An unvarnished blog that dips into the past and comments on the present of WBAI-FM, a once significant, intelligent New York radio station that for years has suffered chronic abuse from within and now nears extinction. Your comments are welcomed and will not be censored.
The above montage is RACIST.
ReplyDeleteKGT
All races are subject to degrees of intelligence, KGT.
DeleteActually the montage is “speciesist”.
ReplyDeleteI saw a bumpersticker which read, “Apes evolved from Creationists”.
TPM
(JustAListener)
ReplyDeleteMy 2 cents:
You may not intend it as racist but it will be seen that way.
It simply gives others ammunition to destroy your reputation.
Thank you for your 2¢ donation, JAL :) You make a valid point, but should I care how WBAI/Pacifica's resident racists feel about me? We are all descendants of primates, at least according to the scientific research that I find plausible. I don't think the above somewhat stereotypical illustration of mental regress will upset people who are grasping to justify their own racism.
DeleteIt may give them "ammunition" to point at me, but duds never blew up the truth, and here the truth is that I aimed at individual mental status, not the ancestry we all share. I depicted a simple evolution from homo sapients to primates and the statement I made lies solely in my reversal of the commonly accepted order.
To me, that reversal is sadly applicable to the effect of inept, irresponsible programming on the general make up of WBAI's audience.
I thought that was obvious. Still think so, but I am always open to differing viewpoints.
I understood where you were coming from with that, but also could see how some would view it the opposite way.
DeleteWhen you hear some of the calls now on air, it seems like most of the calls agree with the programming that is currently being offered, which leads me to believe that bai is pretty much preaching to the choir at this point.
Lets face it, no matter how bad programming is, there is always going to be SOMEBODY that wants to
hear it, even if you have a really great program on a subject, but a subject nobody wants to hear, or very few people are interested in it, you will get the same effect.
To me bai is both of them. They have ALOT of bad programming on subjects that relatively very few people are interested in. Hence the absence of listeners.
You are correct, WBAI is preaching to the choir. Also listeners develop habits that keep them tuned in—many decades ago, Bob Potts (our news director) and I did the early morning show, replacing a couple of hours of recorded classical music. As expected, the station received letters of complaint (any program change triggered that) as well as the also customary thank you. One complaint was particularly vitriolic, which is why I recall it, but when the manager (Joseph Binns) decided to revert to music, the same very angry complainant sent a letter demanding that our program be reinstated! Habits.
DeleteThere is nobody at the station who oversees the schedule, so it has become a random round of fill-ins. Now the Pacifica National Board has decreed that each station add five hours of Spanish-language programming. That does not make sense for a variety of reasons, one being that it immediately reduces the listenership further, to people who speak Spanish, leaving out the majority that doesn't. Why not add programs in Chinese languages, or German, French, etc.?
And let us also keep in mind that the five Pacifica-owned stations do not have in common any one demography.
Before Pacifica was restructured to make it "democratic," program decisions were left up to local management, which made sense. Managers had to meet several requirements, one being good knowledge of the area served, another—of course—being able to apply that to broadcasting. Today, we not only have inexperienced station managers, we have governing board that remains clueless when it comes to broadcasting.
Hey. I was just joking.
ReplyDeleteKGT
That's what smileys are for, KGT :)
Delete