Corporate-owned local news: should we expand the 1st Amendment to protect news creators?

[Cubo de Sangre]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by 'decentralising the media', and how that would work in a capitalist economy? Can you explain what this would look like?

I mean preventing consolidated ownership of news sources. It works by having the government step in to prevent mergers & acquisitions and forcing divestitures.

 

[Trotsky]

@Quipling do you have any opinion on this? I was hoping I'd get responses addressing the positive rights allocation angel and not just saying "no nationalization."

 

[Quipling]

@Quipling do you have any opinion on this? I was hoping I'd get responses addressing the positive rights allocation angel and not just saying "no nationalization."

Been traveling, but I don't believe in angels.


More seriously, severing this sort of control between subsidiaries and parent companies would spend a lot. It'd have to be pretty strictly limited to speech to avoid destroying a lot of corporate structures.

 

[Trotsky]

Been traveling, but I don't believe in angels.

You, my friend, are just a treat.

 

[lifelessheap]

If people want an example here is a short video.

Notice how it is CBS/FOX/NBC/ABC stations that all say the same thing WORD FOR WORD.

 

[Trotsky]

If people want an example here is a short video.

Notice how it is CBS/FOX/NBC/ABC stations that all say the same thing WORD FOR WORD.

If that's the one from your thread, it's linked in the OP.

 

[lifelessheap]

If that's the one from your thread, it's linked in the OP.

This is a different video showing that all the different networks are saying the exact same things. So the parent networks are colluding to all disseminate the exact same propaganda word for word.


All under the guise of "local news."

 

[TobyLerone]

If government takes over the media wouldn't that be anti-semetic?

 

[Seaside]

This thread topic was brought to mind by two things:

1. A thread by @lifelessheap about the optics of local news stations all repeating the same national news headlines passed down to them by their corporate parent company.
2. A post by @Tropodan suggesting that Facebook and Youtube be nationalized to prevent selective promotion or coverage based on corporate political motivations.

These two topics seem to me to coalesce into a broader discussion about entitling positive First Amendment rights to content producers in the arena of journalism and news coverage. While I think that the experience of using Facebook/Youtube is too user-driven to really accommodate an argument for nationalization or First Amendment protections (that is, the users pick the videos they watch and the content providers that they follow), I think the argument for more robust protection against censorship does exist for local news outlets.

As it stands, most local news stations are owned by larger national corporations. This can result in news anchors and stations being forced to propagate the overtly political rhetoric and agenda of their corporate headquarters, as was once displayed when hundreds of local stations owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group read a pre-scripted statement about news bias that clearly tinged of rhetoric espoused by a certain famous politician. Likewise, Sinclair Stations had previously been forced to air short segments by talking heads deriding "snowflakes" and more recently attacking critics of border family separation.


Because the First Amendment only protects citizens from government infringement on or substitution of speech, if a news station director were to refuse to air these pre-scripted headlines or political rants, they could be fired.


So, should positive First Amendment rights extended to local stations' journalists or managers so that they can resist scripted political rhetoric from their parent company? This would not be natonalizing local news since the government would not be administering the channels, but it would be extending government status and limitation to corporate parent companies and giving speech protections to local news stations.

In effect, individual local news organizations would enjoy First Amendment protections from their parent corporation, which is itself being subject to the same limitations as the government faces.

You guys should of had state financed media long ago most countries have this. Even in most of the EU.

 

[Seaside]

Government change but state media can remain independent.

 

[lifelessheap]

@Trotsky

Did you watch that short video I just posted? What are your thoughts?

It is obvious propaganda and across all the networks nation wide. Don't you feel that it is very, very creepy?

 

[Trotsky]

@Trotsky

Did you watch that short video I just posted? What are your thoughts?

It is obvious propaganda and across all the networks nation wide. Don't you feel that it is very, very creepy?

Yeah, those are all Sinclair-owned stations. That's the same pre-scripted thing that I mentioned in the OP and that John Oliver did a segment on.

 

[lifelessheap]

Yeah, those are all Sinclair-owned stations. That's the same pre-scripted thing that I mentioned in the OP and that John Oliver did a segment on.

It is absurd. I was just looking into Sinclair and they are disgusting. I am late to the party.

 

[Trotsky]

It is absurd. I was just looking into Sinclair and they are disgusting. I am late to the party.

Yeah, it's confusing too because the local news is aired on network stations and sometimes they use the names of their host networks in their titles (FOX, ABC, etc.). I can't really explain the logistics of that aspect, but it gives the appearance of them all belonging to a different corporate chain (at least to me).

It's pretty startling. Even here in St. Louis, you can see the very clear bias in certain channels - and that can result from corporate direction or from lower-level effort to pander to and frighten their audience for ratings.

 

[ocfightfan]

News creators? Or news reporters?

 

[lifelessheap]

Yeah, it's confusing too because the local news is aired on network stations and sometimes they use the names of their host networks in their titles (FOX, ABC, etc.). I can't really explain the logistics of that aspect, but it gives the appearance of them all belonging to a different corporate chain (at least to me).

It's pretty startling. Even here in St. Louis, you can see the very clear bias in certain channels - and that can result from corporate direction or from lower-level effort to pander to and frighten their audience for ratings.

Why don't you and I agree on something.




Lets agree on this video. I know you will like it. I know I like it.

And I love what a hypocrite Carlin is giving this speech disguised as comedy, while making millions of dollars on the most influential subscription based cable network. It has something for everyone.

 

[Trotsky]

Why don't you and I agree on something.




Lets agree on this video. I know you will like it. I know I like it.

And I love what a hypocrite Carlin is giving this speech disguised as comedy, while making millions of dollars on the most influential subscription based cable network. It has something for everyone.

Yeah, I love Carlin. He was actually the center of a pretty notable First Amendment precedent too. He's a classic mid-century liberal, back when the liberal mainstream was fairly socialistic and wary of corporate tyranny. I don't really think Carlin is necessarily a hypocrite: you have to use some platform to get your product out, and that was before internet offerings were available.


But what is strange to me is that Trump/Republican supporters rally behind this, when Trump and the Republicans are the ones deregulating and empowering the ultra-wealthy and the oligopolist corporations, and passing policies to their benefit in every imaginable area (worker protection, consumer protection, mergers and acquisitions, environmental regulation). I mean, no one batted an eye when Rex Tillerson, a former ExxonMobil CEO, was appointed to freaking Secretary of State, or a for-profit swindler college tycoon was put in charge of Education.

Even if you believe that the Democrats are similarly under the influence of major corporate lobbying (they are), they are undeniably harder on those corporations, want to regulate them more closely, want to limit their influence on government, and want to keep them from consolidating together and monopolizing the economy.

Sorry to make it partisan. Good video.

 

[Fluffernutter]

Oldie but goodie

 

[Madmick]

@Tropodan suggested nationalizing YouTube and Facebook?

Trope, what the fuck??!!!!

I never said facebook I said google, and I meant YouTube too.

Et tu, Trop? Et tu?

Spoiler: This is the end

Are you aware the opioid crisis first flourished in the Northeast? Places like "Oxyana" are the hardest hit, and that corridor runs up into New Jersey.

With men being fired for imaginary offenses one wonders why they're turning to drugs. It's a clear symptom of hate and oppression against them. Isn't that liberal logic?

This isn't about red vs. blue states. This is about the city vs. the country. The assholes who are selling all those prescription drugs work for pharmacies headquartered in such cities. The same people burdened with the lion's share of these taxes are the ones selling the addicts their drugs. Cry me a river.

At some point all the Berniebots and the Trumpets are going to realize they're on the same side-- that they're the same party. Then my nightmare will be complete.

These are the people who say, "I don't think it matters which party is in power." Have any of you noticed that? I think it's the most common sentiment I hear from people who don't really follow politics. This is what the anti-Establishment group all share in common, and they have become the majority. They are oblivious to the fact that, no, we wouldn't have detention centers at the borders separating families with a Democratic President. There's a million other examples. Those peoples' lives are radically different. So what they're really saying when they parrot this contemporary colloquialism is, "I don't think it makes any difference which party is in power...to me."

This is a vote of no confidence in the ruling class, not partisan platforms. After Trump doesn't do anything to meaningfully dent the already vast and still growing inequality divide, in spite of a flush economy, this will be revisited, with twice the fury. I sense "the working class' development of class consciousness, leading to their conquest of political power..."

That's what I hear every time someone says, "I don't think there's a difference between Republicans and Democrats", and it terrifies me.