of them were Muslim.
Together with this wave of embarrassing news bits came news of some venues not being completed on time. Football fields or media centers that, based on the photos, were indeed embarrassing if they were in fact to be used. Now, the SEA games are ongoing and neither football field nor media center was used. No more pictures of toilet cubicles with two toilets inside and the like.
What have I to say about all these matters?
Let the news breathe! Around 24 hours would do.
It's very easy to jump on a news article that supports your viewpoint. Pro-admin camps will usually jump on any little news bit that will highlight the admin in a good light and anti-admin camps will do the same but with news bits that will show the admin in a bad light. As such, putting out any news bit that falls on either side of the aisle will no doubt be published to please a certain crowd.
Let's take the case of the Cambodian team sleeping on the floor. The news bit that broke the story didn't even get the side of the hotel as to why the team was sleeping on the floor, which I think is very irresponsible. The true story of the Cambodian team was that they simply arrived earlier than the agreed upon check-in time. The slept on the floor because they wanted to as the floor was carpeted.
The hotel that housed the team released a statement which explained everything very calmly and reasonably before the 24 hour breathing window expired. Those who shared about the Philippines being a bad host for treating its guests this way then became quiet as it was shown that everyone got riled up over a simple issue. Don't get me wrong, I still think it was an issue but it was very mild compared to how it was reported.
Another news bit that ticked me off was one where the article made it sound like there was a shortage of water for the athletes. "Athletes given 2 bottles of water only," the news goes. This news bit seemed odd to me at the onset as it sounded very familiar to me. The athletes said they were only given two bottles of water per room per day.
As our family operates a hotel, this was very familiar as industry standard is exactly that! Two complimentary bottles per room per day. There is free service water and paid bottled water beyond the two that you get for free but the way it was worded made it sound like the athletes came here for a Fyre Festival 2.0, which is very very much far from the truth.
The truth about this came out before the 24 hour breathing period and so if everyone simply waited for all the facts to come out, the Fyre Festival 2.0 comparison would never have been made. The same goes with the kikiam for breakfast news and the news bit about serving the muslim athletes pork! All of these supposed issues were explained further after the news was allowed to breathe.
So really, don't jump on any expose right away. Allow the news to breathe for 24 hours and you'll get a fuller picture of the entire story. In today's day and age, it can be very easy to forget that journalists have their own biases as well and we have to remember that they too can fall into the sin of reporting biased stories.
What have I to say about all these matters?
Let the news breathe! Around 24 hours would do.
It's very easy to jump on a news article that supports your viewpoint. Pro-admin camps will usually jump on any little news bit that will highlight the admin in a good light and anti-admin camps will do the same but with news bits that will show the admin in a bad light. As such, putting out any news bit that falls on either side of the aisle will no doubt be published to please a certain crowd.
Let's take the case of the Cambodian team sleeping on the floor. The news bit that broke the story didn't even get the side of the hotel as to why the team was sleeping on the floor, which I think is very irresponsible. The true story of the Cambodian team was that they simply arrived earlier than the agreed upon check-in time. The slept on the floor because they wanted to as the floor was carpeted.
The hotel that housed the team released a statement which explained everything very calmly and reasonably before the 24 hour breathing window expired. Those who shared about the Philippines being a bad host for treating its guests this way then became quiet as it was shown that everyone got riled up over a simple issue. Don't get me wrong, I still think it was an issue but it was very mild compared to how it was reported.
Another news bit that ticked me off was one where the article made it sound like there was a shortage of water for the athletes. "Athletes given 2 bottles of water only," the news goes. This news bit seemed odd to me at the onset as it sounded very familiar to me. The athletes said they were only given two bottles of water per room per day.
As our family operates a hotel, this was very familiar as industry standard is exactly that! Two complimentary bottles per room per day. There is free service water and paid bottled water beyond the two that you get for free but the way it was worded made it sound like the athletes came here for a Fyre Festival 2.0, which is very very much far from the truth.
The truth about this came out before the 24 hour breathing period and so if everyone simply waited for all the facts to come out, the Fyre Festival 2.0 comparison would never have been made. The same goes with the kikiam for breakfast news and the news bit about serving the muslim athletes pork! All of these supposed issues were explained further after the news was allowed to breathe.
So really, don't jump on any expose right away. Allow the news to breathe for 24 hours and you'll get a fuller picture of the entire story. In today's day and age, it can be very easy to forget that journalists have their own biases as well and we have to remember that they too can fall into the sin of reporting biased stories.
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