Media Reform Seems to Interest All Sides - Guest Column
Media Reform Seems to Interest All Sides
9/10/05
Guest Column sent to the Humboldt Advocate
(and later published by the Humboldt Sentinel)
It seemed only fair to take Shawn Warford up on his offer and make another attempt to share our perspective. The entire point of the Eureka Greens' stance on media reform is to encourage dialogue, and since Sept. 1 there's been quite a bit of back and forth on what constitutes fair use of media.
When we reiterate the Green Party's platform about how "access to information has profound consequences to our democracy," we do so in the spirit of encouraging better access both public and private to the airwaves, Internet and newsstands. If one thing is clear from the passionate statements of the past week, it is the serious interest in honest media by many Humboldt County residents regardless of their party or paper of choice. In this spirit, we hope the upcoming General Assembly at Humboldt State will endorse a local media reform conference, where we'd like to include other local political parties and many media institutions in public debate.
We do regret the talk of legal action flying around in a flippant manner. To our knowledge, no Greens have made any such accusations, and are seeking change purely through lobbying, legislation, public relations and political campaigns. This talk of our supposed threat of a 'boycott' was entirely concocted outside our circle. No statement by any of our members, and no Green resolution, press release or other document has ever called for this. We merely seek to persuade a change in policy.
From all appearances, the Humboldt Advocate is disclaiming any participation in further inaccuracies being spread about the Greens, which means our call for slowdown and scrutiny has met its objective. We look forward to making this clear in writing when our general membership next meets, where we will also discuss the latest revelations regarding abusive or misattributed communications being used to manipulate our local media. We're confident our members will agree about the need to discourage the use of threats in any situation, in keeping with nonviolence.
Paul Sanderson, Chair
Eureka Greens
Heidi Calton, Vice Chair
Eureka Greens
David Giarrizzo, Local Delegate
Eureka Greens
9/10/05
Guest Column sent to the Humboldt Advocate
(and later published by the Humboldt Sentinel)
It seemed only fair to take Shawn Warford up on his offer and make another attempt to share our perspective. The entire point of the Eureka Greens' stance on media reform is to encourage dialogue, and since Sept. 1 there's been quite a bit of back and forth on what constitutes fair use of media.
When we reiterate the Green Party's platform about how "access to information has profound consequences to our democracy," we do so in the spirit of encouraging better access both public and private to the airwaves, Internet and newsstands. If one thing is clear from the passionate statements of the past week, it is the serious interest in honest media by many Humboldt County residents regardless of their party or paper of choice. In this spirit, we hope the upcoming General Assembly at Humboldt State will endorse a local media reform conference, where we'd like to include other local political parties and many media institutions in public debate.
We do regret the talk of legal action flying around in a flippant manner. To our knowledge, no Greens have made any such accusations, and are seeking change purely through lobbying, legislation, public relations and political campaigns. This talk of our supposed threat of a 'boycott' was entirely concocted outside our circle. No statement by any of our members, and no Green resolution, press release or other document has ever called for this. We merely seek to persuade a change in policy.
From all appearances, the Humboldt Advocate is disclaiming any participation in further inaccuracies being spread about the Greens, which means our call for slowdown and scrutiny has met its objective. We look forward to making this clear in writing when our general membership next meets, where we will also discuss the latest revelations regarding abusive or misattributed communications being used to manipulate our local media. We're confident our members will agree about the need to discourage the use of threats in any situation, in keeping with nonviolence.
Paul Sanderson, Chair
Eureka Greens
Heidi Calton, Vice Chair
Eureka Greens
David Giarrizzo, Local Delegate
Eureka Greens
posted by rumpledcritic @ 12:00 PM
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