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Introduction:  Watchdogs and Lapdogs

In the late 1960s, shortly after I started work as a reporter for a Vermont daily newspaper, an angry reader complained about my bias in a letter to the editor. "I strongly doubt that he could cover the proceedings of a dog show without incorporating a message," wrote the critic.

I took it as a compliment at the time. And I still do.

Perhaps that’s why I was so pleased to join about 1000 other progressive media-makers in New York City for a Media and Democracy Congress in October 1998. For three days, journalists and activists from across the country gathered to examine the problems — concentration of ownership, the relentless slide into info-tainment, an avalanche of gossip and "news" people really can’t use — and also debate some potential solutions. It was certainly inspiring to be among colleagues and friends who aren’t afraid of the A-word — advocacy. read more

Vital public discourse starts small. That’s why independent periodicals with modest circulations — exemplified by the members of the Independent Press Association (IPA) – matter just as profoundly today as they did a century ago. The practice of democracy, everywhere in the world, depends on media outlets like these.

Despite the proliferation of all-news cable channels, talk radio and the now ubiquitous internet, print persists as the medium where we begin to describe and name public problems, where we undertake the first discussion of issues that shape the daily lives of ordinary people. read more

As a long-time reporter for Pacifica Network News and KPFK, it was exhilarating to watch staff at sister station KPFA in Berkeley put their jobs on the line last spring and summer to demand a little of the free speech, justice, and democracy that the network has long advocated.

When KPFA Station Manager Nicole Sawaya and Pacifica correspondent Larry Bensky were fired last spring, staff took to the airwaves in defiance of Pacifica’s long-standing policy of not airing internal grievances. They told Bay Area listeners what many already suspected: The network was becoming a top-heavy bureaucracy hungry for mainstream legitimacy. It was unaccountable to the community and preoccupied with ratings and market share. The conflict escalated when Pacifica National Board member Pete Bramson confirmed rumors that the National Board was considering a sale of the station. read more

On October l, thousands of New York artists, activists, and politicians rallied outside the Brooklyn Museum against threats by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani to defund one of the city’s preeminent cultural institutions. The excuse was one painting on display at a controversial art show, called Sensation, that had played earlier in London. The mayor – who hadn’t even seen the canvas – branded it an outrage to Catholics because of its depiction of a Black Virgin Mary surrounded by sexual organs with an overlay of elephant dung. read more

The mainstream media in the United States were aware that the Pentagon and NATO were releasing biased and false information regarding the war in Kosovo. Yet they continued to pass on the information to the US public as if it were gospel.

"The media were once more asked to sort our a few kernels of facts from a barrage of distortions and half-truths from government information manipulators…baloney-ladened military briefings in Brussels…cryptic shows at the Pentagon," Newsday’s Washington Bureau correspondent Patrick Sloyan reported in June. Writing in  the American Journalism Review, Sloyan went on to describe how the elite of US media complained to President Clinton, but failed to use their power to challenge the government. read more

In the 1960s and 70s, "new wave" comedians exploded the stilted forms of comedy and explored deeper issues. An album liner note proclaimed, "In night clubs these days you get group therapy, prayer meetings, sociological community. You get thinking." One theorist even referred to standup comedians as shamans – holy persons, healers, priests of a sort.

That sort of thing was also briefly visible on television. But it’s not evident in today’s widely-heard late-night show monologues. A major opportunity for public participation has become a tension-relieving exercise, warping the public’s perception of society and democracy through its constant distortion of what constitutes critical social dialogue. read more