| Being proven guilty of smuggling 4.1 kilograms of cannabis into Bali, Schapelle Corby, 27, a woman from Brisbane, was sentenced to 20 years in jail by the Denpasar District Court in May 2005. This conviction stirred the mass media, especially newspapers. The newspapers covered the progress of the case almost everyday. Australian readership was stirred and overwhelmed by the tabloid sensationalism. This study aims at investigating the macro-sociological phenomenon which underlied the media sensationalism in defence of Corby's innocence. This study focuses on an editorial of The Age, one of the most widely circulated newspaper in Australia and one of the most eager media to cover Corby's case. The analysis of the editorial is conducted by analyzing the argumentation. This study finds that the editorial is not so much of an independent observation but more of a demonstration of the covert xenophobic ideology by, among others, repeating the scornful public reactions toward the Indonesian legal institutions and using various references to distort the context. This study concludes that the editorial implies that Indonesia is a savage country and Corby is merely a victim. Hence, it uncovers the social phenomenon of the latent xenophobia of Australians, more precisely those who participate in the angry protests and the hostile backlash. |