PGHIMC - Pittsburgh Independent Media Center

Call to Action: Stop the Media Monopoly
by david Sunday, Aug. 31, 2003 at 10:57 AM
david@heartofdarkness.org (email address validated)

for Pittsburgh Indymedia: Protest the corporate media and the FCC this Thursday.

CALL TO ACTION:
RECLAIM THE FCC!
BLOW THE WHISTLE ON THE CORPORATE MEDIA

WHAT: National day of protest/education to stop the media monopoly.

WHEN: 5:15p, September 4; the day the new FCC media ownership rules go into effect.

WHERE: Meet at Federal Building (Liberty and Grant), march to KDKA (One Gateway Center) then march across the Roberto Clemente Bridge to the Tribune-Review (near PNC Park). Similar protests are being held in cities across the country.

WHY: The FCC was created to protect the airwaves -- a scarce public resource that is vital to democracy. Instead, they're giving it away to huge corporations whose sole interest is profit and they're shutting down low power, community-based FM stations whose sole interest is the people. Now the FCC is helping big media to get even bigger.

Ignoring the protestations of more than half a million people and hundreds of organizations, FCC Chairman Michael Powell and his two Republican colleagues on the commission voted to allow the media behemoths that already dominate our airwaves — the likes of General Electric, Rupert Murdoch, AOL-Time Warner, and Viacom — to gobble up even more TV stations and local newspapers.

During the war on Iraq, we witnessed just how dangerous a threat to democracy the corporate stranglehold over the publics airwaves can be. Viewers were 25 times more likely to see a pro-war U.S. source than an anti-war one, performers who spoke out against the war were vilified, anti-war protesters were marginalized, and the human devastation wrought by shock and awe went largely unreported.

On September 4 -- the date the new FCC's new media ownership regulations go into effect -- Pittsburgh joins cities in a nationwide uproar over the media monopoly. Our march kicks off at the Federal Building, where people will speak out against the FCCs capitulation to corporate greed and their arrogant dismissal of opposing voices. Then we march to KDKA and the Tribune Review to expose the corporate media for the boardroom bulletin that it really is. Bring whistles -- we will blow the whistle on the corporate media for their complicity in perpetuating the Bush administration's lies on the war on Iraq and domestic policies, as well as their ongoing bias, sensationalism and homogenization. The Pittsburgh Independent Media Center will take this opportunity to educate the public about alternative media and to encourage them to take action for media diversity. An open house is being planned for later that evening.

WHO: This local call is sponsored by Pittsburgh Media Action, a project of the Thomas Merton Center. The national call is sponsored by Global Exchange, Code Pink, United for Peace and Justice, among other groups.

For more information about the Pittsburgh action, visit www.pghmediaaction.org. For more information about the national call, see www.reclaimthefcc.org.

add your comments