From: shunkw <shunkw@sbcglobal.net>
To: shunkw <ShunkW@sbcglobal.net>
Sent: Monday, 11 May, 2009 3:20:30
Subject: [issuesonline_worldwide] Hate Speech, Media Activism and the First Amendment
"On these programs he found "systematic and extensive use of false facts,
flawed argumentation, divisive language, and dehumanizing metaphors that are
directed toward specific vulnerable groups"-which results, Noriega argued,
in marginalized populations being "characterized as a direct threat to the
listeners' way of life.""
Hate Speech, Media Activism and the First Amendment
Putting a spotlight on dehumanizing language
By <http://www.fair. org/index. php?page= 10&author_ id=316> Candice O'Grady
In just over a month last winter, two Latino men were beaten to death in New
York state while their attackers shouted racial slurs and epithets
(Philadelphia Inquirer, 1/25/09). Such hate crimes, motivated by
anti-immigrant prejudice and other bigotries, have spurred a media justice
campaign to reveal the potential human costs of hate speech.
When the FBI reported that hate crimes against Hispanics had increased by an
astonishing 40 percent between 2003 and 2007 (FBI: Hate Crime Statistics,
2003 and 2007), UCLA professor Chon Noriega began to ask "whether the media
plays a role in the persistence of hate speech and hate crimes." In a pilot
study that attempts to quantify hate speech in commercial radio, Noriega
tracked language on the Lou Dobbs Show, Savage Nation and the John & Ken
Show (Latino Policy and Issues Brief, 2/09
<http://www.chicano. ucla.edu/ press/briefs/ documents/ PB22_000. pdf> ). On
these programs he found "systematic and extensive use of false facts, flawed
argumentation, divisive language, and dehumanizing metaphors that are
directed toward specific vulnerable groups"-which results, Noriega argued,
in marginalized populations being "characterized as a direct threat to the
listeners' way of life."
While deeply unsettling, Noriega's findings should come as little surprise.
Last August, San Francisco-based shock jock Michael Savage unleashed this
xenophobic tirade (Savage Nation, 8/4/08):
We need to get our troops out of Iraq and put them on the streets of America
to protect us from the scourge of illegal immigrants who are running rampant
across America, killing our police for sport, raping, murdering like a
scythe across America..The Statue of Liberty is crying, she's been raped and
disheveled-raped and disheveled by illegal aliens.
Savage is hardly alone in advocating violence against immigrants in recent
years. Montana radio host John Stokes said of non-English speakers (John
Stokes Show, 9/1/07): "Romans 15:19 says that if they break into your
country, chop off their leg. We have to forcibly get rid of them."
(Actually, the verse cited says nothing of the kind.) Rush Limbaugh (Rush
Limbaugh Show, 3/27/06) cast all Mexicans as a "renegade, potentially
criminal element." MSNBC's Tucker Carlson agreed on-air with radio host Mark
Williams (Tucker, 10/16/06) that illegal immigrants are mainly "drug
runners, human traffickers" and "people who engage in slavery and
prostitution. " Meanwhile, in 2007 alone, Lou Dobbs connected crime to
illegal immigrants on 94 episodes of his television show (Media Matters,
5/21/08). (For further examples, see FCC Petition for Inquiry: In the Matter
of Hate Speech in the Media, 1/28/09
<http://www.nhmc. org/documents/ PetforInquiry- HateSpeech. pdf> .)
This kind of racist rhetoric is endemic to the mainstream press and requires
urgent attention, says National Hispanic Media Coalition president Alex
Nogales. In response, Nogales and his colleagues filed a petition with the
Federal Communica-tions Commission (FCC), asking the regulatory agency to
investigate the scope and consequences of hate speech. (FAIR has signed on
to this petition.) His organization believes that the issue must be
identified and understood so that it can be addressed. "We want a spotlight
put on this problem, on the people that are doing it.and the companies that
are allowing it to go on."
This has been a controversial move in some media circles. Opponents say that
by its nature, an FCC inquiry leads to regulation and inevitably to a
chilling of First Amendment rights. Moreover, argues University of Syracuse
information studies professor Milton Mueller, "it seems to assume that there
is some unambiguous, clearly defined thing called 'hate speech' and that we
all recognize it when we see it. I don't think that is the case.. Is it just
expression that one group considers offensive or insulting? If so, we cannot
regulate that without stifling all manner of expression."
Nogales counters that hate speech is incendiary, comparing it to a person
yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater. Scapegoating Latinos for the country's
social and economic problems in a time of crisis is deeply irresponsible on
the part of commercial media and merits investigation, he says.
We need to be able to discuss immigration and all of us arrive at a
consensus about what we're going to do. But that's a far cry from just
blaming a specific community for the ills of this nation and, in many ways,
creating an environment where hate crimes are being committed against a
community.
NHMC hopes that with heightened public awareness and criticism, media
corporations will choose to distance themselves from the personalities
espousing racist views. While the group also supports bringing a greater
balance of perspectives onto airwaves and television screens, it does not
want to reintroduce the Fairness Doctrine, a regulation-supporte d by
FAIR-that required broadcasters to allow a limited amount of space for
dissenting opinions on pressing public issues (
<http://www.fair. org/index. php?page= 2053> Extra!, 1-2/05). Nogales said it
led to "dull programming. " The group does not have a specific suggestion for
what kind of regulation, if any, could take its place.
Another tool activists are using to combat the negative impacts of hate
speech is media literacy-learning to decode how news is framed. "[The news]
works to reinforce this idea that its 'us' and 'them,'" says Andrea Quijada,
executive director of the New Mexico Literacy Project. Those on the "us"
side of that divide, she adds, get the message that they have no
responsibility for finding solutions because vulnerable groups bring these
problems on themselves, while those on the "other" side get the message they
have no power to bring about solutions.
In her community, the news media have fallen under heavy criticism for their
reporting on the bodies found in Albuquerque of 12 women, mostly women of
color, characterized as drug-addicted prostitutes (KRQE.com, 3/2/09; AP,
4/3/09). The way the story has been told leads viewers to think, "That's
what happens when you're a drug addict or a prostitute," she says. Coverage
has been so dehumanizing that Quijada and the members of a local women of
color group, Young Women United, have begun media monitoring, writing op-eds
and meeting with elected officials.
The corporate media's continued sanctioning of programs that regularly
broadcast hate speech is, at the very least, fueling racial animosity in an
already volatile time. In Quijada's words, "There's no opportunity in the
framework that [the news media are] using to actually challenge the system..
Instead, they're turning it into a Law and Order Special Victims Unit
episode every time we're watching the news."
http://www.fair. org/index. php?page= 3776
Sw
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