The FCC Is Coming to Oakland
December 16, 2013
Tom Wheeler, the new chairman of
the Federal Communications Commission, is heading out to Oakland, Calif. — to
hear from you.
On Jan. 9, Voices for Internet
Freedom will host a special town-hall event that’s
open to the community. Voices is a coalition of close to 30 groups representing
people of color in the fight to protect the open Internet.
The town hall will explore how
policies on media ownership, the Internet and journalism impact communities of
color. The event will be held at Preservation Hall in Oakland from 7–9 p.m. The
gathering will give people an opportunity to discuss how structural inequality
in the media has hurt the public interest.
People of color make up close to 40
percent of the U.S. population but own just 3 percent of the nation’s TV
stations and 8 percent of all radio stations. In the Bay Area, people of color
make up two-thirds of the population but own just 6 percent of all broadcast
outlets.
These skewed statistics help
explain why media outlets get away with stereotyping people of color. And they
show why we need to fight to preserve the open Internet through strong Net
Neutrality protections.
Right now those protections are
under attack from the broadband companies that provide us with Internet access.
Companies like AT&T and Verizon want to restrict our digital rights to
speak freely and assemble online.
Please join us on Jan. 9 to
make sure the FCC chairman hears from real voices in the Oakland community
about the critical need for the Commission to address our nation’s growing
media inequality.
And if you can’t join us in person,
you can check out the livestream on the
Voices site.
Joseph Torres is the senior
external affairs director for Free Press, and Steven Renderos is the national
organizer for the Center for Media Justice.
No comments:
Post a Comment