White Privilege and Racist Hate Radio

[Igel]

41. This is mostly just screwed up.

In all sorts of ways.

Your tax dollars don't go to support racist speech, as suggested up thread. The electromagnetic spectrum is just the set of frequencies that can be used. The government regulates who can broadcast at certain frequences in the radio spectrum, how much drift their signal can have, how closely they're spaced in terms of frequency and geography. That's about it. It doesn't regulate content, and it doesn't charge for use of the spectrum.

It regulates the airwaves in that sense by selling or otherwise granting the right to use certain frequencies. The government granted permission freely for a long time--it was like granting title to federal lands if you used the land. Now the licenses are traded on the open market. Frequency rights with large ranges are very expensive in large urban areas. The broadcast equipment is owned by the broadcasters, who have to have it inspected. The government still lets you broadcast for free if you use unclaimed frequencies at low wattage. When my high school set up its radio station it was fairly simple. It applied for a bit of the spectrum, call letters, got both, and started to broadcast.

The AM spectrum was parceled out in the same way but it's cheaper to get a license because, well, it's less suited to music. Not the same level of fidelity, and it doesn't do stereo. There's less competition.

But the same spectrum that broadcasts Limbaugh also broadcasts, in my area, Vietnamese and Chinese channels. There are numerous Spanish-language channels, mostly Mexican-oriented but not always. There's an Africa-centered tv station (it's digital, so it's a stack of "channels&quot , and it's certainly not kind to whites. As bad as Limbaugh? Dunno--I don't listen to either and find both beyond the pale. But both should be allowed to bid as long as they meet content-neutral requirements. They have to serve a portion of the public (not a majority, and nobody gets a real veto), they have to have so much local programming, they have to have so much educational programming for kids, I think (at least they used to).

The population pretty much votes on how the spectrum gets used. The grunge station I liked in Los Angeles didn't last 6 months until one day my alarm went off and I found myself listening to hip-hop. The classical station I liked in Jersey vanished and went "classic rock." It's the same with talk radio--but the rent's cheaper.

Nobody regulates the Africa-centered tv station's content and requires that some white guys be allowed to tell the black audience how bigoted and hateful they are, and they shouldn't. It wouldn't be any different saying the same things to Limbaugh listeners. They're part of the public, too, and not every frequency has to meet the standards set by every member of the public.

The Fairness Doctrine was something not everybody liked, and was pretty much a joke as far as I remember. There'd be somebody saying something that disagreed with the station's viewpoint or take on a story, and pretty much only die-hards cared one way or another. The turnaround time made it so any rebuttal was stale. It provided an extra-long bathroom break. But it made a certain sense when there were 4 tv stations in a city, or perhaps fewer. Then one or two viewpoints could monopolize tv news. (When I moved to Eugene, Oregon, there were 2 tv stations. One station carried two networks.) Now I can get 50 channels over the airwaves, hundreds by cable (if I got cable). I don't have to worry about my viewpoint being presented. All I have to do is find it. And I don't have a right to hear my viewpoint on every station, or ensure that others hear my viewpoint, and feel no burning desire to make sure my voice is heard. My response to offensive speech is to ignore it if I can't rebut it. But nobody says I have to rebut it in the same medium. If enough people ignore a broadcaster, it'll go away. Which is why "my" grunge station didn't survive--the owners got a deal they couldn't turn down.

Note that the FCC is out of the "freely granting" phase and is trying to free up more space for more stations and things like wireless communications. It's not going to seize the spectrum back, however--the last time it did something like that was forcing conversion of tv stations from analog to digital it was a mess. http://www.broadcastlawblog.com/2015/03/articles/want-a-new-fm-station-fcc-proposes-fm-auction-in-july-lists-channels-to-be-sold-and-imposes-a-freeze-on-certain-applications/