“Finally, after 50 years of television broadcasting, there now exists a national television channel that reflects the diversity of our society, provides perspectives that are under-represented or ignored by the mainstream media, and shines a national spotlight on engaged citizens working for progressive social change. Seizing the power of television to expand social consciousness, FSTV fuels the movement for progressive social, economic, and political transformation. By exposing the public to perspectives excluded from the corporate-owned media, FSTV empowers citizens to fight injustices, to revitalize democracy, and to build a more compassionate world.
Free Speech TV broadcasts independently-produced documentaries dealing with social, political, cultural, and environmental issues; commissions and produces original programming; develops programming partnerships and collaborations with social justice organizations; provides special live broadcasts from remote locations; and maintains an adjunct Web site that hosts one of the Internet’s largest collection of progressive audio and video content.”
December 5, 2007 at 2:23 pm
If it can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theater, I’m not watching.
December 5, 2007 at 2:31 pm
I think a lot of the free-press people fail to ask this question: If people wanted the Truth, it would be worth more than the trite content on tv currently. So the issues run deeper.
The presentation itself (McLuhan’s “The medium is the message”) and the experience people have watching stuff on tv is not just “news,” per se, but story, anecdotal myths that we can relate to in abstract ways. These celebrity archetypes are important. The CIA knows just how important, hence its use of bin Laden as a character for Americans to watch gleefully on the tv.
If an alien spacecraft landed and offered humanity the Truth, we’d turn it down. It would have no context by which to exist in our lives. We’ve already created this peculiar, North American culture by which we live out our lives. Any sort of Truth would ruin too many people’s lives. Even the ones chasing after it.
December 5, 2007 at 3:27 pm
Free Speech TV’s been around for a while now. I got the chance to watch an hour or two of it at a friend’s a couple years ago, and was pretty impressed.