Bassnectar - Inspire the Empathic

This Bassnectar track, from he album "Mesmerizing the Ultra" is an informative pastiche on media ownership and illuminates some very salient points..


"i think you are right undoubtedly that most people seem to be accepting the war on terrorism
but i believe that acceptance is very superficial
very thin
i believe it's based on the fact that people don't have information given to them by the media...let me give an example

the federal communications commission regulates radio and TV, telephone and satellite transmissions
the concentration of media in the hands of few and fewer corporations isn't a news story but the changes in the last two decades have been remarkable

in 1983 90 percent of the major media were controlled by just 50 companies
by 1992 that number had been cut in half to just two dozen companies

and by 2000 the overwhelming majority of the mass media was owned by only 6 companies:

AOL TIME WARNER
DISNEY
VIACOM
BURGLES-MAN
NEWS CORPORATION
AND VEVENDI UNIVERSAL

by 2006 ALL THESE COMPANIES WERE OWNED BY ONE COMPANY:
Clear Channel Communications

what you don't want

is to have so few owners in a community
that they can dominate the dialogue
and move it in any direction they might want to move it in without having the alternative
of competing ideas to ensure that there are diverse owners of media

the founders of this country figured out a way for there to be a fairness in the media - to make it possible for ordinary people to create media

that means that it isn't in the hands of very large corporations
(clear channel communications)
but just locally owned locally produced organizations to the folks who are consuming it

that's the answer
and right now we have a set of changes that will move us in exactly the wrong direction being considered
and still the vast majority of Americans no nothing about it

3/4 of Americans had absolutely no idea what so ever
NO IDEA WHAT SO EVER
people who did actually know about it were almost universally opposed
people do not have information given to them by the media.

we have enormous freedom
that's not a gift that was given to us it's a legacy that was left to us
by centuries of struggle centuries of people most of whose names are completely forgotten
the ones who created the freedom and the rights that we now have

and that will be taken away unless you constantly defend them
there is in fact A MAJOR EFFORT TO TAKE THEM AWAY right now.