[Seattle-editorial] FEATURE PROPOSAL

Sun Sep 8 18:23:56 PDT 2002

Hi all.
Following is my proposal for a feature on Clear Channel. Hopefully my
formatting isn't too wacky -- I was unable to find the feature proposal
tutorial on the Seattle IMC site.
Heather

Green Bar: STATIC ON THE AIRWAVES
Title: CLEAR CHANNEL'S BROADCAST INTERFERENCE

Clear Channel exemplifies many of the dangerous trends in US media today.
The largest owner of radio stations in the U.S. with stations in 247 of the
nation's 250 largest radio markets, Clear Channel embodies the
corporatization of media and its consolidation into a few very powerful
hands. Clear Channel's expansion means the further atrophy of discourse on
the increasingly privatized public airwaves, and the erosion of
representation and diversity.
 
Clear Channel was empowered to snatch up its oligopolistic portion of the
radio market by the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which dismantled
then-existing laws designed to protect the public's access to diverse media
content by limiting the number of markets a single entity could control.
According to the Center for Digital Democracy (CDD), the laws which had been
established over the course of fifty years prior to the Telecommunications
Act, "have been an important safeguard ensuring the public's basic First
Amendment rights. The rationale for these policies is that they help provide
for a diverse media marketplace of ideas, essential for a democracy."
Represented by the powerful National Association of Broadcaster (NAB) lobby,
Clear Channel and other station owners, with "sympathetic support from
politicians appreciative of their financial contributions and political
endorsements" succeeded in fundamentally destroying these protections
through the implementation of the Telecommunications Act. Says the CDD, "the
emergence of unregulated digital media gatekeepers, able to dominate the
nation's political and cultural discourse, will seriously challenge the
rights of individuals in a free society to speak and receive all manner of
communications."
 
With 1,200 stations in its control, Clear Channel is one of the players at
the core of this challenge to society's access to diverse media. The company
's policy of limiting the range of views expressed on its stations was made
clear when, following the attacks of September 11th, management issued a
memo to its station managers, with a list of songs which were deemed
inappropriate for airplay. Some of the songs on the list seem to have been
selected solely for their peaceful, anti-war message, such as John Lennon's
"Imagine." Clear Channel also played an unsavory role in the firing of a
professor from his tenured position at University of South Florida. A
Salon.com article by Eric Boehlert describes how Sami Al-Arian was accused
on "The O'Reilly Factor" of aiding radical Palestinians and terrorists.
Although "[t]he charges had been thoroughly investigated and rejected by
USF, and an immigration judge; [and] the FBI ha[d] been looking for years
and has never filed any charges," several of Clear Channel's Tampa radio
jocks jumped on O'Reilly's bandwagon and "vilified Al-Arian for months."
Then one October morning following the September 11th attacks, after a jock
spent his time slot "insulting Al-Arian on the air, the professor was hit
with a wave of hate e-mails." Claiming that the death threats being sent to
Al-Arian constituted a significant danger to the university and its
students, the USF administration fired the persecuted professor. In yet
another disturbing 9/11-related incident, Davey D., Hip Hop program host at
a Clear Channel station, was rather suspiciously "laid off" following an
interview he conducted with U.S. Representative Barbara Lee, who cast the
lone dissenting vote against Congress's decision to grant Bush vast powers
in the War on Terrorism. Thus, Clear Channel has abused its power to silence
the voices of peace and dissent by artists such as John Lennon and Rage
Against the Machine in a critical moment when a nation's pain might have
been channeled toward calm reflection or knee-jerk vengeance. Clear Channel
poured fuel on the volatile flame of prejudiced persecution in a time when
President Bush was urging Americans against just such acts of blind racial
hatred. And by firing Davey D. after his interview with Representative Lee,
Clear Channel sent a message that there is no room for a dialogue about the
courses of action open to the American people.
 
Clear Channel's broad reach does more than shut out dissenting and differing
political views. It is also a catalyst for the homogenization of radio
culture and the corporatization of music. According to the Salon.com article
"Radio's Big Bully," Clear Channel, in addition to dominating the nation's
major radio markets, "also dominates the live entertainment business in
North America. It owns, operates or exclusively books 135 amphitheaters,
arenas, theaters and clubs, as well as controls the most powerful promoters,
and buys entire tours from superstar acts like Madonna, 'N Sync and U2. Last
year Clear Channel's promoters sold 27 million concert tickets, according to
the live entertainment trade magazine Pollstar. The second largest promoter,
House of Blues, sold just 4 million tickets." There are sinister
implications to a single company holding assets which transcend various
segments of the music industry. Allegations have been made by several bands
that "their acts were pulled from Clear Channel stations over
concert-promotion disputes, and not just pulled locally. The bands were
yanked off playlists from a coalition of aligned Clear Channel stations
stretching over several states." In other words, charges have been made, by
more than one party, that Clear Channel has withheld airplay from bands who
refused to use Clear Channel's concert promotion and venues. Clear Channel
denies these charges. Lawsuits are pending. Another Salon/Boehlert article
states that "last summer, a small Denver concert promoter, Nobody in
Particular Presents, sued Clear Channel for antitrust, claiming, among other
things, that the company 'has used its size and clout to coerce artists ...
to use Clear Channel to promote their concerts or else risk losing airplay.
'" Boehlert writes that, "[A] judge in Denver refused to dismiss the NPP
suit as Clear Channel had requested. He ruled NPP's allegations 'are
sufficient to make out a case of monopolization and attempted monopolization
under Section 2 of the Sherman Act.' Depositions are now moving forward as
agents, managers, promoters and programmers will be questioned under oath
about their dealings with Clear Channel, and whether its radio stations
rewarded or punished artists based on their business relationships with
Clear Channel's concert division."
 
Clear Channel is also facing several anti-trust lawsuits. In another article
in the Salon series, "Radio's Titan Hits the Skids," Boehlert writes about
Spanish Broadcasting System suit against Clear Channel. SBS, "the nation's
largest Hispanic-owned radio operator, sued Clear Channel alleging antitrust
violations. Specifically, SBS claims that in an attempt to eliminate SBS as
a competitor, Clear Channel executives...contacted SBS's financial
underwriters in an effort to get them to withdraw their support of SBS's
1999 public offering, tried to depress the company's stock price by limiting
financial analysts' coverage, and 'improperly induced significant
institutional investors to divest their positions in SBS, depressing SBS's
stock price.' Clear Channel is a major investor in SBS's competitor,
Hispanic Broadcasting Corporation, or HBC." Further mentioned in the same
article is an allegation against Clear Channel of "illegally operating
stations through shell companies in order to circumvent existing ownership
limits."
 
Concentration of wealth and power have negative societal consequences.
Concentration of power over the media is doubly dangerous, because it is
through the media that society has the opportunity to learn of, discuss, and
resolve its problems, including monopolistic business practices. Clear
Channel, as the dominant owner of US radio stations and other music industry
interests, is in a position not only to coercively manipulate those in the
music industry, but to silence criticism.
 For more information about Clear Channel and the US media's downward spiral
into corporatization and consolidation, see Eric Boehlert's articles at <a
href="SALON.COM http://www.salon.com </a>, and check out <a
href="CLEARCHANNELSUCKS.ORG http://wwwclearchannelsucks.org </a>. You can
also read <a href="US Senator Russ Feingold's statement about his proposed
legislation http://www.senate.gov/%7Efeingold/releases/02/06/2002613529.html
</a> to address concentration of ownership in radio. Also, for more
media-related articles and a schedule of events for the upcoming RECLAIM THE
MEDIA: A COMMUNITY MEDIA CONVERGENCE in Seattle simultaneous with the NAB
conference, go to <a href="RECLAIMTHEMEDIA.ORG</a>.