By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
When NAACP president Kweisi Mfume summoned the heads of the major TV networks to a day-long hearing on November 29 to tell what they are doing to promote racial diversity in their industry, only the president of CBS Television showed up.
Depending on whom you want to believe, the other network bosses didn't show either because they didn't think it was worth their while to come, or as they claimed, there was a scheduling mix-up. Whatever the reason for the near-total industry no-show, NAACP officials were left dangling. They put off until the end of December their decision whether to go ahead with their much-talked-about boycott against the networks.
They should do more than delay their boycott decision; they should drop it completely. And I don't say this lightly. I have repeatedly hurled harsh broadsides at TV executives for their blatant and disgraceful ethnic sanitizing of blacks, Asian-Americans, Latinos and Native-Americans in this season's major TV shows. But there are just too many worrisome questions that NAACP officials haven't answered and problems and issues they haven't dealt with to justify asking blacks to support a boycott of the networks.
At the top of the list is that TV executives have over-saturated the airwaves with a parade of goofball, sex-laced sitcoms, and action, and gossipy talk shows that are deliberately designed to appeal to young, middle-class whites. Many blacks see absolutely no relevance in this programming to their needs and tastes. They regard the major networks with profound contempt and declare network TV a hopeless wasteland that is not worth their time and attention.
Even if a TV boycott does succeed, it still would benefit only a tiny handful of black TV industry professionals. Therefore, shouldn't the battle for greater diversity be waged by black media and entertainment advocacy groups? This is the strategy employed by Latino and Asian-American media advocacy groups. If a boycott doesn't succeed—which is far more likely—would TV executives be able to say "See, I told you so," and have yet another excuse to give an even colder shoulder to African-Americans in the industry?
Then there's the deep suspicion that despite the tough talk about targeting advertisers, NAACP officials won't really mount a no-holds-barred attack on them. After all, many of them are the same corporations that bankroll NAACP fundraising campaigns, dinners, banquets, scholarship funds and general programs, and they are the ones to whom the NAACP will almost certainly go again to provide funds for its programs and causes.
The most worrisome question, however, is: Aren't there more crucial media issues and concerns that have a bigger impact on African-American communities that the NAACP should direct its time and resources toward? Here's the checklist of some of those issues that the NAACP has either made a low priority or—worse—ignored.
- The Federal Communications Commission report in 1998 that condemned major corporations for refusing to advertise on black-owned radio stations and in black-owned newspapers. Little has changed since then.
- The steady wipeout of black-owned radio stations nationally. According to a study by the Black Broadcasters Alliance on minority radio ownership, the number of minority-owned radio stations nose dived from 127 in 1997 to 100 in 1998. The majority of those sold were black-owned stations. If present trends continue, even more black-owned stations will become faint memories in the next few years. There are enough financially well-heeled black investors to purchase some of these stations. The NAACP could and should take the lead in organizing them to do that.
- The battle by black comics against Black Entertainment Television for failing to pay union-scale fees for their appearances on the station's comedy shows.
- The proposal by FCC Chairman William Kennard to create a slew of low-frequency radio stations. This would give community public interest and social-activist groups media access. The proposal has been under intense fire from some of the major broadcast network owners. The creation of more programs to provide African-Americans with wider access to computers and the Internet. This is an effective means to broaden the dissemination of information and stimulate discussion of issues in black communities.
- The foot-dragging by the Writers and Directors guilds in Hollywood over admitting more black and minority writers and directors.
- The persistence by some filmmakers, and that includes some black filmmakers, in pumping out dated, hackneyed images of African-Americans as crooks, clowns and charity cases. At the NAACP hearing, some performers made the point that the fight should not just be for more jobs for blacks and minorities but also against the sometimes blatant, but more often subtle, racially stereotyped typecasting of minorities still rampant in the TV industry.
These are the big-ticket media policy issues and battles that impact and concern many African-Americans. NAACP officials should realize this. But even if some don't, I do. And this is why I won't boycott the major networks.
- Earl Ofari Hutchinson is the author of The Crisis in Black and Black (Middle Passage Press, Los Angeles, 1998).
Reprinted with permission from the author.
