Spain’s Love-Hate Relationship With The New York Times · Global Voices
L. Finch

A news stand in Madrid. Photo by Flickr user Juanedc. CC BY 2.0
When The New York Times reports on Spain, Spanish media report on The New York Times. The American newspaper's coverage of the country throughout the crushing economic crisis of the last several years has routinely made headlines, and a February 18, 2014 story about the relative lateness of Spain's national schedule was no exception.
The article, titled “Spain, Land of 10 P.M. Dinners, Asks if It’s Time to Reset Clock“, profiles a small movement that wants to bring the country's traditional schedule – with its late bedtime, long lunches and even longer workdays – in line with the rest of Europe in the hopes of boosting productivity.
The Gray Lady's story, which ran on the front page of the print edition below the fold, made its way into the Spanish news cycle throughout the day, appearing on more than a dozen news sites. Criticism was heaped on reporter Jim Yardley for evoking the stereotypical siesta, or midday nap, a thing of the past for most working people in Spain and a sore spot for Spaniards fed up with skewed foreign coverage.
Some outlets used headlines claiming that The New York Times “criticizes the Spanish lifestyle” or was outright “against the siesta and Spanish schedule.” A poor translation of the story's own headline that traded “Spain […] Asks if It's Time to Reset Clock” for the more accusatory “Spain, […] Ask Yourselves if It's Time to Change Schedules” (“España, el país de las cenas a las 10 P.M, preguntaos si no es hora de cambiar los horarios“) further fanned the flames.
While some Spaniards got behind the idea of dialing back their country's clock, others took to social media to defend Spanish culture.
Y todos somos toreros y tocamos la guitarra http://t.co/N9YJwIQBbd
— Pedro Luis García (@pedrol2013) February 18, 2014
And we're all bullfighters and play the guitar
Parece que para trabajar en The New York Times es imprescindible odiar a España y sus costumbres
— Adriana LópezÁlvarez (@AdrianaAlvarezz) February 18, 2014
It seems that to work at The New York Times it's essential to hate Spain and its customs
Totalmente a favor de cambiar nuestros hábitos horarios, pero prefiero mi cena a las 10 que tener una pistola en casa http://t.co/akNpFuUGZz
— Alberto Bonilla (@albertobonillaz) February 18, 2014
Totally in favor of changing our schedule habits, but I prefer dinner at 10 than having a handgun at home
Kick ‘em when they're down
It's not the first time during the economic crisis that The New York Times or other American and British media have acted as a rallying point for Spaniards who see the reporting as sensationalized or arrogant. British newspaper The Telegraph ruffled feathers with a similar report in September 2013 (“Time's up for siestas, delayed meetings and late nights, Spaniards told in effort to make them work better“) on a Spanish parliamentary commission's call to reform the working schedule. A photo of a shirtless pot-bellied man sleeping upright in a chair outdoors originally accompanied the story, but was swapped after the paper received complaints for a less crude shot of a man in a button-up shirt and newsboy cap napping in a horse-drawn carriage.
Much more outcry followed another front-page, below-the-fold story published in The New York Times in 2012 that featured a black-and-white photo of a man rummaging through a dumpster. The article detailed the problem of hunger against the backdrop of Spain's high unemployment – about a quarter of all Spaniards are out of work, while the number is closer to 50 percent for young people. It also cited Catholic charity Caritas’ report that it had provided meals for nearly one million Spaniards in 2010, more than twice the number in 2007 before the crisis. A slide show of photos capturing scenes of protest and poverty was published online alongside it.
The story and accompanying photos sparked heated discussions online. An Internet campaign #paraNYTimes countered the narrative by collecting more positive snapshots of daily life. One user on Reddit-like website Menéame wrote:
Sensacionalista, podría poner fotos similares sobre los EEUU, en blaco y negro y todo, y hacerlos parecer un país tercermundista.
Sensationalized, you could find similar photos about the US, in black and white and everything, and make it seem like a third-world country
In a different discussion thread, user “josejon” argued:
El reportaje da una imagen parcial de España: realidad cierta, pero no completa. Es comprensible que media docena de fotos no pueden abarcar todo un país, y que el fotógrafo tiene derecho a escoger y mostrar una parte del todo, según su interés o el tema que desea reflejar, pero después nos encontramos con la opiníon generada por ello en quienes, desde el desconocimiento y la distancia, juzgan el todo por la parte, lo unifican y España entera somos los de las fotos. No es así, y lo sabemos.
The report gives a partial image of Spain: true fact, but not complete. It's understandable that half a dozen photos can't cover the whole country and that the photographer has the right to choose and display only a selection according to his interests or the theme that he wishes to convey, but afterward we are left with the opinion that it generates in people who, in ignorance and from a distance, judge the whole by the part and put it together that all of us in Spain are those in the photos. It's not like that, and we know it.
Holding up a mirror
Others saw the story as confirmation that the situation in Spain had indeed gone from bad to worse. Responding to an analysis published by online news site eldiario.es, “What happens when the most influential newspaper on the planet gives you the third degree,” commenter “kio” wrote:
Muy de marca españa eso de invertir más energía en preocuparse más por la imagen que se da al exterior, “el que dirán”, que de arreglar las cosas de casa. No importa que haya gente que pase o se muera hambre, lo importante es que no se enteren los de fuera. Patético.
Very much in line with the Spanish brand, all this investment of energy in worrying more about the image being broadcast to the world, “what they will say”, than about fixing things at home. It doesn't matter that there may be people starving or dying of hunger. The important thing is that those abroad don't hear about it. Pathetic.
When it was revealed last summer by an ex-Popular Party treasurer that current Spanish President Mariano Rajoy had received payments from a secret slush fund for years, the international media coverage was taken by some as an important echo of the corruption in the country's politics.
Qué vergüenza…hasta The New York Times dice que Rajoy debe pirarse. Qué pena da España, joder…
— Lorenzo Chedas (@LorenzoChedas) July 15, 2013
Shameful…even the New York Times says that Rajoy should beat it. How pitiful Spain is, damn…
Hasta el Financial Times habla ya mal de Rajoy, a ver si le queda un poquito de dignidad, que lo dudo y dimite de una vez #RajoyDimision
— Daevandi70 (@daevandi) September 20, 2012
Even the Financial Times is talking bad about Rajoy, let's see if he has a little bit of dignity left, I doubt it, and steps down once and for all
And a New York Times piece from May 2013 detailing the culture of corruption in local and national politics – about 1,000 officials were under investigation at the time, according to the article – stirred up similar reactions.
“I hope the damage that this New York Times article causes to this rotten system makes it so that there are more and more people who are ready to change this terrible reality of corruption, abuse and power,” a Menéame commenter wrote.
The power of foreign coverage
But why is so much attention given to foreign media's editorial choices? With tourism a major driver of the Spanish economy, accounting for 10.9 percent of the country's economic output in 2012 according to Spain's National Institute of Statistics, many worry about the marca España, or Spanish brand, being portrayed to the rest of the world.
Positive coverage can certainly have an impact. After The New York Times included Burgos in its list of “46 Places to Go in 2013,” the northern Spanish city saw a staggering 145 percent jump in American tourists, what one local paper dubbed “the New York Times effect.” And the level of confidence that potential overseas investors have in the stability of a country can make or break their decision to put money there.
But with foreign coverage sticking to its largely negative focus and the country's political and economic struggles still ongoing, #MarcaEspaña has become go-to sarcastic commentary on social media for Spaniards unhappy with the current state of affairs.
Still, others recommend ignoring the coverage. For better or worse, foreign media will continue to report on Spain how they want.
The New York Times escribe un artículo sobre España y nos revolucionamos. Cuando deje de acomplejarnos lo q opinan los demás seremos mayores
— David Fernandez (@davfernandez) February 18, 2014
The New York Times writes an article about Spain and we get upset. When we stop getting worked up about what others think we will be better off