Sunday, March 30, 2008

People Get All Democratic About the CBC

One of the good things the Internet does is allow people to find others of like mind and organize activity. Nearly everyone in Canada has an opinion on the CBC and what it should do, or what has been done with it. This is a good thing. The people, after all, own the CBC and have an important voice when it comes to the operation of the National public broadcaster. Listening to this voice will be especially important if the CBC wants public support for the implementation of the recommendations of the Heritage Committee.

Until recently though people had a hard time actually organizing themselves to talk to the CBC. There might be a great many people across the country with a shared opinion, but they rarely were able to make themselves heard. So, I think it's a good sign that there has been a recent flurry of activity, primarily Facebook related, aimed at expressing public opinion to the CBC.

  • Save Classical Music at the CBC(9,415 Members) has sprung up in response to announced changes to CBC Radio 2

  • Save the CBC Radio Orchestra!(2,357 Members) is obviously related to the first group I mentioned and is fighting for, obviously, saving the CBC Orchestra from it's announced disbandment

  • Support East Coast Music! Demand the ECMA awards show back on CBC! (1,166 Members) Fairly self explanatory, they'd like the ECMA's back on CBC Television.

  • Save jPod Now (1828 Members) is trying to bring jPod back to the airwaves next fall.

  • Lastly the group Fuse (1 member - don't take that as an indication, I just made it like 5 minutes ago) exists to not only celebrate the wonderful radio program but also to lobby the CBC to make it into a podcast.
  • Yes, there are alot more groups related to the CBC tons of them but I won't try to list them all here - if you are a fan of the CBC, of any of it's programs, of specific parts of it like CBC News, or Radio 3 - do a search, there is probably something there for you, and if there isn't...make a new one! Whatever you decide to do though let the folks at CBC know how you feel, about their programming and direction. It is your national public broadcaster and they can't possibly 'do what you want' if you don't tell them what you want.

    3 comments:

    Anonymous said...

    In solidarity with the musicians of the CBC Orchestra that the corporation's management want to axe in the fall, I have designed and posted two printable "Save CBC Orchestra" posters online in PDF format at http://www.claireart.ca/links.htm.

    The second of these has a list of officials & organizations I have compiled that people can write to.

    Anyone who would like a higher resolution file for printing in larger format (e.g. gigantic ;-) can contact me via the Contact page on the page above. Available as a PDF or native Illustrator file.

    Bill Horne, Wells, BC

    BobMan said...

    Please sign the petition at:
    SaveCBCOrchestra.com

    The site is collection about 1000 names per day in an online petition. Please sign and forward the URL to others to tell them that they too can have a voice.

    Thanks

    Tom S
    SaveCBCOrchestra.com

    Unknown said...

    Good Autism News: CBC Freezes Executive Salaries

    http://autisminnb.blogspot.com/2009/03/good-autism-news-cbc-freezes-executive.html

    the good autism news department the CBC has announced that it is freezing salaries of its executive. Some of these CBC decision makers would have been involved over the past few years in the relentless push to promote the nonsensical, mis-representative ideology and rhetoric of Neurodiversity icons Michelle Dawson and Dr. Laurent Mottron by providing them with repeat appearances on Quirks and Quarks (CBC Radio) and CBC television. The one sided, misleading, "Posautive" special was shown again this past week. The CBC web site also recently published an editorial by Stephen Strauss in which he misrepresented the current state of scientific knowledge on possible vaccine autism connections.

    Whether it be pushing the "we don't want a cure" views of the Neurodiversity camp as representing autistic children and adults, or pushing a false view of science, vaccines and autism , the CBC has pushed agendas of one side of very controversial issues without providing fair or any coverage of other views. In the case of autism the CBC now invariably ignores the views of parents seeking to help their autistic children through treatment and cure. And of course CBC journalists wouldn't think of leaving their offices to provide coverage of severely autistic persons who live in institutional care or otherwise won't or can't pose for media interviews.

    I have a son who is severely autistic. Autism issues are, and will always be, of primary importance to me. With the CBC demonstrating such extreme bias and journalistic incompetence I can no longer trust this publicly funded Canadian media institution on any issues.

    Freezing the salaries of CBC executives is a good start. Autism disorders are, despite the beliefs and agendas of the pro-Neurodiversity CBC decision makers, serious neurological disorders impairing the lives of 1 in 150 Canadians and their families. Actually dismantling the CBC, a one sided source of autism mis-representation, would be a great help to parents fighting to help their children overcome the challenges of autism spectrum disorders.