As violence erupted on a 12-consecutive weekend in Hong Kong, a picture showing a large group of journalists cornering a solitary police officer while indifferent to the nearby chaos went viral online, helping the public see the truth hidden behind biased cameras.

Initially published by People’s Daily on its Sina Weibo on Aug. 24, the picture was taken right after thousands of protestors gathered in Kowloon, vandalizing smart lampposts, as well as attacking local police officers using iron bars and bricks.

In the picture, a police officer was taking notice of the ongoing violent attacks at a street corner, holding his gun; while dozens of journalists, without paying the slightest attention to the nearby vandalism and mobs, surrounded the police officer and casted their flashlight only on him.

Some Hong Kong media outlets later depicted the police officer as “the riot police officer who aims at protestors.” Ironically, as if coordinated, they all brushed aside or downplayed the mobs’ violent attacks.

The picture is not the sole evidence of their biased reports on Hong Kong. Western media outlets, for instance, The Guardian, published an article on Aug. 24 about the latest violence in Hong Kong. Large-hearted on the mobs’ violence, the article used “HK riot police beat protestors” as its eye-catching headline, while to the similar protest that happened in Portland, US, on Aug. 17, media simply downplayed the fact that police in the US also arrested some protestors, adding that the protests led to “sporadic violence.”

Due to biased media’s continuous efforts to tarnish the image of Hong Kong police, as well as underestimating the severity and truth of the mobs’ violence, Hong Kong police, once the heroes protecting the city’s security and stability, have become the prey of some unscrupulous media, with their justified moves criticized, and their family members threatened.

During an interview with People’s Daily Online, Martin Jacques, a research fellow at Cambridge University, said that media outlets in the UK have been overwhelming pro-demonstrations and against both the HKSAR and the Chinese central government.

“I think the Western attitude is definitely encouraging the opposition in Hong Kong, because I think the demonstrators are essentially their audience. The audience they have in mind are actually the western audience,” he said.

Even the public in Hong Kong have arranged several protests in response to the media bias. According to Sing Tao Daily, many Hong Kong residents arranged rally on Aug.13, calling for unbiased reports from local media and stressing that media should be neutral in their reporting.