Listening Without Prejudice: Tourism journalism

Javier Mato is a journalist who contributes to the Spanish tourism and travel magazine, "Preferente". He has penned a short opinion piece for the website under the heading "Waiting for Podemos". As is common with websites there was a facility to comment on the article, and as is also common the comments missed the point. Mato was not acting as an advocate for Podemos, as two suggested. A third corrected them and rightly suggested that they hadn't read what he had written.

Mato's article was a stinging attack on the recent tourism decree in the Balearics. Or rather, it was a stinging attack on elements of this decree which had nothing to do with tourism, such as the change to building regulations to allow the Rafa Nadal tennis centre to go ahead and the legitimisation of land on which Son Espases hospital is built. Mato went on to suggest that the decree may as well include provisions for school heating and aspects of education. He was being ironic. As he was in concluding that "these shameless acts which destroy all logic" take away what credibility remains of "our political class" and so open the door to Podemos.

Rather than address the point that Javier was making, commenters wandered into tangential territory. It happens all the time. And there are two key reasons why it does. One is that the article isn't read properly (or is read in a way to suit a particular agenda). Two is that commenters aren't really that interested in the article, only in highlighting their own prejudices, opinions and solutions, even if the latter might be half-baked, impractical, sometimes self-serving and self-promotional or fail to appreciate wider issues (of legislation, for instance).

Hence, we get comments of the following variety (not untypical through the good offices of the "Majorca Daily Bulletin" and its Facebook page): Mallorcans don't know what they're doing when it comes to tourism; Mallorcans don't like foreigners; Mallorcans don't and won't listen to what anyone from outside Mallorca might have to say.

I find such generalisations ungracious to say the least, and just who are these "Mallorcans" anyway? They are rarely specified, if ever. They are, it would appear, some amorphous mass of non-intelligent life form. Of course they know nothing about tourism, which is why Mallorca has provided some of the world's leading hotel chains, which is why Mallorca has exported its tourism know-how, which is why Mallorca was the birthplace of tourism. If by Mallorcans we mean politicians, then there may well be credibility to the claim, but otherwise there is not. Mallorcans don't like foreigners? I treat such a view as some kind of reverse xenophobia. It may have some cultural legitimacy on account of insularity, but it would be a dislike reserved as much for mainland Spaniards as it is for people from other countries, while if one takes this as safeguarding interests, then which nation (or island) can truly be said to be any different? And what of not listening to foreigners? Do the "Mallorcans" not listen to Peter Long of TUI, to Stefan Pichler, the CEO of Air Berlin, to Natalia Vorobieva, the CEO of Russia's leading tour operator, Natalie Tours? I would suggest that they listen very closely.

And they certainly listen when news, opinions and reports presented by journalists from overseas are good or bad. They might circle the wagons when Magalluf hits the headlines, but they certainly don't ignore what is said, and when there is, by comparison, a glowing tribute, they readily and naturally acknowledge it. But when it comes to listening, how much attention is paid to the Mallorcans' own journalists? Javier Mato was making a political point, but "Preferente" as well as the better-known "Hosteltur" magazine are reference points for tourism opinion-making. They are Spain's leading tourism publications, and they are both published in Mallorca. Coincidence? No. Mallorca gave the world tourism as we have come to know it, and so it has maintained a journalistic tradition in tourism that goes back to the turn of the last century when it was journalists, notably Miquel dels Sants Oliver, who created the vision for what was to become tourism as we now know it.

Too little attention may be paid to journalists. Wrongly so. The "Mallorcans", in this instance the regional tourism ministry, love journalists who contribute to the tourism promotion strategy of having them write nice things about Mallorca and the Balearics, but they should listen just as attentively to what else they have to say. In a year when the 150th anniversary of Sants Oliver's birth is being commemorated, it would be appropriate were they to be. But then, whatever they might say, there will still be those who choose to read what they want to, even if it is not what was being said, and to self-indulge their own agendas.