Air America: A voice for minorities dies

[ringmastery]

http://www.nynewsday.com/news/local/bronx/nyc-wlir0411,0,5160088.story?coll=nyc-manheadlines-bronx

Until a couple of weeks ago, black- and Caribbean-owned restaurants all over the city would set their radio dials to 1190 AM.

Customers would bounce to reggae music as they ordered jerk chicken. They'd cock attentive ears to heated discussions about police brutality.

But on March 31, the owners of WLIB began leasing most of their airtime to an organization called Air America, which bills itself as the liberal answer to right-wing radio. With Air America came a whole new cast of hosts and programs.

Gone is the music, and focus on black issues. For many New Yorkers, March 31 was the day black music died.

"We listened to it not only for the music, but you got good opinions from people and a whole lot of good talk. It was really the only station that provided West Indians an opportunity for their opinions to be heard," said Cecil Kerrutt, owner of Sybil's restaurant on Church Avenue in the heavily Caribbean Flatbush section of Brooklyn.

These days, Kerrutt, a native of Guyana, slips reggae CDs into the stereo. Or he turns the radio to 106.7 "Lite FM."

[K-W]

1. Its a sad sacrifice, but the intentions are right.

Whether or not it was worth the sacrifice is the debate.

[qb]

2. Maybe AAR will help put Dems back in power

who will then make ClearChannel give up some of their monopoly and allow more independent radio stations.

[NightTrain]

35. Unfortunately, I doubt that the Dems will do a thing about...

...the concentration of media ownership in the United States. Remember, the Telecommunications Act of 1996 came into being when Clinton was in the White House. :(

[Ruby Romaine]

3. so we should only have Rush & RW Radio?

n/t

[ronnykmarshall]

8. Are THE Ruby Romaine

like the lettuce?

"I had a fling with Lawrence Welk."

"That's irrelevent."

"Wasn't to Mrs. Welk, anywho!"

[GreenPartyVoter]

4. They should call their concerns in to AAR

I bet they could get on the air and get some talk started.

[rucky]

6. Why? AAR has nothing to do with it.

WLIB does. They should call the station manager.

[GreenPartyVoter]

15. I don't mean radio concerns I mean life concerns

like say, the lack of health coverage, affirmative action.. whatever it was they were calling into LIB with before they should keep calling into AAR with now.

[rucky]

21. oh. that is very different

nevermind

:)

[GreenPartyVoter]

26. Yeah, I should have made it clear in my original post.

:)

[rucky]

5. If it changed it's format to oldies rock & roll

would we be blaming Bill Haley & the Comets? Take it up with WLIB, but leave AA out of this.

funny how the press is determined to bring down Air America with schmaltzy pieces like this. They're afraid they may set the journalistic bar a little higher by reporting the facts?

[terisel]

7. Russ Limbaugh , Boortz etc. need to go so that others can

get on the air.

What about Clear Channel-whay aren't they serving these markets?

Liberal politcs needs a voice; jazz needs a voice; Caribbean interests need a voice; women need a voice.

[stopthegop]

11. they aren't serving the markets because they

don't think they'd make money

[BlueEyedSon]

9. VRWC trick... I listen to Chuck D on AAR every morning!

And last I checked, Jews and Lesbians (who are also well represented on AAR) were still minorities.

on edit: VRWC = Vast Right Wing Conspiracy

[K-W]

13. There are 3 black hosts atm. eom

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

10. I love how the rw-ers suddenly care about minority voices in radio

yet have had no problem with clear channel gobbling up stations and filling them cookie cutter rush-wannabes (boortz, beck, etc)

it's not like there are no minorites at AA. Chuck D has two shows! and all of the hosts address monority concerns

[demnan]

12. Face it

these stations were on the way out. Air America took over stations that weren't doing well.

You would have gotten some Clear Channel playing hits station but instead we have the most wonderful thing that's happened to liberals since folk music.

[Goldmund]

14. Yeah,

liberals are the racists. Blablabla. They don't like Condi because she's black. Blablabla.

How's this for an idea? Put Air America on 770 WABC in NY.

[CatWoman]

16. this is bullshit

there are still plenty of black stations and programs.

[maddezmom]

17. this was same article has been posted many times

original date 4/10.... :eyes:

[sangh0]

18. They are liars

Customers would bounce to reggae music as they ordered jerk chicken

I've been to Sybil's. The jerk chicken isn't all that good. Few people order it, and if they do, they're bouncing because the rest room is occupied. :-)

[mouse7]

19. Oh for cripes sakes. What about WRTN 93.5 FM?

That's a Caribbean music, reggae music station... in stereo.

http://www.geocities.com/synergy_two/radioguide/zradio4.html

[Quahog]

20. More right wing media BS if you ask me

Yeah, look what those BIGOTED, RACIST liberals are doing now! Taking away the only radio voice of African-Americans! Crushing the dreams of the black community beneath the heels of their, um... Birkenstocks! In their greed to gobble up radio stations across the nation, they're beating the black man down once again!

I swear, if Bill Clinton personally funded the building of a shelter for homeless blacks in NYC, the Bush-luvin' media would write an article describing how Clinton's building replaced an abandoned tenement, "The only place left in the neighborhood for many troubled residents to shoot heroin and smoke crack. Now these unfortunates have been turned out on the street by Bill Clinton's greed."

Fuck 'em, I say.

[BurtWorm]

25. I think it's unfortunate, myself.

What if Air America bought time on Pacifica Radio in your market, for instance? Or community free radio? Would that be acceptable to you? It might not matter unless you relied on the radio, or had a radio habit, anyway. I've been wondering what the WLIB audience would be thinking about this. It's very, very unfortunate. I wish there had been a better solution than killing community radio. It's an ugly irony.

[sangh0]

27. It is unfortunate

but if AAR was on Pacifica, that wouldn't have saved the Caribbean station. The bottom line is that the bottom line counts, and the Caribbean station didn't have a very good bottom line.

[LTR]

22. It's all bullshit

Would there have been an uproar if a company like Salem or Starboard came in and flipped to a religious format? Doubtful.

And last I checked, there are quite a few other stations in NY that serve a black audience. And one of them is not Lite FM.

Besides, where were all these people when WLIB needed funding? Somebody's gotta pay the light bill.

[SidDithers]

23. Do people actully still listen to music on AM?

I thought only talk and sports were on the AM dial now.

Sid

[Logansquare]

24. I had no idea Newsday cared so deeply about minority radio

They haven't previous to this article.

[robbedvoter]

29. Yup. And Robert Novak is a civil rights activist/douchebag for liberty

They are all trying to turn the tables on us - now that the "there's no market for it" argument was erased by reality.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

31. translation: AA scares them

It shows how hopelessly slanted they are

fair and balnced conservative media, my ass!

[no_hypocrisy]

28. Where the f* was Newsday on September 1, 2001 when WEVD became

the NY affiliate of ESPN-Radio?! The Forward first leased, then sold the station known as WEVD to Disney-ABC which immediately changed the format from one of the longest operating radio station in the city, named after Eugene V. Debbs, and the last independent progressive formats in the market. I only read journalistic comments applauding the savvy business deal made by Disney. No one bothered to even write a proper obituary to WEVD.

And now these gatekeepers of culture lament the demise of a radio station, when in fact there is another radio station with a similar format, WWRL, 1600-AM (<http://www.1600wwrl.com>). Not to mention the Caribbean format on WRTN in Westchester County. (Ironically, one of the former WEVD talkshow hosts, Bill Mazer got bumped from WRTN in order to make room for more Caribban music.)

I understand, but come on, be consistent. Either both format changes are worthy of criticism or they aren't.

[Bridget Burke]

30. Is there no other station to sell them airtime?

KPFT, Houston's Pacifica station, went through one of its periodic purges & dumped a lot of "ethnic" shows. The communities (Indian, etc.) bought time on AM radio. They'd supported Pacifica heavily & discovered they could afford it.

Surely there are other outlets for the shows once on 1190. And I doubt that was the only "black" station in the city!

[robbedvoter]

32. None that the RW wouldn't find something wrong with. When Clinton came to

Harlem they were screaming that he deprived kiddies of a city agency 9it had that suite - but never used it - raw space0. before that, they screamed that his midtown office was so expensive - and taxpayers had to pay for it.
Are you trying to pacify the thugs? remember Gore and the media?

[NightTrain]

33. About six months ago, a Modern Rock station in my hometown...

...of Hartford, CT changed formats to Hip-Hop/R&B. But the format change did not make the news (except briefly as a blurb), nor did fans of the Modern Rock format bitch and moan. And it certainly was never impled that anti-white racism was a factor in the format change! (OK, so that wasn't necessarily in this piece, but it damned sure has been implied, and outright stated, in other places.)

Having spent (wasted?) five years of my life working in commercial radio, I can tell you from personal experience: radio stations change their formats all the time! It has nothing to do with race and everything to do with economics.

I've read in more than one place that with its "Caribbean Hits & More" format, WLIB consistently lost money. It was the FM carrying both stations. Now, with Air America buying airtime from WLIB, both stations are pulling their weight.

Mind you, I hate the idea of radio having to be a money-making enterprise first and foremost, but it's the sad reality in Clear Channel's America.... :shrug:

[Cocoa]

34. did Air America force the station to sell?

did it exercise any undue pressure? Is there anything remotely wrong with this transaction?

[NightTrain]

36. Of course not!

When WLIB chose to do business with Air America, it was a perfectly legal--and common--business practice. It's only getting this kind of press because the right-wingers will do anything they can to try to make Air America look bad.

Well, fuck the right-wingers! How many times have Limbaugh or Hannity had two million simultaneous Web listeners?

[SoCalDem]

37. I am sure that they can find other stations.. WE cannot

or, there is always the possibility that the restaurant owners could buy a few cd's and a cd player to have the music that the patrons like..

When the music stations were taken over by the "talkers", lots of us did not like it much either.. To quote most republicans.."Get over it".."Move On"...:)