Chinese journalists seem to have a thing for superfluous infographics. Behold this computer simulated reenactment of Tiger Woods's car accident, or this rendering of a heroic (yet, paradoxically, black) man, or the following illustration I discovered in the Guangzhou Daily the other day:
When I first saw the blue strip with the stick figures, it reminded me of those signs designating Olympic events. And since the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games is just around the corner, I briefly imagined these nine figures might represent, from left to right:
"running, running, cricket, running, breakdancing, running, running, running, running"
As is often the case, my first instinct was... not correct. As I unfurled the paper I saw the headline to which this graphic was attached:
"Unemployed doctor hacks to death 8 elementary school students."
Er... whoops. But, besides the fact that I need to learn to read from top to bottom, let's think here. Is the Guangzhou Daily really paying someone to illustrate bloody neighborhood tragedies with silhouette figures? Is that someone's job? Shoddy work if you ask me. Couldn't they at least have drawn in little speech bubbles, make it a little more fun? Can we get scratch-and-sniff cartoons for coal mining disasters?
What? Really? Is there a significant portion of the population that's not literate and needs those?