Haunting green eyes

IN Media Watch Briefs | 09/04/2002

Haunting green eyes

Haunting green eyes

National Geographic Channel`s "Search for the Afghan Girl", telecast on Sunday 24th night, seemed to be one more case of the media making itself the story. The promos kept telling us that it was an extraordinary story of how the green-eyed girl in a Peshawar refugee camp featured on the cover of the magazine 17 years ago was traced recently in Tora Bora. The search did not, however, seem particularly difficult or daring. Moreover, only about 10 minutes of the one-hour programme was devoted to telling us what had happened to her and her country all these years. The rest of the one-hour programme seemed to send out two messages: that the western world is terribly struck by the fact that brown people.can have green eyes, and two, that they find it surprising that they can actually track down one person among the teeming millions. in this part of the world. What was really disappointing was that the programme did not improve anybody`s understanding of the plight of Afghanistan -- or even of their women.

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Amazon resisting voluntary censorship

The new term for self censorship is voluntary censorship, as proposed by companies like Netflix and Hotstar. ET reports that streaming video service Amazon Prime is opposing a move by its peers to adopt a voluntary censorship code in anticipation of the Indian government coming up with its own rules. Amazon is resisting because it fears that it may alienate paying subscribers.

Let the games begin

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