Friday, January 05, 2007

 

ABC attempts to silence critic of its racist programming

Thanks to Avedon for mentioning this. ABC has a long history of pandering to racism. Think Bob Grant. ABC attempts to silence blogger for protesting calls to hatred and violence on KSFO. From Spocko (who Mercury Rising recognized early on), via Online BlogIntegrity Two days before Christmas I got a Cease and Desist letter from ABC regarding my use of audio clips from KSFO radio hosts Melanie Morgan and Lee Rogers on my blog, Spocko’s Brain (see attached PDF). KSFO is a Disney affiliate whose radio hosts broadcast violent rhetoric directed toward journalists, liberals, Democrats, Arabs and Muslims all over the SF Bay Area and to the world via the Internet. I commented about the content of these host’s broadcasts on my blog and informed KSFO’s advertisers about what they were supporting by letting them listen to the exact audio quotes from the hosts.... KSFO is using the full weight and force of an ABC/Disney lawyer and copyright law against a private citizen blogger. I dared to use the audio content in question for nonprofit educational purposes (I don’t even have ads on my blog!), and thus under the protection of the Fair Use Doctrine set forth in Section 107 of the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C.§107.... Why me? I’m not the one saying journalists should be hanged, thieves should be tortured and killed, people should be burned alive, stomped to death or have their testicles cut off. I’m not the one saying that millions of Muslims should be killed on the presumption that they are extremists or just because they live in Indonesia . I’m not the one who says that lying is as natural as breathing to Egyptians and Arabs or demanding that a caller “Say Allah is a Whore” to prove he is not an Islamist. What ABC has done to Spocko, they have done to all of us. ________ My suggestions: 1. Cut a CD of KSFO talk hosts talking about executing Bill Keller or "painting a bullseye" on Nancy Pelosi and send it to your your Congressman with the suggestion that hearings on FCC oversight of enforcement of broadcast license requirements be put on the early agenda. 2. Send same to FCC Commissioners like Jonathan Adelstein and Michael Copps, asking them if this is what the public airwaves should be used for. 3. The KSFO license runs until 2013. But one can file objections with the FCC as to whether ABC should be allowed to have access to the public airwaves, given its broadcasting record. 4. Consider contacting sponsors of the Melanie Morgan program and other KSFO open sewers to ask whether they want their name associated with that programming. 5. As Spocko says, support the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Comments:
Thanks, Charles! This was also posted over at Daily Kos, but I never got round to linking to it.
 
Glad to see you're in favor of free speech!
 
Aha! We've got an actual KSFO listener trapped here! So how are things in the Bay Area, Not-All-That-Anonymous? Are you chomping at the bit to carry out KSFO's edicts against Nancy Pelosi?
 
We are absolutely in favor of free speech, Mr. Anonymous, but free speech does not mean lobbing bombs in a consequence-free world. The "personalities" at KSFO are perfectly welcome to spew whatever flavor of hateful bile they like, but they should not expect their advertisers to join in their redneck, whitey jihad.
 
I do believe in free speech, Anonymous-- just not in the rights of commercial broadcasters to say what they want while silencing critics. KSFO licenses the airwaves from the American people on the promise that you will use those airwaves to better this nation.

Broadcasting hate is not in the interests of the American people. We don't tolerate it here, and I hope that we can persuade KSFO to either change its ways or face having its license pulled.
 
Hi Anonymous,

I, too, am *totally* in favour of free speech. Problem is, this speech isn't free. It is paid for handsomely by advertising revenues, which means by me and you through the products we buy, and I for one just want to let the guys who plunk down bucks to get a message to me that it isn't working, at least not with me.

I could just cut up my VISA card and only use my M/C from now on, but how would they know why? Not fair, I think. I look at it as a courtesy, you know, like telling a friend that she has toilet paper stuck to the bottom of her shoe. The advertisers are free to do as they wish about it, of course, as I am free to not buy their product (aka 'vote with my dollars', remember that phrase?)

It may also transpire that the on-air comments made over public airwaves under the terms of a federal license may violate a that lecense and/or other laws. In which case, proper authorities may requested to investigate and generally do their sworn duty to uphold the law. Or they would be in breach of the law. That's how it works, see?

Gosh, it is such a free, free country!
 
KSFO has nobody but low-life, pipsqueak brown-shirt wannabees. If they encountered true Aryans they would shit in their pants.
 
Truly a new low for an already suspect news orgainzation. One thing I've learned about the Repugnant Party; they do exactly what they accuse others of doing first.

Just watch how they handle this. First the Sturm und Drang, then the Mea Culpa, finally the victim.

It would shock you to see the consistency in every response.

R
 
Post a Comment

<< Home

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

More blogs about politics.
Technorati Blog Finder