Many nasty things are written about journalists though we are a much more decent lot than, for example, lawyers!

The world famous drama writer, Henrik Ibsen, once wrote that "it is inexcusable for scientists to torture animals; let them make their experiments on journalists and politicians! He also attacked journalists in his play "Enemy of the People."

John Swinton, the Scottish-American journalist, newspaper publisher and orator wasn't any nicer towards journalists. Once he wrote that "the business of the journalist is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread."

Coming from the chief of staff of the New York Times that is definitively no compliment at all.

There are many things to blame journalists for; but there are many things that journalists should be praised for. Our society would be worse off without journalists, I believe. I declare an interest quite naturally.

I will not, today, discuss the role of journalists in society but I feel I cannot let go without comment a very moving report penned by Ariadne Massa and published last Sunday (August 19) in The Sunday Times. http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120819/local/-They-rescued-me-from-the-dead-but-I-wish-I-had-died-with-my-wife-.433380

I was planning to write about it tomorrow in my weekly commentary in the same paper. When Dom Mintoff's death was announced I decided, however, to change subject and dedicate my commentary to his relationship with the Church. I still wanted, though to comment on Ariadne's piece titled 'They rescued me from the dead, but I wish I had died with my wife.'

This is a humanely written human story. A modern day tragedy – migration from poor countries to the presumed 'Promised Land' called Europe – is treated the way it really is: a human tragedy. The report puts to shame those who post the vilest comments whenever a boat full of migrants comes ashore. Ariadne Massa showed migrants the way they really are: fellow human beings with blood like ours in their veins. Like us they love and cry. Like us they have feelings. They feel pain: physical as well as emotional.

In Ariadne's story we don't meet stereotypes. We meet real people, grappling with real problems.

Bridget Ezukuse recounts how she lost Celestine, her 32-year-old husband and father of her unborn child. He drowned in front of her very eyes. The only thing she could do was screaming in agony.

A 14-year-old boy, whose 16-year-old brother had to identify his brother at the mortuary. What went through his heart and mind at that excruciatingly painful and traumatic moment?

Mr Sunday pours his heart out for his 22 year old wife who died just when the group was finally rescued. He became extremely frail surviving only after drinking sea water which was really poisoning not salvation. When help arrived he started to carry her over his shoulders from the dinghy to the patrol boat. "When I put her down she had stopped breathing. I don't have anybody else in this whole world, I don't know where to start."

The report managed not only to communicate the drama of the people whose story was recounted. The report showed us that migration is first and foremost a complex human problem. The other dimensions of the problem pale into insignificance.