Australia’s most popular newspaper has corrected an article that mistook Singapore for Hong Kong by using a photo of the latter – except that the internet never forgets.
A screenshot of the lead photo of the opinion piece by Anthony Bergin, a senior fellow at the Australia Strategic Policy Institute, originally showed an image of pedestrians in Hong Kong’s Wan Chai before it was replaced with another showing Singapore’s Chinatown. The article, dated Jun 28, 2021, offered Bergin’s in-depth perspective on Singapore’s latest response to the pandemic. There was no mention of Hong Kong.
“Eh, Sydney Morning Herald, that’s a photo of Hong Kong lah, bodohs (stupid),” social media influencer Lee Kin Mun, aka Mr Brown, reacted on Twitter today, while others joked about it.
“Same same but different,” Twitter user Naomi Wu wrote.
“On behalf of Australia…please accept my apologies. Very paiseh (ashamed)!” Girish Sawlani said.
Nearly half of Australia’s population are under lockdown as the country struggles to contain the spread of the Delta variant that has infected nearly 150 people in Sydney. Australia has recorded 30,528 infections and 910 deaths since the pandemic hit last year.
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