I must take exception to your misleading headline by Daniel MacEachern in the business section of your paper on June 1. It reads: “They like us! They really like us! (except Quebec)”
The article was reporting on a poll conducted by Abacus Data and the results were presented to the board of trade by Tim Powers.
The headline gave the impression that all the provinces like us but Quebecers don’t like us.
If you look at the questions asked in the poll, you will conclude that the headline is misleading to say the least. These comments tend to unfairly fuel mistrust against the people of Quebec and I consider it to be irresponsible journalism. Let me quote the following which was contained in the article: “The silver lining is that, while Quebecers aren’t as positive about Newfoundland and Labrador as the rest of the country is, neither are they particularly negative; just six per cent of the province said they have an unfavourable impression of the province, about the same as central Canada and slightly lower than Alberta (seven per cent). The majority of Quebecers (55 per cent) profess to feeling neutral on the province, a much higher percentage than the Canadian average of 34 per cent.”
It will not surprise you to know that some readers just look at the headline and base their opinion on that alone. That is why journalists should be particularly careful of the language they use when they construct their headline.
Burford Ploughman
St. John’s
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