In the month that brought us public hearings on an apartheid-inspired Protection of Information Bill, the resurrection of a government media tribunal to regulate the media and Jeff Radebe’s disclosure that the Criminal Procedure Act is being amended to force journalists to disclose their sources, Pick ’n Pay decided to censor the media.
After a couple of pesky complaints about “nudity” and bad language in the Afrikaans newspapers, Sondag and Die Son, Pick ’n Pay decided to no longer carry these papers on its shelves. This was despite the fact that the Sunday weekly is sold in supermarkets in sealed plastic bags.
Speaking to the Saturday Star, Ingo Capraro, Sondag's editor, said the decision was disturbing: "The constitution enshrines freedom of choice, freedom of association and media freedom. Pick ’n Pay's decision to decide on behalf of its customer what they are allowed to read flies directly in the face of freedom of choice."Now I don’t read Die Son or Sondag, but that’s irrelevant. What’s at stake here is media freedom and frankly Pick ’n Pay couldn’t have chosen a worse time to mess with a freedom that is enshrined in the Constitution of South Africa.
Adding insult to injury, Pick ’n Pay appears to have taken the decision unilaterally, without any consultations with media or civic or watchdog organisations. The company acted as judge, jury and executioner without even notifying the public or explaining to consumers what complaints had been made and why it took the decision to evict Die Son and Sondag from its stores.
Perhaps if Kevin Korb, Pick ’n Pay's merchandise director, who appears to be responsible for this decision, had any media savvy he’d realise that the media in South Africa is in a high-noon showdown. That this would be a very bad time for Pick ’n Pay to start playing media censor.
Local media are currently contending with a raft of bills and proposals and amendments to laws that would seek to silence and subjugate them. To plug holes that leak information in the public interest, that would impose brutal jail sentences on journalists for serving an open democracy and that would obfuscate the acts of government and be a death blow to transparency.
The current media restrictions mooted by government and members of the ANC ruling party are in direct conflict with the Constitution, more particularly section 32 of it that reads: “Everyone has the right of access to any information held by the state; and any information that is held by another person and that is required for the exercise or protection of any rights.”
Aside from being a unilateral media censor, Pick ’n Pay’s other great offence is to take decisions that would treat its consumers as if they were children or not intelligent enough to make their own media decisions. Let’s get real for a moment Pick ’n Pay, Die Son and Sondag are hardly peddling pornography.
Then there’s the matter that these papers understand what people want to read which is what has made the newspapers so immensely popular. Despite this Pick ’n Pay choices to deny people access to these newspapers because of some self-righteous moral minority?
Pick ’n Pay, you have made your choice, now I will make a few of my own.
I choose to no longer shop at your stores or to support or participate in any of the businesses to which your brand is allied or involved with, because you are no friend of the media. More so because you are hypocritical in riding roughshod over the consumers’ rights to freedom of choice under the pretext of being a consumer champion.
This fails to make sense, the Pick 'n Pay (for which I do not work or consult and with which I have no ties at all) has a right to carry any newspaper it wants and to decide not to carry any newspaper it does not like. The Pick 'n Pay has a right to decide that it is "middle South Africa" and that Die Son is to risque for that segment of the market, Die Son, has the right to decide whether to tone it down to fit in with that or it can decide that it can do without Pick 'n Pay. For that same reason, Pick 'n Pay long ago decide not to carry Hustler or any of that ilk. The word censorship is being thrown about with far toom much liberality here. Publishing something does not give you an automatic right to be publicised.
When I go to the Pick 'n Pay in Claremont on a Sunday I know they do not carry the City Press (other Pick 'n Pays do, so slow your roll if you're about to allege something...) because (I surmise) that particular Pick 'n Pay does not have enough black shoppers, does this mean that they are racist? I doubt it.
Well said and I now understand you a little better.
Following your logic, Pick n Pay's refusal to carry lead-based paints probably constitutes an attack on the right to freedom of trade.
This was a business decision, not a moral one.
Pick 'n Pay has all the right to assess media and decide whether the content fits its target market. Using that logic, they only stock a small percentage of magazines that, for instance, CNA stocks. It's not so much media censorship as it is stock control.
A business has the right to fit its stock to fit its ethos. If Pick 'n Pay refused to sell propaganda for Mugabe (let's say), would you object too? Because I distinctly remember you had a PROBLEM a while back with Naspers printing Mugabe's propaganda pamphlets. ( http://mdw.typepad.com/ai/2008/06/naspers-the-blood-money.html )
Freedom of speech? Look it up, and decide which side of the fence you want to sit on. You can't have it both ways.
My local Pick 'n Pay does not sell the Mail & Guardian either, and while it would sometimes be more convenient if they did, I just get it elsewhere and thus excercise my right to read it.
If you want to boycott Pick 'n Pay, go for it rather than talking about it, but I am not sure there is a story here. I also think that it is disingenious to conflate Pick 'n Pay's decision (which is probably about the brand image) with government's inentions (which is properly about control of information). Now, there is a big story.
What needs to be considered in this argument is this.
1. Die Son and Sondag are newspapers rather than being nebulous products like a bar of soap or a pot of paint. Both papers – whether you like them or not – play a role in terms of educating consumers on issues related to matters of public interest. Alongside stories about Joost and Amor, Die Son and Sondag have covered stories in the greater public interest like articles on corruption within Fifa, lack of service delivery, and government corruption. They also cover stories of community interest and provincial stories that rarely make it in to the national press.
2. Pick ‘n Pay has some 775 stores countrywide so a decision to stop carrying a newspaper title is a significant one because the print media sector relies on this distribution mechanism to get titles to the public. The newspaper sector is facing threat and for the most part is in decline. If a retailer decides content is problematic and effectively halts distribution or bans a title it is an effective silencing of that media title.
3. The decision to stop stocking the newspapers was taken in climate where media freedoms are under attack. This may be coincidental, but it is unfortunate in terms of Pick ‘n Pay’s decision and to my mind shows a degree of media naivety on Pick ‘n Pay’s part.
4. In a month and a half the pro-government “The New Age” will launch and seek good distribution. It may be speculative, but it will be interesting to see whether Pick ‘n Pay carries the (less sexy) pro-government “The New Age” in favour of Die Don and Sondag which are independent of government.
5. No information has been forthcoming from Pick ‘n Pay on its decision making regarding the banning of Die Son and Sondag. How many complaints were received and who were they from? Pick ‘n Pay is a publically traded company and as such would do well to communicate effectively and transparently on decisions that affect the media, media distribution and the public image of the company.
6. While Pick ‘n Pay is clearly within its right to stock whatever it chooses, what must be remembered is that it relies on public custom for its livelihood. What I have done is chosen to exercise my right not to shop at Pick ‘n Pay because of what I believe is a poor decision on the retailer’s part and one that I believe affects media freedom. What concerns me is the quality of the decision making and how easily Pick ‘n Pay will surrender media freedom to competing interests in the future. If newspapers carried stories quoting atheists and Christians protested these, would Pick ‘n Pay remove these publications from its shelves? If publications voiced support about gay marriages and religious groups protested, would Pick ‘n Pay remove these publications from its shelves? If newspapers carried stories on government corruption and the government complained would Pick ‘n Pay remove these publications from its shelves?
Distributing news and matters of the public interest can’t be seen as akin to stocking or not stocking a type of paint or bar of soap. Media freedom speaks directly to the correct functioning of a democracy and therefore it is my strong opinion that any attacks on media freedom need to be made public and must be vehemently contested.
I'm in agreement especially with your point #2 - given P&P's leverage, this sort of action can constitute a chilling effect on free expression & debate. Despite this, I could sympathise with P&P if they made these choices on grounds of established principle (and yes, approved by shareholders). But instead they demonstrate a spinelessness in simply bowing to pressure groups.
You struggle to get The Mail & Guardian and Noseweek from most outlets - even though they've broken heaps more important stories than Die Son ever will. The Business Day is an important paper but you cannot find it from most places that sell the paper. Living in the Western Cape now I cannot get my weekly tabloid fix through the Sunday World, but I rather have to settle for the Sunday Sun. The reasons why these publications are only selectively available is because of business decisions by those outlets (and also because Avusa’s distribution is not as good as Media24’s in the case of the Sunday World/Sunday Sun), not because of censorship. When I want BDay, M&G or Noseweek I know where to look, Die Son should be confident enough in its product to trust that its loyal readers will also know where to look – not claim some special right to be carried by everyone regardless of how they might feel about the paper.
It is undoubted that the media play an important role in our society, but they are least attractive and least convincing when they suddenly claim to be precious and to have rights above the rest of society. Forcing Pick ‘n Pay to carry Die Son is a violation of their commercial rights “finish and klaar”.
If the Pick 'n Pay was a store with a strong evengelical Christian ethos, and it chose to not stock a paper that ran down Christianity, they'd be well within their rights. In the same way that Muslim stores would have been well within their rights to dump the M & G during the recent Zapiro fracas.
Freedom of speech comes with consequenses, refusing to support someone whose speech you disagree with is also a right.
Personally I disagree with your assumption that the one freedom is so much more important than the other.
To your points 1 and 2: in spite of the odd sensible story (for which I take your word) I don't think even Die Son or Sondag themselves would claim to be a bastion of investigative journalism, fighting vigourously to let the disinfectant of sunshine in on the seas of injustice. I also don't think, anecdotally going by the size of the newspaper piles in the stores, that Pick 'n Pay is a heavy in newspaper distribution.
More importantly, the point remains that what any single distributor (other than possibly a monopoly) does about any single title or handful of titles for whatever reason is up to that distributor, and while it may infringe on people's convenience, it certainly does not infringe on anyone's rights. They make the sums: weigh their perceived gains against possible backlash, all of which is fair in love and war. And individuals or groups are free to do whatever they want in response, provided of course that it is legal.
Turning this into a media freedom issue is pushing it a bit far.
Been boy-cotting them for years. They, under leadership of young Gareth, endeavoured to usurp our soccer fields to expand their local shop.
Fortunately they lost as the community offered resistants.
Time to create a Facebook group maybe?
Since when has the store been under any obligation to stock an item that it doesn't feel like stocking? They're a business and even though they can be pompous and irritating at times, it is still their right to do exactly as they please without consulting you.
If Pick 'n Pay start to decide what to stock based on moral grounds, then when are they going to stop selling liquor or tobacco?? Or maybe we should only sell a certain religious communities type of food (pick one - Jewish, Muslim or Buddhist)
Slippery slope...
I agree with Mandy. If Pick 'n Pay wants to try and decide my morals for me, then I don't want to support them. Simple.
Hot topic!
Much ado about nothing as far as I'm concerned.
Newspapers are simply one of the items on sale - no law or regulation governs any store's stocks! I'm not sure you thought this through ...
If I"m selling little pink teabags in a retail store and the store discontinues it for whatever reason, it is the store's absolute right. I cannot demand that they do and I can't run to press and complain that my freedoms are endangered ...
If PnP was complaining about "sleaze" then surely the Sunday Times back page also qualifies? Perhaps PnP was making room for the new ANC daily?
Did PnP ever advertise in these papers? Does it do so now?
So far I have read 550 words with very little content indeed, and not much investigation into the issues. Please try harder.
What proportion of Sondag's sales were made through PnP? What was the return rate? Is this a huge blow for them or merely an irritation? Does it threaten the life of the paper?
So far the opinion piece has given me little information on which to decide whether PnP is trying to screw the paper or is tired of the shelf space being used for a paper that doesn't sell. Judging by the other comments, I'm not the only one who remains unconvinced.
I'd like to have an *informed* opinion. So far the only *information* in the 550 words is contained in the sentences "After a couple of complaints about ... the Afrikaans newspapers, Sondag and Die Son, Pick ’n Pay decided to no longer carry these papers on its shelves" and "Kevin Korb, Pick ’n Pay's merchandise director, appears to be responsible for this decision."
There isn't even a link to the Saturday Star article. Did Mandy check that Kevin did take the decision, and the reasons? I doubt it. I'm willing to wager a year's subscription to Sondag that she didn't speak to Kevin.
I used to work for several newspapers in the IT dept and I was shocked at how easy it was to send a rumor around a newsroom, no matter how implausible. So I have learned to be skeptical of wild accusations. Even the Star's story was very thin on facts.
Let me ask y'all this: if P 'n P pulled a gay publication from their shelves because they disapproved, how would y'all react?
Ah, well. We really do get what we deserve as a nation.
To the others who dissed you, I refer them to the words of Martin Niemöller.
Not that they are likely to see the connection...
I hardly think PnP capitulated because of Mandy's emotional ranting! It probably had something to do with the amount of money they would lose ... which, as far as I'm concerned, is a valid reason.
See, if P 'n P had simply pulled the newspapers and, when asked, simply said: "they were not selling enough", I would not give a toss. It's precisely because they set themselves up as morality police that I have a problem.
It's a slippery slope. First, you kill newspapers with nude pics. Then, you kill gay friendly magazines "because the majority of our readers don't approve". Then, you kill Noseweek "because they are disrespectful of government and the majority of our shoppers are ANC voters".
BTW, I've just re-read Mandy's piece and am having difficulty locating any emotional ranting. Please enlighten me? (For the record, I do not know her other than by what she has written here.)
I do not work for Pick & Pay and they have irritated the living bejingles out of me many a time but when someone asks me to join them in boycotting the only decent supermarket that's convenient to most of us, there needs to be a very good reason. Not being able to buy a piece of trash that's detrimental to the future of our nation, is not a good reason - freedom or no freedom.