The Fight for Media Democracy

Speech given at the 27th Convention of the CPUSA

Introduction

At this Convention we need to re-examine our approach and sharpen our thinking on the role of media: ours, theirs and the ones in between; communist-left, independent and corporate mainstream media.

The fight to defend democracy is central to our outlook, to our strategy and tactics today and on the road to socialism. The right to public education, the fight against racism, for women's equality, for the full civil rights of the GLBT community--all these battles are understood to be part of the battle for democracy.

The struggle against the corporate domination of the media is a cornerstone of the fight to defend democracy. So that is why we are discussing mainstream media, communist-left, independent media today.

We haven't placed an emphasis on this aspect of the battle to defend democracy for quite some time. I think we have been a little behind the curve on some new developments both in analyzing the corporate strategies and in responding to the media megamergers.

The Bush right-wing drive to carry out the corporate media game plan has begun at the FCC and in Congress. Our Convention needs to examine the right danger and strategize to sharpen tactics to defend democracy in this arena of struggle as we discuss the anti-right fight.

We have to make it a priority to organize the fight for the freedom of expression in the mass media. Our role is specific because we have our own media: communist media. In some senses we have even more responsibility to help organize coalition efforts to defend the constitutional right to a free press and media. We have a whole lot of experience fighting for First Amendment rights. We are not alone in seeing the corporate attack on the freedom of the press and media.

Freedom of the press is a concern of a majority of people. Adding our voice and historical perspective will sharpen our tactics in the fight for democracy overall and focus the vision of this vital struggle on today's stakes and the possibilities of a socialist future.

The Bush Administration

Globally, the majority of TV production, cable ownership, book and magazine publishing, music and soon the Internet is controlled by 50 companies with only nine controlling the lion's share. This tightly-knit global media power of the top nine is maintained through a vast array of joint ventures with potential competitors. The Bush administration is already rolling back the regulations that have been stumbling blocks to the continued gobbling up of media entities by the top nine media conglomerates.

The current, sharpest, right-wing attack is coming out of the Federal Communications Commission. The Bush administration appointed Michael Powell, son of Secretary of State of Colin Powell, as chair. Powell owns millions of dollars worth of stock in Time Warner, one of the top nine controlling the media. The commission was originally established to regulate the telecommunications industry and manage the broadcast spectrum, but has now taken on a position of defending corporate free speech rights by removing regulations that have restricted the corporate mergers and their ability to dominate media markets for decades.

Popular Public and Media Conceptions

The majority of people in our country may not be able to name the top nine most powerful media corporations but they are well aware that they exist and exert an ever-growing influence on the news coverage and on our culture in general. In a recent poll, only 21% of Americans thought the press "cared about people." The prevailing mass thinking is that the media is controlled and those who control it wield their power without concern for right or wrong and only act on their own self interest.

The people are aware of the tightening corporate domination of freedom of the media.

The class struggle goes on as corporate control tightens. A recent study conducted by journalists concluded that there is widespread disorientation among news media reporters due to the pressure to merge news reporting with entertainment, or what has been called "infotainment": a product of the drive for profit. Infotainment is an attempt to strip the class nature of society and hide the class struggle. And what is emerging in response is a struggle between left center and right journalists on how to counter the class-based censorship--even among the syndicated columnists who are at the top of their professions in the print media.

A New Strategy

We in the left, communist and independent media need a new strategy that takes into account the class struggle within the corporate media and the rising class consciousness of the workers in the industry.

The crisis is particularly sharp in broadcast news production because the ownership is totally in the hands of the mega media corporations who, in the estimate of this committee, have no interest in journalism and only have class aims: profit and the generating of stories that reinforce their class aims.

These journalists acknowledge that journalism is a business but it should be one with responsibility to the people first and the stockholder second. These reporters are talking about freedom of information, First Amendment rights and the freedom of the press. In short, they are advocating democracy.

Case in Point

The coverage of our Convention makes this point: we and the labor and people's movements must fight for every inch of democracy. We have had press coverage on the AP wire, PBS, National Public Radio and locally on Black, Latino and community radio outlets. The fight for our right to be seen and heard and is a part of the fight for democracy and against the right-wing corporate control of the media. This weekend we fought and we won. Mainstream Milwaukeeans know a bit more about our ideas ... and some are saying, "Oh my, they seem to make a lot of sense!"

Independent Media

Independent media is as old as dirt. It has existed since the class struggle began. Marx and Lenin spoke about it, participated in it. In every stage of class struggle and the fight for democracy, there's emerged a fight for independent news coverage of the class and peoples' struggles. The movements have always needed their own voice.

The history of the struggle for independent media by, for and about the struggles for justice were dramatically outlined at last night's People's Weekly World event!

The independent media movement of today is a wide network: labor, Latino, Black, Asian and American Indian press and broadcast media; publications of the peace; women's, GLBT, and youth movements. Local community newspapers, community cable TV, community radio programming. There are diverse political trends in this independent media, but the main trend is the battle for coverage of the aims, ideas and the life in these communities who have limited access in the corporate-controlled arena. Their fight is the democratic right to be heard. The media of these communities become the main vehicle to bust through the racist, male supremacist and anti-working class media exclusion.

The Response

Along side of these multi class forms of independent media is the Communist and left media. A media has a sharp focus on the class struggle with political commentaries. Our coalition relations, our approaches and ability to influence the broad left developments have suffered in the last decade from not being familiar with the left and independent media and their personalities.

The passage of the 1996 Telecommunications Act fostered a slew of megamedia mergers. The response has been the creation of an incredible array of media analysis research organizations, such as Fairness and Accuracy in the Media and the Media Channel, as well departments in many universities.

Their role is to spur on public awareness of the raising anti-democratic tide of concentrated corporate power. And to teach how this power and drive for profit censors the stories and shapes the content to maintain the ruling class ideological hegemony. They research the facts of how the corporate message is being streamed into the consciousness of the people to stunt the fight for decent lives. Are most of these groups anti-capitalist? No, they mainly fall into the category of pro-democracy, pro-First Amendment rights, but there is a strong broad left trend among the people who work for these organizations, whose main concerns are the lack of coverage of oppressed peoples' struggles, issues, independent political action and to counter the corporate political and economic agenda. We share their basic framework.

The Communist-Left Media and Us

The communist-left media have always been a very direct reflection of the state of the people's movements. Why? Because the communist-left media is generating struggle, philosophy, strategy and tactics devoted to getting rid of capitalism, expanding democracy and, for some, advocating socialism. Unfortunately, we have had a sense of competition and ownership of ideas that isolated us from the new developments in the left independent media and theoretical work in the last decade. Our ideas developed out of the objective conditions, struggling for a Marxist interpretation of reality, as do theirs. We are coming to similar conclusions about the corporate media and the threat to democracy that it presents. We need closer working ties with the other left media.

Our relationship to the left media will have a big affect on the content and circulation of our own media: the communist media. Many on the left at times have begrudgingly acknowledged our continued existence-against tremendous odds. But the onus is on us to build the bridges and the coalition with the broader left media to exchange and refresh our thinking and theirs. Coalition work by the communist media is natural and necessary to be effective in the battle against the rightwing corporate control of the mainstream media.

Independent Media Movements: Then and Now

The struggle against globalization gave rise to a new trend of the independent, anti-corporate media. What is qualitatively new today that has given rise to this trend in the media movement? It is the access to new technology while at the same time a raising of the anti-corporate, anti-capitalist consciousness. This new independent media movement exploded onto the scene most dramatically in Seattle, where the Independent Media Centers (IMC) were born. Desktop publishing, the Web, low-cost audio and video equipment have given grassroots activists a relatively low-cost way to duplicate the quality of corporate media and to challenge the corporate media in real time as actions and struggles are unfolding--not a week or a month later. The new technology also allows for an explosion of collaboration, exchange of information and distribution. The IMC Web site got almost one million hits on the weekend of the FTAA demos in Quebec, and has gotten the attention of the corporate media and right wing.

Our Party has also helped initiate broad left independent media movements in the past. In the 30's and 40's the movement we helped to initiate was called the Film and Photo League, which saw itself as the current IMC movement does: a media that is rooted in the people's struggles, which have been shut out of the corporate media, media made by the activists of the movements for social change, media production as activism and a movement itself.

Changing America

The main breakthrough of today's independent media movement is the spontaneous participation of tens of thousands of media activists in organizing media coverage of the anti-globalization struggles. Out of those experiences, live satellite daily coverage was organized for the Democratic and Republican Party conventions, which brought many smaller media groups together in coalition along with grassroots videographers, an initiative which we, the communist media, Changing America (CA), an helped to lead.

Our two years of experience with CA is just the tip of what is possible through collaboration. CA has become a part of the media activist community. CA, like PWW and PA in the print media, has presented a devoutly pro-working class, communist analysis in a community of video activists fighting the corporate domination of TV. CA has been quite an achievement for our Party.

We won awards from the steel workers union for helping to win a strike with our investigative reporting. We won awards at two film festivals for the documentary "Texas Trail: Firsthand in Bushland." It was a popular pro-working class, pro-democracy voter mobilization video, widely used by labor and community groups in the battleground states in the presidential elections.

What Our Media Offers

The doors for the communist media are opened wide because we are strongly connected to the class and people's struggles, and yes, we are gutsy and have proved that to ourselves and others over decades. Just take a look at the reporting on the 2000 elections from Florida, the Charleston Five coverage, and the Weekly Rant, which is quite a favorite from Texas to the Bronx.

Renewing efforts at coalition building and initiating joint collaborations can help influence the politics of the new independent media movement that will exist with or without us. It will also greatly enrich our thinking as well.

Too often we have taken a "go it alone" attitude because it is easier. This approach does not take into account the new, broader movement and infrastructure existing in the independent media movement. We should subscribe to, read and exchange our media with others in the left media. Shouldn't we be submitting articles to The Progressive, Z Magazine, Common Dreams and The Nation?

So in effect we need to readjust our attitude towards coalition building with other media entities. Not only will we be welcomed but it also refreshes and enriches the theory and practice of the anti-corporate movement for democracy as well as our own. Coalition work is as natural approach in this area of work as it is in others. That's one adjustment to our work we should make coming out of this Convention.

"Diversity of Views"

The second and just as critical adjustment is to give renewed attention to the fight to be covered by the corporate media for what media democracy advocates call "diversity of views." The Party needs a public relations collective to nationally publicize our ideas and initiatives. We need a collective that develops relations with the journalists who work inside the belly of the corporate media beast and want to fight for democracy, for coverage of the labor people and left movements.

We need a national collective that gets the Party on the air to fight CNN Crossfire-style to defend democracy and for the Party to fight for our right to be to be heard. Tim Wheeler's recent appearance on Fox's O'Reilly Factor and Terrie Albano's repeat appearances on the Allan Colmes Show prove that a challenge to right-wing arguments must be made and we come out none the worse for wear. Feedback from viewers says we gave the right a run for its money!

The Communists, the other voices on the left from the labor and people's movements are systematically locked out of debates by the corporate media. A renewed push for political pluralism should be at the heart of our tactics in the fight against the right-wing domination of the media.

We, Communists, and the left need to fight for coverage of strikes, community struggles, independent political action and third party initiatives so they can reach mainstream America. Unfortunately, we, and many in the independent media movement, see the enemy more as the media itself rather than the corporate control. The fight for democracy necessitates that we push the envelope and demand coverage of the labor, people's and left's right to be seen and heard. It's about democracy.

Conclusion

Clearly the struggle to expose the system and the role of the media cannot be disconnected from the political and economic struggles of the working class and oppressed communities. So our tactics have to be multileveled, working with the independent media movement, strengthening coalition efforts to curb the power of the media global corporations, defend democracy and First Amendment rights to freedom of the press and media.

From the 27th National Convention onward, let's fight for the right for the revolution to be publicized and televised.