Racial tension from misinterpreted newspaper context

Perodua's ad promoting their MPV with accordance to the Hari  Raya Festive Season
(Image Source: paultan.org)

Traditionally, advertisements are often associated to marketing and consuming products or services. With that being said, advertising practitioners often intertwine the discourse of culture to create a more effective advertisement as studies found that “links have been made between advertising and culture while foregrounding the idea about culture as an important economic commodity”(Aziz & Ahmad).  

(Image Source: themalaysianconscience.blogspot.com)

The article, ‘Home Ministry reprimands The Star over supplement’, which was published in The Star, talks about Malaysia’s Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein lecturing The Star Newspaper, because of their carelessness of publishing non-halal restaurants articles alongside the ‘buka puasa’ stories. The Home Minister had criticized the insensitive mistake made by the publication, and the newspaper has since reported that they had suspended the editor that was at fault. In the article, though The Star had been supportive of the Muslim Festivals, there is still a need to exercise extra precautions in all aspects of the editorial work flow in order to avoid making the mistake again.

Racial Tension
(Image Source: freelittlebrain.blogspot.com)

According to Schriver (1997), individuals interact and interpret words and visuals based on their values and beliefs. In other words, a country with cultures and beliefs that vary, are bound to interpret advertisements in a dissimilar way. In a country with many races, similarly to Malaysia, there is still risk of facing racial tension among one another even though we may live in the same country. The distasteful mistake has cost The Star Newspaper bad press where many Malaysian Muslims’ perceived their wrong doings to be racist. Therefore, newspaper editors should be more discerning in their work to avoid creating problems between the races of the country, which may subsequently put the national security on the line.

References

Aziz, J & Ahmad, AL, ‘Characterization and Leitmotif: Archetypal Imageries in Malaysian Festival TV Advertisements’, Malaysian Journal of Communication, [e-journal], vol. 27, no.2, pp.46-58, Available through: http://www.ukm.my/jkom/journal/pdf_files/2011/V27_2_3.pdf [Accessed 8 June 2012].

Schriver, K.A. 1997, Dynamics in document design, John Wiley & Sons, New York, USA.