Ben Hooks interview

Benjamin Hooks is currently the only black commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission. In August he leaves the FCC to become head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. In light of the recent attacks on gay rights by Anita Bryant and her ilk it is refreshing to hear Mr. Hooks himself a lay minister and practicing Christian comment on gay rights as he's interviewed by former fruit punch or Bill Hartman commissioner hooks at a recent hearing of the Federal Communications Commission. Ginny vide of the National Gay task force and the gay media task force presented testimony to the commission. Asking for more favorable treatment of gays by broadcasters asking the commission to take note of the need for better treatment of gays by broadcasters. And at that meeting or shortly thereafter you were the only commissioner who spoke with any sensitivity to gay rights. If I remember what AP quoted you as saying this something to the. The broadcasters have to serve the whole community blacks as well as whites and gays as want to

straights. Is that pretty much correct. Yes but I have to admit it. Two positions and the first one is that as a member of the FCC I respect very much the First Amendment privileges extended to the folks that the newsprint media as well as electronic media. It's hard to me to have to deal at all with any restraint on the news media because I think that's the first sign of a dictatorship when you can't have it with the press. The greatest cost to constitutional guarantee that any people have is the amount of people the press high up because of the fact that the electronic media operates on alway's that have been deemed to belong to the public does give us a little different slap bass so that my feeling is that since we have that to deal with then I think broadcasters obligated to serve the top public which includes all members of the public and set in my judgment have been periods of time when the broadcast industry only served a

certain select the segment so that I hope you get the difference of what I'm trying to say that while I think that is true it ought to be. I would be loath of reluctant to try to impose rules and regulations on broadcast industry because in my own judgment I have no out and I have no hesitancy in saying that if you have a good government the proper motivation of rules and regulations they will not be fair to two minorities of any kind because that's the historical record that we've had where there has been suppression of freedom of the press and so on the question I'm asking I'm coming from the standpoint of a member of a minority group that's not protected by the law in most parts of the country. Black people are discriminated against at least in theory can turn to the courts for assistance. Although there is some question as to how much help they can get from you know my feeling about minority groups of any kind. And is that what Federal Express money Tennille vigilance is the price of it to abseil that the majority does not have the right to carry them and not

in any way under any circumstances. As a practical matter you and I know they do that right. Right but I don't think that it is right that they should and I think that there have been repressive laws. You know we start off with a proposition in 1776 had all been a created equal then that word man was supposed to be a generic word that included man can human cat. But it was it was a weapon in 1900 before women even got the right to vote in this country so you know I'm not I guess I take a long view of history that that which is round we ought to struggle to make the right and the fact that we don't win the battles you know immediately it doesn't mean that in the not in and I have been I guess in the majority in some situations and not in others but the certainly the fight must wait and see and then I don't I don't give up you know as a black man in this country. Things afire from being right and I feel the stings of lingering racism every day in my life I just can't get around it but I have never given in despair

and dispatch to it and never plan to I plan to keep on a fight and against it because I know that a bad Bill Press and Bill Press and sometimes Bill Press that does not see that. But slavery was a terrible institution not only for the enslaved but for those who did enslaving because it made them lose their sense of mob values and judgment so that mistreatment. I'm not about to be a gay minority in a minority just intrinsically in my book wrong inherently wrong. You do them believe that. Gay people should not be discriminated against in absolute and I don't think there should be no I don't think any people whether they you know whether one leg one on the whether they're black or white a Jewish or Gentile a bond with a mental defect of this NSP or whatever you know and I'm not trying to say that I guess that sounds bad but I'm not trying to say that gays that I consider to find anything of that so I'm simply trying to say what no matter what we are we are still in my bill. Children of God and entitled to the

ultimate human dignity. I agree with you. I wonder in getting access to the media because even though you and I feel that everybody should be treated equally. A lot of broadcasters tend to have a sort of. One dimensional view of person kind. Well yes that's true but we when we see that they are broadcast to one dimensional you know it. I understand that. Accept it as a reality. I don't accept it as a final conclusion. I think we have to work to try to change it when I was a boy living in Memphis riding on the back of that streak at one time my whole thought was to leave Memphis because I had heard that out of the city called Chicago and New York where black folk didn't have to live like that. I went to Dom and fought for this country photo and had his expose my life to death and it on the front lines and came back to the great city of Memphis and could not attend law school

because my great state did not have a place for black men and women to go to law school. I had to go to Chicago which was the nearest city to me to pay law school educated but on the way something happened I don't have that to live and often escape the south but my desire then was that go right back to faith. Household and raise enough hell to change conditions and I went in there voluntarily enough Chicago where I could have practiced law you know with with much more ease and went back into society was complete desegregated. In 1949 it was a 90 foot Inanna 12:41 in that where I could not even use a courthouse labrat without special permission because it belonged to the bar association and that preamble said that this association shall be open to all white lawyers practice in the county. When I went to the jail to see my class I was treated like a criminal myself but I didn't give up. I didn't leave I didn't know enough about law you know that many other good people who were by the way black and

white and finally became a judge in that county and when we went to the courthouse we change the whole complex and we went there it was live right when we left there was like the keys of a piano board we would sing in black and white together we still looked up. Not someday but today so I mean I'm just simply giving you the you know the harsh facts of life as I face them that I'm not an old. All that talk I did about what was right with black folks didn't help much until we began to work you know together and five men and women of good will of a Will across racial lines were willing to work with us and we did make some changes we have made all we need to make and I suspect we will make them in my lifetime but I'm going to still be fighting all the men and against what I consider to be evil. There are some people who believe that a backlash is taking parts against blacks and other minorities including gays Absolut and linen in the voice of George Wallace and Bryant and others some of the joy as well as

the absence of backlash as men and women much more sophisticated than he who sit in much more powerful positions and who give lip service to togetherness but who and that they that fight is so again that the backlash the Baka case in California the coonass case out of Seattle Washington do you think the Baki case reverse discrimination against gold quotas and Pam tables intellectuals in high places of great power. Of a sophistication and means to be disingenuous surely we have faced a tremendous backlash and the gay rights movement you're facing a tremendous backlash. It made a little progress got a little exposure got people saying well at least you're human and deserve some light and before you can get a custom job right you had a backlash knocking you right back into hell again you know. So I think that we have sort of become accustomed to that and and and again I shall try to become a student of history these last few years. It's the only thing to give me the philosophical bases

to not become discouraged and give up the good fight. You mentioned Alan Docky decision. And that's now before I guess going before the U.S. Supreme Court regarding affirmative action and what he and others have labeled reverse racism. I'm wondering if if the Supreme Court rules in favor of baki. What kind of effect this will have on broadcasters obligations to I don't know what what kind of domino effect it will have pray and trust the Supreme Court will not take that backward step because the premise has been stated incorrectly and if it learned judges can't see that then we have all men most miserable. The premise is not and should never be based on the fact that blacks and Hispanics and other aggrieved classes are special people but that in the prolific We're about two thirds Well a cut of that stupid silly criminal and disgraceful. They have a medical school that will be 100 percent linen white. You cannot train folks to meet the conditions of the day and a

laboratory school is completely divorced from reality and every white man who insists on evidence it's not an unserious second rate education and against his will and have to break his back to help do it we're going to change it and make him see what right is that's all. And we don't give up when I want to be afraid of it and we going to raise hell from the mountaintop until something happens to change the game. It's just that simple you know it. If they want to battle in hell let's go to battle that's it. Sounds good. Getting back to broadcasters again. All broadcasters are supposed to ascertain community problems by going around and talking to community leaders. Yes currently there is no obligation for broadcasters to meet with members of the gay community. In a few of the major metropolitan areas they do this where there's been intense pressure brought to bear. But in other parts of the country no. And I'm wondering. View of Jimmy Carter his aide Mitch Costanza having met with several gay community late leaders at the national level. And having agreed to meet with him in the course of a

series of meetings do you. Would you consider it proper for a broadcaster somehow to be required to meet with. I'm taking today will be desirable and obtainable goal up to a noble goal and the future I mean if we continue that same requires that all of you know as you very well know that whole doctrines on the basis and vigorous attack by those who give away the time of this raid on a facade that's meaningless but if asked a payment can pay to be a requirement period and I think that the parameters of inclusion of various groups might very well include all the segments of the community I think that we've suggested now certain groups not as. The old and in old but as a representative I did the Fama as the grains the labor unions and a CPA that had been leader of the Kiwanis of the I mean we don't use all those made by I think we make suggestions of class of the groups of people all to be seen and in the community to

survey and I and I suspect if ascertainment continues to hold up in court and does not get knocked out by the rewrite of the Communications Act that is will be going forward in this Congress that it's very possible that with pressure put on by your community that a new group of commissions might include a few more listens of people that ought to be included in that this survey. I have two questions about the commission itself. One criticism I've heard and been asked to bring to your attention for comment is the fact that the FCC frequently aligns itself with big business and does not really care about protecting the public at all. I'd be appreciate your comments on that. And also I wonder if you. Any idea about what the tenor of the commission is with regard to gay rights. Is there anyone else in the commission likely at all. RICE No I can't say that I have any particular feeling about that because that question of gay rights has never been presented very forcibly at the commission. I must say however that I think this Commission presents seven person commission is a fairly

humane and get to a human rights and is fat assisted to the rights of the public so that the allegation that the commission is lined up with big business is not true in its entirety. It is the fact that most of the members of all commissions come from the at least the middle class community very few really poor people of you know make it to a commission and. The polls that most of us have some connection with law engineering you know the academic community that that gives you a certain kind of Steven and and most of us are committed to the American way of life even though I might want to see it changed more radically than others. I'm basically a good American citizen and believe in the country and think it is a Swiss preserve and with all of its wants and temples and such. And so that that is going to be a tendency to protect.

But I can say that Sisi perhaps have been the fall from the last 10 years of all the regulatory agencies maybe with the exception of the FTC in trying to protect consumer rights but lying was not the debate and Consumer Rights itself is a is a vague term. I suspect the mass in this very post and bear probably with deliberate full fault that the Cossacks pastor the church for many many years and came into contact with their poorest people touch a passage in methods in the poorest sense Astrachan. Whole city where many people for years were living on pensions that never exceeded $70 a month. And because I consciously kept in contact with them I have found it minute so-called consumer groups really don't have a good feel for the vivid picture of this country that millions of them live on inadequate social security pensions pinned up in their apartments and adequately heat it inadequately lighted at the inadequate fair and it's not a criminal that a country this rich could let many of its best citizens both black and white live like that and I am and I

half feel that if I talk with other people they always tell about how poor they were but one of the problems that exist is once we pass the problem level we tend it. We tend to think we still think like we will pull it is not an option and I'll light that on a mad daily contact every hour of the day with people who will vote. Some the most beautiful and modest people I've ever known but who were dirt poor who didn't have a bank account who had never written a check in the last who depend on the rest and you know the American Express office and that builds up public transportation to get where they want to go and who are dependent on the state the government to take care of them because they gave the last to the country plain adequate wages. Funny if it is but I'm not sure the consumer groups really represent them you know I think that consumer groups have it they don't rush themselves will tend to become so involved with middle class values and and middle class that is a middle class ideals that they'll forget the wretched and the disinherited in the poor of this era also need

spokespersons. I've heard that criticism made of the gay movement and also the women's movement and there's a lot of self-criticism going on and I think that's good I think that's healthy. I think every movement ought to have the capacity to examine itself when I go to the end of ACP I hope that they will never come when I can stand it and analyze it. Myself I have people to criticize if we moved away from my objectives I think it's good that people remind us of it you know and I think the gay movement the women's movement a feminist movement the black movement every move we have to periodically re-examine its bases abandoned its rationale and its reason for existence in several communities. L.A. and San Francisco I know the groups within the gay community in the black community have been formed. People who are both. There's a black gay caucus in San Francisco and Los Angeles the Association of Black gays. And it may be that on the East Coast there are similar sorts of groups. I'm wondering if as you go to become head of the noble ACP

if you envision any way in which gay people can work with black people to correct injustices that they suffer in areas I want to make it larger that we want to work with all people of goodwill if that are going to get us a question that people of goodwill whatever the sexual proclivities inclination doesn't prevent them from being people of good will who want to see the country move forward and we welcome working with all people of that kind. I thank you for that answer and I thank you for agreeing to be interviewed for fruit punch. This has been fruit punch Gaiman's radio. We welcome your comments both good and bad so please write us fruit punch care of KPFA Berkeley California 9 4 7 0 4 fruit punch. Care of KPFA

Berkeley California 9 4 7 0 4. Speaking for the entire fruit punch collective This is Roland with Kevin Fred and Susan on the board with special thanks to the bill Hartman and our own day for making Tonight Show. Good evening.