Thursday night at Hunter College, Federal Communications Commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein, the two Democrats on the 5-person commission, heard from New Yorkers that people of color do not have a voice on America's airwaves.
The hearings focused on how the consolidation of media into the hands of a few mega corporations is stifling minority voices, choking off local radio stations, and perpetuating negative racial stereotypes.
The commissioners, as well as invited panelists and community members referred frequently to information gathered on media ownership by Free Press.
(The Columbia Journalism Review also has a site with detailed info on ownership.)
Free Press reports that only 5 percent of U.S. television stations are owned by women. 1% are owned by Latinos 1% are owned by African Americans.
Does that represent the America that you know? Does this sound like an industry you want to work in?
Daily News reporter Juan Gonzalez testified that "if there is no diversity in ownership, it is unlikely the public will receive sufficient diversity in coverage."
NYU Anthropology professor Arlene Davila testified that the 1 percent of media ownership held by Latinos is dismally far behind representation in U.S. society, where they make up 14 percent of the population.
She criticized Univision for dominating the Spanish-language market without providing television programs that come anywhere close to reflecting the diversity of voices and needs of Latinos in the United States.
"The Latino market is not homogenous, yet it is increasinly homogonized by Univision," she said. "Latinos are not being served by a media giant that stifles creativity and diversity."
The FCC is considering new regulations on broadcast ownership (after being inundated by 3 million protests following reforms in 2003 that were pushed through by then-FCC chair Michael Powell that were widely criticized as benefiting corporate media) and the two Dems have visited different parts of the country to get citizen input.
Commissioner Copps told the crowd, "Now is the time to assert our ownership rights," given that the airwaves belong to the American people.
"This is not a partisan issue, a Republican or Democrat issue, a conservative or liberal issue, a red state blue state issue. This is about grassroots America that affects all of us," Copps said.
The issue of diversity in media affects all of us and we should keep an eye on how we can contribute to a more democratic and representative media in this country (even when we are swamped with lots of other priorities!).
Anne Noyes @ October 21, 2006 - 12:32pm
It's troubling that only the two Democratic FCC commissioners are traveling the country to gather public input on broadcast ownership regulations. Media ownership is not, as Commissioner Copps noted at the Hunter event, a partisan issue.
Fundamentally, this issue affects us all because public access to information allows citizens in a democracy to make informed political decisions, which directly influences the voting decisions that determine the make-up of our governing bodies.
If control of communications outlets is monopolized by the powerful few, we risk suffering the effects of undue influence, homogeneity, and other outright abuses of power in the reporting and dissemination of our news. For example, when one corporation owns all of the TV stations in a given market, the impact of high-level editorial decisions about which stories to air and how to present sensitive issues is magnified, due to the lack of competing or alternative broadcast news sources.
Moreover, an increasingly consolidated media industry benefits any political groups that seek to carefully manage their public image, as fewer independent media outlets allow for tighter control of the flow of information reported to the public.
Unfortunately, the business implications -- rather than the relevant public policy issues -- of media ownership have come to dominate the discourse on broadcast ownership regulations. In this day and age, news outlets have morphed into huge media corporations driven by shareholders' profit expectations. In pursuit of profits, these corporations command legions of lobbyists and leverage networks of business relationships to advocate for regulations that will benefit their bottom line objectives.
And the result?
Reforms made to broadcast ownership regulations -- many pushed through in 2003 by former FCC Chairman Michael Powell -- have hugely benefited corporate media by allowing increased ownership consolidation within media markets. In other industries, monopolies are carefully monitored and avoided. Yet the broadcast media seems to defy this rule.
Perhaps if all five of the FCC Commissioners -- two Democrats and three Republicans -- were interested in seeking public feedback, rather than relying solely on input from special interests, broadcast ownership regulations wouldn't skew so obviously in favor of corporate business interests.
Stricter regulation of media corporations may have adverse economic results, but the public will certainly benefit from increased diversity and objectivity in news reportage.
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