The First Amendment; Minorities in the Media: Media Managers

I have great affections for great affection for South Bridge the town in which I publish the 6000 circulation news. But Southbridge lest you be confused is not South borough as some of bucolic bedroom community for Boston and south bridge is not Stockbridge. A quaint village in the Birchers south bridge is a 17000 population in central Massachusetts mill town. Thirty five hundred people work in one optical factory. The kind of place many young people leave after high school in search of better opportunities. South Bridge is a town of low cost apartments in buildings called three deckers. It is a town of spas that open at 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning to sell workers a paper a cup of coffee and a lottery ticket. It is a town of churches one for the Roumanians another for the Greeks another for the Poles another for the French another for the Irish and Italians. It is a town of hard workers and hard drinkers along with neighboring Webster It has the second highest rate of alcoholism among non urban areas in the state.

As a people who frequent not only local bars but the Franco-American war vets post 29 the Polish-American club and the Italian-American associates the people I'm talking about perhaps you call them ethnics are blue collar types or white lower middle class or working class are under reported. Except when involved in strife a labor dispute or a school busing controversy controversy or one caricature as Archie Bunker style social and political primitives I'm reminded of some lines from Hamil's book Irrational ravings about quote the failure of the literary intellectual world fully to recognise the existence of the white working class except to abhor them. With the exception of James T for all no major American novels and I'm quoting now has dealt with a working class white man except in war novels our novelists write about bullfighters migrant workers screenwriters psychiatry is failing novelists homosexuals advertising men gangsters. I've yet to see a work of the imagination deal with the life of a

carpenter a subway conductor an ironworker a derrick operator. The result has been the inability of many in the intellectuals and I might add many reporters to imagine themselves in the plight of the American white working men. They don't understand his virtues loyalty endurance courage among others and see him only through his false narrowness bigotry and worship of him among others. The result is the stereotype unquote. The goal for the press is coverage of course should be quite different. The news should include as the Commission on freedom of the press suggested in 1907 the projection of a representative picture of the constituent groups in society. Ironically journalism is growing professionalism. It's a new breed of reporters and editors struggle for objectivity. It's evolving set of values works against the presses solution of this problem of coverage in at least three ways. First newspapers are hiring better educated more responsible more professional fledgling reporters. They possess a college degree sometimes a Masters a social conscience and an

elevated vision of the press's mission. But increasingly those journalists come from and sociologists lingo relatively advantaged positions in the social economic hierarchy not generally from big city or small town ghettos and newspapers increasingly pay those journalists not only by lines psychic rewards but also wages that keep them from experiencing a lower income life. That may be less true on weeklies and tiny financially undernourished dailies. I call them weeklies spelled K L I E S. But even on those papers the the gulf between reporters and working class Americans widens. Second a newspaper person tries for the sake of objectivity to leave his personal values out of his work striving to become the untouched an observer observer seeing the whole picture. Because he is not in the picture. That may help explain why the personal idiosyncratic values of say a black journalist from outside the middle class mainstream do not more greatly affect the content and presentation of the news he

reports. Why is reporting read so much like that of the mass of reporters from relatively advantaged positions. There are the achievement of the journalists tends to be defined narrowly only in the highly competitive terms of newspaper work itself. Better assignments more journalism awards. Better news room titles. As a result the journalists work often takes place in an emotionally sterile. Hostile environment. Sociologist Chris R. gyrus studied the New York Times News Staff. He found a world of bloodthirsty rivalry self centered manipulation and fear. In his book Behind the front page he quotes a Times editor. After a while you wonder if all this is worth it what the hell is life all about. Is this what I should be doing. The ideal journalist sounds like a compulsively careerist version of Clark Kent. Young and single blessed with the stamina of Superman and devoid of emotional attachment to friend or other animate object coverage of working people personal ties to them or feelings for them all are for the most part

irrelevant to a journalist's work and therefore by definition irrelevant to the journalist. I say all of this to make one point even when the media millennium finally comes when the press employees in management as well as an entry level News positions its share of blacks Hispanics and other minorities. The media will need to overcome a built in bias against reporting quote ordinary people. Of course this is no excuse for not doing a better job of employing minorities but I confess that the news rarely if ever has a chance to hire for example blacks. In the 10 years I've been at the news there's not been as far as I know one black applicant for a position in the NEWSROOM. Perhaps this is just a reflection of the town's population there are only two or three black families in Southbridge Or perhaps this is only a reflection of my failings or perhaps qualified blacks are choosing to apply to better paying more prestigious metros or television stations. I don't profess to know all the reasons why we aren't seeing black applicants. It is important for the media not to give into tunnel vision either in their

recruitment policies or in their coverage. We can't just look for blacks Hispanics and women. Our task is more difficult than that. We have to remain sensitive to people of all ethnic racial and cultural backgrounds and the disadvantages they have fought or may be fighting now to overcome. And we can't be self satisfied by the growing professionalism of the reporters we hire. We must recognize that such professionalism may in fact be helping to isolate the media from ordinary people discouraging the kind of coverage of those people that they deserve. Thank you. Thank you Lauren. Eugene Lasry the general manager of W E I. That will give us a little different for you and also including perhaps radio as media of communication. Thank you. Good morning. The unfortunate part when you become a general manager is they only tell you

two things. Deliver the bottom line and protect the license. They don't tell you about the 3 through 100 that you have to do and they give you no guidelines of how to do that how negotiate contracts how to deal with community and dealing with crisis recruiting etc.. But in a five years as general manager and having had to do all these things one to 100. I've come to one conclusion that the responsibility of broadcasters in dealing with all segments of the minority communities is not only a moral or legal obligation. It is absolutely good business. And since I am a businessman I'm always interested in anything that's good for my business. It's good for your business because as high as a CBS owned all news station the ethnic community is

not only the subject or can be they contribute to news stories but certainly in a in a more broader scope that broadcast approximately one hundred one hundred twenty five editorials per year. It does approximately 25 or 30 public affairs news documentaries and many of these subjects of the editorials and documentaries that concern the minority community. The most difficult part I think is is dealing with the different voices within the different ethnic minority communities. Certainly there is not one voice that speaks for the entire community. We have to do and we try to do is course hear all those voices. But I think one of the one of the questions that should be in your mind today is understanding what broadcasting is all about. Certainly the electronic into broadcasting and that is how do they

operate what are the policies within the stations both radio and television. You know how to how do we reach our editorial policies whether it be on housing whether it be on abortion whether it be on gun control whether it be on political endorsement public service announcements broadcast approximately 12 to 15 hundred public service announcements per month and another 700 community calendar calendar announcements per month. How do we do that. Getting to understand the operation of a broadcast facility. It is to your best interest and certainly to ours. And to do that of course you have to get to know the people at the stations. Who makes the. Who are the people in the in the news department making the decisions on hard news. Who are responsible for the features. Who's Boss where editorial policy.

Very very important and the time to do that is a time when you don't have a beef. I probably get well I can tell you yesterday at private receive 12 phone calls and I have every turned 10 so far. If I get out of here I'll return the other two from listeners who either have some question regarding news coverage or editorial topics. And of course when they don't know who to call they say let me have the man who's making the decision. And we talk the general manager. And so I talk to him. But one thing is very very and I just can't overstate it is getting to know the people at the stations. It is easier for us to get to know people in the community because where we're out there we're more in sessions like today or sessions and I were there I was in yesterday and you get to you get to meet him.

So he came to the mall. But I guess if I have any kind of disappointment is in the five years I've been drawn managed by I think I can count on exactly two hands a number of replies to editorials from members of the minority community. And I cannot believe that every or Torah we do everyone agrees with. This is an opportunity to express an opinion that is different from the management. We have an editorial board to station consist of seven people between myself and we meet about twice a month and talk about those issues that we would like to comment on. We send out copies of our toils to approximately 600 individuals agencies newspapers. But we certainly could get some sort of would appreciate some more feedback. Because that's what we get is feedback through our

editorial process. So made a comment and maybe I just like to jump in on on recruiting. When I came to the minority complection the station was about 8 percent 8 percent of the 67 people on staff is now about 24 percent. And in the top four categories which the FCC deem vital which is officials and managers professionals technicals and salespeople. It is about 26 percent in those top four categories. Difficulty in recruiting minorities is that the good minorities applicants are working. They have jobs to get out. You've got to go out and recruit them. Thanks John.

Thank you very well I'm going to speak a little about the law. I left my wig at home but the law as it affects this part of the life of communications companies and I think the very first thing we've got to look at is the fact that there's an enormous difference between the way the anti-discrimination laws affect print media and the way they affect licensed media. Keeping in mind that the print media in this country is completely unlicensed to publish a magazine newspaper periodical of any kind. You do not need a license from the federal government. You may have tax problems with the federal government you may have problems with the postal rates a sign of the particular kind of publication you have but you do not need a license. As a matter of fact I assume that if anyone were to float the idea in this country

that periodicals or newspapers had to be licensed would be considered to be the greatest threat that the first moments ever and countered on the other hand Americans have taken for granted the fact that the licensing of all other forms of media. Is not a form of dangerous First Amendment implication that it is permissible and I don't think we have a question. The enormous difference between the two kinds of media the Federal Communications Act requires that all radio stations and all television stations must be licensed and those licenses must be renewed on a three year basis and they are subject to a number of tests both for the granting of the original license and for the renewal of that license on a tri annual basis. Those tests are not brought to bear against the Boston Globe or learned only as paper and Southbridge but they are brought to bear again or

the banner but they are brought to bear against it. And I think that these people live in two different worlds in the sense of affirmative action because one of the tests in order to be granted a license or to have your license renewed is to see how you stack up against the Federal Communication Commission the affirmative action standards and something we have avoided I think as we discussed that and that is the whole question of access to ownership. How do you get into the ownership club the ownership club is a sash ranking club of rich corporate conglomerates predominantly. Own and run by white males for better or for worse. That is something that it's hard for for those of us here to address. But it's a fact because it's become extremely expensive to own a communications media. Now turning to to management that is

the one area which the FCC is able to affect. Dramatically I think they cannot tell you who can own things they cannot tell you what you can print. Although I think we may beginning to see that. But they can tell you in a sense who your managers are because as as Jeanne mentioned the FCC has set up some categories against which it measures each license form of media as to their performance in affirmative action. I want to speak any longer about that. Why don't we move to talk about some of these statistics in a in a real sense. Cynthia Bellamy is the managing editor of the Bay State Banner. Our next speaker. The base a banner is black press and so I come here with a very very different perspective. I want to start off my remarks by talking about a place in the

black community I want to start off talking about Dudley Station. Dudley Station. As you might know is one of the hubs of the black community. It is the area in the city where the orange line the raggedy orange line brings blacks workers people who are going downtown for fun or whatever into the white community it brings them home at night back to the black community it brings white people into the black community. Dudley Station is also the point where the Harvard Dudly line the end on our side of the river. A very funny bus line that turns whiter as you go from auditorium going towards Harvard it turns blacker as you make the reverse trip. Dudley Station. It is a a microcosm or reflection

of something that maybe we might wish didn't exist but nevertheless still does that we live in two different worlds. We live in a white world and we live in a black world. As much progress as has been made that fundamental reality has been changed. Now within the police station. You can also see the wide varieties of currents of the black community of minority communities. You can see the street life you can see the church people you can see the revolutionaries set up with their little corner stands you can see a working class people on their way to the factories are on their way to being nurses aides in the great hospitals of the city. But also in Delhi station and not very far from the only station is 25 Rugel Street which is where the Bay State Banner is located now. In light of the fact that my remarks are supposed to be directed toward the

media's relationship with ethnic minority communities I think this is a very significant fact. Our relationship to this community to the community that we serve is determined in a very immediate way by the happenstance if you will of our location. We are right in the thick of things and that has its good aspects it has its bad aspects being right in the thick of things on the good side means that there is no place to run and no place to hide. You cannot pretend that the problems don't exist. You cannot sit there if you would be so inclined to think that you can look at the minority community as a monolithic unit. Any stereotypical views are immediately blasted away when you turn a corner. You cant run away from your responsibility because when you walk down the street there is surely going to be someone who says you know that story you did last week

and all these things are good because they keep you honest. When I talk about. Nowhere to run in the median see of the problems. I'm talking from the perspective as I said before the black press and the black press historically in this country has been charged with a different role and a different duty I think than the rest of the press. We are supposed to be a voice for our community. And we're supposed to fight for our community. Now how we do that varies from black newspaper to black newspaper from where I sit at the band we do basically two things. We report and we teach which might be an odd thing to say that a newspaper does that it teaches and maybe it isn't. With regard to reporting and hopefully will make this very brief this part here we do two kinds of things.

We do the stories that everybody else does. Some of those and we do the stories that nobody else does with regard to the stories that everybody else does. The big stories of the week the stories that you'll see in the globe the stories you'll see in the Herald the stories you'll see on channel 2 and Channel 7 and 8. We do it but with a difference. Well as we're all sitting around in the NEWSROOM drinking coffee and losing our minds we say what is the banner angle on this story. Right. What is the black angle on this story. And what I'd like to do is give you a couple of examples of how we approach the story that somebody else did and maybe even draw some conclusions about differences in approach. A story that immediately comes to mind as a fairly simple example of the differences is a story maybe a year and a half

ago which we thank you Boston Globe. We didn't know about it until we read your paper. There was a sort of scandal of sorts that was broken that the Department of Public Works sanitation department was on an extended vacation. The people who were supposed to be cleaning the streets would be driving often pulling up to coffee stands and having themselves a little ball while the streets of the city were filthy. Now that was the story in the major dailies and I was a little fact in that story. It was very interesting fact. Which was that and which also I might add appeared it appeared very low in the story. That the street cleaning was banned or poorly done across the city but there were two communities which got the real short in a broomstick if you wouldn't mind the pun. And those were Roxbury and South

Boston and that was our story. Our story was that our community and our sister community were being shortchanged. All right now that is an example of a story where a fact which is of not perceived I guess is important by a press that serves a wider community is drawn out and that is you for the angle for a story in the banner. Another story which is a little bit more difficult case is this. The coverage of Carson Beach about two years ago and what happened if I can capsulize these the incidents of the summer. I'll give you just the facts and then I'll give you the embellishments. A group of women who lived in the Columbia Point Housing Project decided that Carson Beach which is a very short walk from where they live would be a good

place for their children to play during the summer. Now unfortunately there were another group of people who lived a short walk from Carson beach in the other direction which is south Boston who thought that this should not be permitted. Now this is a public beach. All taxpayers pay for it. All taxpayers are entitled to access to not just taxpayer assistance. So these women decided to pursue a nonviolent course and they went out and sat in at the beach. I did that for several days maybe several weeks I don't recall. At which point when they went out there a group of rowdies came along and threw rocks at them and taunted them. It's my understanding that they did not fight back. Now in the daily press What do you see. You see photos of angry white youth. You have stories that are talking about racial confrontation which I take issue with because it takes two people in

a confrontation to a group and it talks about racial violence and violence in this city and ties it to the busing controversy which if you ask me a rowdy and racist behavior is rowdy and racist behavior you need not look much beyond that. So that was the daily coverage and better coverage was very different. The banner coverage was interested in several things. One you could tell the difference in the story because when you look at the front page you saw two different kinds of photograph. Our photographer went out there and took a photograph of a very young child a 2 year old child 3 year old child who's in the foreground and the beach and all the possible action and violence is way way in the background. The photo was pointing to certain very basic human reality that this is a young child. And that he

wants to use the beach and that that focus that human focus should not be forgotten as we talk about racial violence. The other thing the story did was it began to look at why did these mothers want to use that beach. There is another very interesting thing which was unwound that their children had been playing in the fire hydrants and in the preceding weeks a number of kids had been hit by cars speeding cars. It was a matter of they wanted a safe place for their children so that our story was more about that and more about the why in that story were about the historical context of that story that people had marched a year or two earlier in order to try to be able to use that beach in a more detail and perhaps a more complex way that would give you an idea of how we approach a story that's different from how the other precipices story. And I think on that note I will stop right here. Thank you.

Thank you.