Las Vegas
The three-year fight with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) over media deregulation generated an unprecedented national backlash against efforts by the agency's GOP majority to allow media monopolies to grow even larger. Nearly two million public comments-an agency record-were filed opposing the move. Belated FCC field hearings were packed with hundreds of local activists, including many from AFL-CIO state and local labor councils. At these forums, national leaders of media and entertainment unions, along with others who were on the witnesses' panels, protested the declining local focus on community issues and the demise of "localism" in news coverage as hometown outlets and newspapers are swallowed up by distant media behemoths.
Despite a national media blackout, the firestorm of public opposition to the FCC's media consolidation proposal reached a crescendo in the U.S. Senate, where a bi-partisan, liberal-conservative alliance pushed through legislation repudiating FCC deregulation. Later, a federal appeals court also stepped in and stopped the Commission dead in its tracks-a decision that even the Bush Administration has declined to appeal.
From this pitched battle, a nationwide grassroots movement has emerged, determined to protect the public's First Amendment's right of access to what the Supreme Court has described as "an uninhibited marketplace of ideas in which truth will ultimately prevail." The unions, consumer organizations, public interest and minority rights' groups, and other advocates in this burgeoning coalition know that truth, fairness and quality programming cannot prevail in a media environment where:
- News and information line-ups on talk radio and unregulated cable television are overwhelmed by right-wing ideologues masquerading as "fair and balanced" news and commentary;
- Media giants like Clear Channel blacklist performers who speak their minds;
- Radio conglomerates use payola-like practices to prevent artists, musicians and local talent from getting air time, or they leverage their ownership of concert halls to keep these performers off the stage;
- Owner groups like Sinclair Broadcast Group air-biased documentaries masquerading as objective news during a presidential election and force their local stations to participate;
- Pappas Telecasting, one of California's largest broadcasters, donates $325,000 in free air time to 13 GOP county committees in a blatant, last minute hijacking of the public airwaves to influence the outcome of the state elections;
- Quality TV entertainment is dumbed down by so-called reality programming while a rerun of award-winning productions like Saving Private Ryan are cancelled in fear of running afoul of vague and ambiguous government indecency standards; and
- The federal government pads the pockets of self-styled news commentators with taxpayer dollars to generate partisan propaganda, while the White House is caught issuing press credentials to bogus reporters with a partisan ax to grind.
These and other outrages are now sadly commonplace in America's media marketplace. For the AFL-CIO and its affiliated unions, the situation is worsened through a systemic stifling of news coverage about unions and issues of importance to working families. This news blackout is coupled with the frequent and arbitrary refusal of media outlets to air paid ads sponsored by organized labor, for no reason other than the broadcasters' concerns that they might offend their corporate clients or political cronies. Yet, if big media has its way, the worst is yet to come as media giants and their hired guns take aim at national telecommunications laws and regulations in the pro-business 109th Congress.
To fight back, the media and entertainment unions of the AFL-CIO, which collectively represent nearly one-half million professional, technical and blue-collar workers in these sectors, are joining with organizations that have been in the trenches with labor in the fight against deregulation to promote the Bill of Citizens' Media Rights. This statement of principles espouses the fundamental rights of Americans with respect to the media and the news, information and entertainment that flow through its various pipelines.
The news media rights declaration states that the American public has a right to:
- Journalism that fully informs the public is independent of the government and acts as its watchdog, and protects journalists who dissent from their employers;
- Media that values our nation's rich diversity and that reflects the presence and voices of people of color, women, organized labor, immigrants, Americans with disabilities, and other communities often underrepresented;
- News outlets operated by multiple, diverse, and independent owners that compete vigorously and employ a diverse workforce, and stations that are locally owned and operated, reflective of and responsible to the diverse communities they serve and able to respond quickly to local emergencies;
- Meaningful participation in government policy regarding media, including disclosure of the ways broadcasters comply with their public interest obligations, ascertain their Community's needs, and create programming to serve those needs. Disclosure should be coupled with frequent, rigorous and public-inclusive license and franchise renewal processes for local broadcasters and cable operators;
- Radio and television programming produced by independent creators that is original, challenging, controversial and diverse, along with programming, stories and speech produced by communities and citizens;
- Well-funded public broadcasting that is insulated from political and commercial interests and that supports communities underserved by privately-owned broadcasters, and adequately financed local public access channels and community radio, including low-power FM radio stations;
- Maximum access and opportunity to use the public airwaves and spectrum, along with universal, affordable Internet access for news, education and government information, so all citizens can better participate in our democracy and culture; and
- Regulatory policies emphasizing media education and citizen empowerment, not government censorship, as the best ways to avoid unwanted content.
This declaration, a milestone in the evolution of the media reform movement, presents a vision for a competitive, diverse and independent media to better serve our nation's democracy and culture and our citizens and their communities now and in the future. Most importantly, it is designed to serve as the foundation for solidifying organizational alliances and uniting grassroots assets into a massive nationwide campaign to beat back big media.
In our nation, no other entity is as potent or pervasive as the American media in influencing thought and attitudes, impacting our democracy and shaping the popular culture. Given this power, American citizens share the responsibility for making sure the media is held to the highest standards of ethics, fairness and objectivity. The AFL-CIO endorses the Bill of Citizens' Media Rights as the standard-bearer for our ongoing campaign to achieve that goal, as well as the goal of a diverse, competitive, reliable and unbiased marketplace of ideas. We urge our affiliated national unions to sign on to the statement and our state and local labor councils to support community efforts to hold local media accountable. We also look forward to continued work with our bi-partisan allies in Congress, particularly with the members of the newly formed Media Reform Caucus, on issues affecting media consolidation and telecommunications policy that will serve the public interest and protect our members.