What are they saying?

July 28th, 2004 | Uncategorized

This was on TV news tonight. A Brisbane taxi driver was killed by a single punch to the head from a 15-year-old. The youth was sentenced in court today.

Each broadcast mentioned he was 15 years old at the time of killing the taxi driver. Additional information by channel:

Nine: height and weight (over 6′ and 120kg+)
ABC: no additional description
Seven: Islander (they gave his actual country of origin; I won’t, even though the effect is essentially the same)

Seven gave no description of the kid’s size, simply that he was an Islander, while Nine made no mention of race and ABC was content with giving his age only. I didn’t see Ten.

I couldn’t believe it when I heard that on Seven. While viewers may have questions as to how a 15-year-old could kill a taxi driver with a single punch to the head, surely a description of his size would have sufficed. To simply describe him as Islander is irresponsible at best…

What would Seven have me believe, that it’s not because he was a large kid that the single punch killed the taxi driver, but rather it’s because he’s an Islander that the single punch killed the taxi driver? I wasn’t impressed at all.

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