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May 13, 2005
Panels - history of media activism victories
Jeff Cohen is chairing. He believes media activism falls into three areas: that which challenges bias and exclusion; that which builds non-corporate media; that which pushes for greater diversity in media. FAIR concentrates on the first but does all three. The panel spans these three groups.
Cohen is listing a number of successful projects FAIR has had over the years. Internet makes their work easier - can mobilize people quicker. Is also namechecking various members of the audience. Their headline of Chomsky's appearance on PBS Newshour: "Chomsky appears on Newshour. Western Civilization survives."
"The bigger our movement for media and democracy gets the more likely that the journalists on the inside will get reacquainted with their back-bones." When he was a producer, when they had an anti-war guest had to have 2 pro-war guests. When suggested Michael Moore as guests, told had to have 3 pro-war guests to provide balance.
First panellist: DeeDee Halleck. Slide show - based on her personal files. Movement didn't start with Free Press - as McChesney's own work shows. Struggle for public TV 1976-1988. The Television lab at thirteen. New Jersy Coalition for Fair broadcasting. Association of Independent Film and Video Makers. There's lots of other people and pictures. I won't go through it all, because I can't keep up with all the names, and because the slide-show is due to go online at some point. The campaign got quite a bit of coverage over their campaign, including in TV Guide! Interesting to see the TV Guide piece mention the United Church of Christ, AFL-CIO and others co-operating to push for media reform - plus ça change....
Work against stereotypes of race etc. Paper Tiger - particularly successful in bringing meia activism to the streets. Some nice pictures from NAB in SF in 2000. Mentions activists at NAB locking themselves together in middle of exhibition hall. Security can't unlock/remove them, so put barrier around them, but don't gag them, so the activists effectively become a radio show in the middle of the room, hidden behind barriers.
1978. OUR - organization for Unique Radio - people pushing for more classical music on radio. Then stuff from Stephen Dubifer, Prometheus etc.
Various internet/Indymedia images.
International struggle - declaration in support of McBride Commission. CRIS - Campaign for Rights in the Information Society, WSIS - beautiful image of marginalised role of civil society at WSIS. AMARC's role in activism at WSIS.
Mark Lloyd - works with Center for American Progress. Has been a TV producer etc. Works on media diversity. Asks those under 30 to raise their hands (first time I've been the situation of not getting to raise my hand in that situation). Many people raise hands. Lots of the rest clap [enter rant about romanticization of youth - which sounded less bitter before I turned 30!]. He tells these people "this is your movement."
Talks about how troubling things are at the moment. FCC don't just not get it, they are an active opposition. We don't have a single house of Congress on our side. The courts are not on our side. This is a dark, dark time. We do not have political power in office - our power is on the streets. We can't even, despite our votes, get a president elected. And oddly enough the darkest times seem to make the greatest opportunities for reform. [He's sounding quite like Roberta Baskin here] Invokes civil rights movement. Mentions Everett Parker, of whom we saw a photo during Dee Dee's slide show. Talks of his role in showing the people had a right to challenge FCC decisions. Prometheus case depended on this - had standing before the court, as a result of Parker's case. So we have had victories of which we are not even aware. Talks of the good points of the 1996 Telecommunications Act. Universal service funds, etc. Section 706 - FCC must report every two years on access to technologies. These various things show that somebody was there arguing for these things. Obviously not business, so there were activists who created this work.
Andy Schwartzman, Media Access Project. Compressing remarks, because many of his prepared thoughts have already been made. Disagreed with Mark's pessimism. This session is turning into an 'old farts' session. Talking of Everett Parker, 92 year old activist, who he was in touch with last week (of United Church of Christ?) who is still angry and active. "How to talk back to your television set" is still an important document that stands up well to time. "Why I don't work for the telephone company, or for whom does Bell toil" - available in Federal Registry.
Lesson to take away - if these experienced activists can pass their experience to the new generations who have access to new technologies that make organizing easier, then ....
Story: FCC supposed to make decisions based on evidence on table before them. Not apolitical, but needs to be evidence that withstands judicial review. Michael Powell tried to ram through regulations. Meets bi-partisan coalition who file postcards, hold own hearings, go to court, gain stay,.....
The court adopted a precedent from another circuit of the court of appeals. Typically when deciding on a stay you weigh liklihood of success, harms, public good etc. Court said sometimes you can't measure the harms, or the liklihood of success. Doesn't matter, according to court. Court asks FCC "You got a million postcards, does that matter?" FCC says, the postcards didn't provide economic evidence etc.
Court says - if that many people care, think there's a problem, believe enough to seek redress from government, then there's a perception of harm. Stay was granted on the basis that so many people believed there was a problem. People power counts. It's not easy, these are difficult times, but there's a lesson to be taken from this.
Q & A:
Q. Salient points from activist history?
A. There's a new book: K Mills: "Changing channels: How a lawsuit involving a small station changed the history of the South" U of Michigan Press. Important point is to realise how to translate core values (justice, social inclusion, etc.) to deal with changing technologies.
Q. Where to now?
A. Take back the public stations: we paid for them. Legislation requires open board and committee meetings. Take 60 people there, they will change their policies, take 3 people and they will get nervous. Jeff Cohen wants insulated funding for outlets (I take it he's referring to TV license fee style funding). He's involved with Independent World Television which is having a screening tonight at 9.
Q. (Aimed at Mark Lloyd): What is CAP, relationship to Democratic Party.
A. Independent, non-partisan, non-profit think tank funded by some very wealthy (and some not so wealthy) individuals. Growing fast in its (2?) years. No formal ties with Democratic party. Would like to push Democratic party further to left. Not pushing to get Democrats elected, working to get progressive, left ideas out there.
Mark Lloyd: have to support alternative media, but they're not enough. Alt media show how bad the other media are, but we need to change the other media, not just rely on weblogs, FSTV, etc.
Q. What was the name of the primer by Nick Johnson?
A. How to Talk back to your TV - it and all other materials by Johnson are available on his website.
Q. Is there a danger of right-wing taking over the satellite setasides, LPFM etc. opportunities that we work to open up.
A. If they right-wing are better organised and take over those outlets - shame on us for not pushing for our fair share.
Q: Other books
A: Bagdikian and McChesney are both cited, especially Telecommunications Mass Media and Democracy. Dee Dee mentions her book, which deals in part with battles over independent media in the 1970s. Paul Starr's Creation of the Media.
Q. Can the genie be put back in the bottle?
A. Some networks are selling properties etc., showing we were right in claiming they were getting too large.
[This last point doesn't really make sense to me - it is possible that large networks would be a coherent response for corporations but also be bad for society. Similarly, the collapse of the networks (if that were to occur) due to their failure to maximise ROI would not validate our arguments against the networks]
Posted by andrew at May 13, 2005 02:07 PM