“Whatever is your first priority, your second priority
has to be media reform.”

I've been saying that to gatherings of labor, and other
progressive organizations, for 40 years now.

Your first priority may be a fairer shake for labor.
Healthcare for Iowans. Rights for women and minorities. Improvements in local
schools, or the environment. Electing your candidates to public office.

Whatever is your first priority, you have little hope of
making any progress with it if you can't get media coverage – fair and
favorable media coverage.

For no group is this more true than for labor.

“Yeah, so what else is new?” I hear you say.

I'll tell you what's new.

For the first time in the history of Iowa,
so far as I know, two currently sitting commissioners of the Federal
Communications Commission – Michael Copps and Jon Adelstein – are coming to Iowa
City because they want to hear from you.

The national organization Free Press is seeing to it that
Wednesday, October 5th, a month from today, probably at the IMU, hundreds of
Iowans will be coming forward to tell the FCC what they think about our local
media.

There are petitions that give you a chance to participate.
The petitions ask the FCC to at least hold hearings before automatically
granting license renewals to Iowa's
television stations.

All those Iowa
stations have to file for renewal by October 1st. If their licenses are renewed
they will be able to keep up what they've been doing for another 8 years.

Meanwhile, a local group called Iowans for Better Local
Television,  and anyone else in the state, has from now
until the end of December to get comments and petitions to the Commission.
IBLTV's Web site actually lets you sign the petition online.

So why should labor care?

You can probably answer that better than I.

 – When did
you last see a documentary favorable to organized labor on local television?

– What
“news” do they report about strikes – like the mechanics at
Northwest Airlines or Boeing? It's the impact on the companies' stock prices,
how long the strike will last, how well the company is continuing to operate
without the striking workers, and the impact on consumers. How often do you
ever hear about the workers' legitimate grievances: the years without raises,
the cutbacks on health care and retirement benefits, the outsourcing and
layoffs – or even corporate demands for cuts in workers' pay at the same time
executives are getting multi-million-dollar bonuses?

– Do you
watch the Sunday morning talk shows on television? When was the last time you
saw a labor spokesperson? A couple years ago, when Fairness and Accuracy in
Reporting investigated, it found that during a 19-month stretch the Sunday
shows had a total of 364 guests. You know how many were from labor? Two. Two
out of 364.

 – Remember
when we worked to get the local school board to support Project Labor
Agreements for the new school construction? How much effort did local
television make to explain the issue to its viewers? Somewhere between damn
little and none at all.

Our hearts go out to those suffering in Louisiana
and Mississippi. We grieve with
them, and send them our money and our prayers. The dead and injured will surely
end up numbering in the thousands. And the media has been all over the story,
as they should.

But you and I know that there are over 5000 working men and
women killed in the workplaces of this country every year, year after year.
Often because of unsafe working conditions. Every year over five million have
injuries or diseases from their workplaces. And 2.6 million of those require
recuperation away from the workplace, or a restriction of their duties. What do
you ever see of this disgraceful, nationwide epidemic on the evening news? And
as a result of the public's ignorance of these facts, few candidates for public
office, Republican or Democratic, ever make it a campaign issue.

I could go on with this forever. You may think I already
have.

This is, after all, a day to celebrate Labor, and its
accomplishments for all Americans. 

But we will have even more to celebrate, next year, if you
will sign these petitions, and turn out Wednesday evening, October 5th.

Judy Muller provided a comparable analysis (though much better written
and delivered) regarding the consequences for the poor, which I have
chosen to title “Defining the Right Demographic”  (if you'd like
to listen to her deliver it – it's about a 3-minute piece – it's
available online from NPR.

Sources: 

Steve Chermak, Review of William J. Puette, Through
Jaundiced Eyes: How the Media View Organized Labor (Ithaca: ILR Press, 1992),
Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture, 3(5) (1995) 123-126

Peter Hart, “Why Is Labor Off TV?; Chris Matthews
Blames Union Leaders – Not Himself,” EXTRA! Update, August 2005, p. 3
[not online as of September 5, 2005] (“a FAIR study (Extra!, 9-10/01)
found that in 19 months of coverage, featuring 364 guests, only two
representatives of organized labor appeared on the networks' Sunday morning
talk shows”).

International Labor Communications Association, (ILCA Online FAQs, “What's wrong with the
corporate media?” There is a growing consensus in the United
States that mainstream commercial media are
by and large not mainstream at all but instead are supportive of the corporate
agenda. Of course, the largest media companies (which provide most Americans'
news) and their large advertisers are themselves mammoth corporations. In
addition to promoting policies that advance corporate interests, our major
media often appear to place profits ahead of investing in in-depth quality
journalism.)

Mokhiber and Weissman, “Killing Work,” May 21, 1999, ZNet Daily
Commentaries

Norman Solomon, “Mass Media – Hatred of American
Labor?” AlterNet, posted April
26, 2000, (“Coverage of the economy is, more than international or domestic
political coverage, dominated by one social sector – the business class,”
Hoynes concluded after assessing programs on PBS stations. “Corporate
representatives account for more than half of the sources,” while 20
percent of sources represent Wall Street. Overall, “three-quarters of the sources in
economic stories are from the corporate or investment world.” In sharp
contrast, non-professional workers and labor representatives together account
for less than 3 percent of the voices on the air.”)


Worker Health Chartbook 2004, NIOSH Pub. No. 2004-146,  (reports 5524 fatal injuries
in 2002; 5.2 million non-fatal injuries in 2001 of which 2.6 million resulted
in lost workdays from recuperation away from the workplace or the necessity of
restricted duties).

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