Wednesday 9 February 2011

What is it with The Townsville Bulletin and Magnetic Island?

The Bully (like much of Townsville) has a funny relationship with Magnetic Island, just 3km off the coast and closer to the CBD than most suburbs in the town. 

Their coverage of Cyclone Yasi's impact on the Island since their first edition on Friday has been woeful and amazingly, they haven't even bothered to send a photographer over to capture the impact on the region's major tourism asset.  Then of course, the probably haven't sent one over for the last 6 months either.

But they are determined to make good - in their own inimitable style of course.  They've put Mary Vernon's phone pics up in a gallery (including one of her street number for some reason?) and Maggie actually made front page today!  And a humdinger it is too!  "They've all gone batty" is the witty little editor's effort to headline a story about a guy drinking at the Picnic Bay pub who got bitten by a fruit bat - no doubt because he tried to handle it or was so p*ssed that he fell or walked into it.

Don't bother following the link to read the story as it only encourages them, but to summarise, the innuendo is that Islanders are about to get raped and pillaged by marauding bats whose roosts and food trees have been destroyed or stripped.

Of course, I suspect that the real reason they ran the story (other than a rabid bat scare always sells up here for some reason) was that they finally had a professional Maggie pic (slightly p*ssed man with bandage against a lovely blue backgound) without having to send the photographer to the Island.

As I will expand on in a separate post at some stage, in a natural disaster the print media are a waste of space (as is social media pretty much). 

It's just that, with the exception of their first post cyclone edition which consisted almost entirely of pictures, The Bully is a waste of space most of the other time as well.

2 comments:

lemonyofthestate said...

When I lived on Magnetic Island I always thought it was really strange the attitude that Townsville people had towards us, it was like they thought all Maggie Islanders were social out casts and a bit back wards, which I thought was a bit arrogant! Anyway all the people I knew on the island were lovely, and very interesting and unique characters. Never a dull day on Maggie. Maggie has so much going for it, its amazing you don't hear much about it on the tourism board marketing etc. Back here in the UK I try and tell everyone about it's amazingness. Was glad that the people I know in Nelly Bay were ok and their house intact after the cyclone. It was a terrible storm but you are all so luck to live there. I would do anything to move back to Maggie Paradise!!!

PS great blog xx

Island View said...

I agree lemony - I'm very lucky to live here.

I just wish everyone would appreciate it as much as you obviously do! Cheers