RUGBY LEAGUE NEWS:
| The Other Side | ||
| Written by: antonius (Warriors) | ||
| January 24th 2010 11:48 PM | ||
The story reported the visit of two players to a special school in the Newcastle region. The link for this story is below; I urge you to read it. It tells the rugby league story that the Four Corners "Code of Silence" programme chose to ignore. The photos below, which are quite touching, show the genuine joy the players brought to these children. Kudos to the paper for reporting the visit. Reports such as these are rarely seen in the media, even though it is common place for the clubs to organise activities such as this.   Four Corners were present at this visit as part of their report on the Matthew Johns sex scandal. Reporter Sarah Ferguson said "the visit was very touching" and "it was a great scene, but unfortunately it didn't make it into the story". A cynical person would say it didn’t suit the agenda of the report to show those scenes. It would certainly have watered down the general theme of that particular programme, which from my point of view was very one sided. The Four Corners report also featured a young under 20’s Knights player, who, whilst attending a training film during a course conducted by the NRL, answered a question on the film about player behaviour. His response was "perhaps if they had thanked her, given her a cuddle, and put her in a cab, she would have been okay". Remember that he was referring to a woman in the training film. That player was then reported the following day in a manner to imply that he was referring to the woman at the centre of the Sharks story. We are talking about a 19 year old; to humiliate him nationally like that is disgraceful. It shows how low the media stoop at times to sell a story. The Knights article was posted on the pages of these forums and prompted numerous similar stories from other readers, such as a visit to a special school by some Bulldogs players during the recent City/Country game week in Orange. This saw players from the Bulldogs visit the school for kids with disabilities after a request by a staff member to Laurie Daley. The kids were over the moon, while players spent time playing games with wheelchair bound kids and signed autographs. You have to ask why that didn’t rate a reasonable report in the media. The first I heard of it was on the pages of these forums. That response and the others in that thread remind us that these activities are not uncommon and have been going on for as long as the game has existed; something league fans take for granted, but is probably unknown by the general public. Unfortunately, reporting of these stories is all too few and far between. No wonder, then, that the average person thinks of league players as dumb, bad mannered sexual perverts. If the media are not going to promote this side of the game, then the NRL need to take the bat and do it themselves. They do this to a minor extent during the broadcasts of games, promoting a theme that the week is devoted to. That could be expanded. Regular segments can be put into the Footy Show showing these visits and other charity events that clubs are running. The good guys’ column in the Telegraph could be expanded to include these stories. It’s not as if there is no material. A recent letter in the paper detailed how Paul Harragon had visited a boy at an orthopaedic school, attended his birthday, and, when the boy died, attended his funeral. The Knights players donated $15,000 from their players fund to that school. They arranged for students to sit on the sidelines for Knights home games, and regularly visit the school. All things that brighten the lives of those kids. Why can’t stories like that be promoted by the league? At the moment the game is on a hiding to nothing. If everyone sits back and says "it’s too hard", then it won’t get any easier. The league needs to get on the front foot and actively publicise all that’s good with the game - the other side, if you like. We need to get that message to the public. __________________________________________________ 749 Words Reference http://www.theherald.com.au/news/loc...px?storypage=0# Posted in the F7s Matches forum in June 2009 The F7s is an article writing competition hosted on The Front Row forums here on LeagueUnlimited.com To join a team, click on the banner below  FOR ALL F7s MATCHES, CLICK HERE |
