Got Free Speech?
by Risa DickensAdbusters is in court today in Canada fighting for the air waves as public space, here’s a quick sum up of why:
For those of you not quite up to speed, here’s the gist: After over a decade of having our consumer-awareness TV spots rejected by just about every major commercial broadcaster in North America (often with little or no explanation from the network reps who issued the refusals), we resolved to take our fight to the courts. In 2004, we filed a lawsuit against the government of Canada and some of the country’s biggest media barons, arguing that the public has a constitutionally protected right to expression over the public airwaves.
They actually have recordings of Adbusters staff being told that anything controversial won’t be accepted, and to grow up and live in the “real” world. Don’t believe me? Watch the video and investigate the blogs today. There’s a clip frequently quoted in the Adbusters material, “Freedom of the press is only guaranteed to those who own one” and while that has been harrowing and true we see how increasingly that is the exact power of an independent blog - it’s a media portal we can each own, it makes CanWest increasingly irrelevant and so they hold on harder with fear. Good luck to them I guess, but it’s not a tactic that I expect will win friends or influence people. Not me anyway.
Here’s an interview with Adbusters founder - kind of nice to hear him explain it to someone incredulous, oblivious and question asking:
Listen to this article
Published on: January 10th, 2008
Terms Used: Adbusters, eco, independent, interview, media, video
About: Risa Dickens
Risa co-founded Indyish with Elran Oded.
Aside from experimenting with these monstrous/sexy formations, producing Indyish events and developing new and existing Indyish endeavors, and trying to figure out how to do it armed[...]
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CNN news woman = victim of mass distraction
It’s funny to see the reaction of people who have absolutely no idea how the chain of being is connected. When I see reactions from people like her, it seems as though they are living under a bubble, or in an extreme case, have been programed like robotic automatons.
Then again, when have news anchors had any subjectivity anyway? She probably had a bomb strapped to her chair with a corporate sponsor goon sitting in the wings waiting to detonate.
Anyway, you’re talking my language here… nice post.
Posted on January 10th, 2008 at 5:25 pm [permalink]
thanks james! she’s ridiculous, but it almost helps him get the point across i think, because the oblivion is so blatant.
Posted on January 10th, 2008 at 8:50 pm [permalink]