Women & Media Session NCMR 2007
 
Show Notes: Audio provided by Free Press (www.freepress.org) and Reynolds Productions. There Is No Media Justice Without Women: Models for Feminist Media Action (Chicasaw/Mississippi) Jennifer L. Pozner, Women in Media & News Thenmozhi Soundararajan, Third World Majority Karen Toering, Reclaim the Media Jessica Clark, In These Times DeAnne Cuellar, Media Empowerment Project Why should lesbians care about media justice? What are women all over the country doing to bring about reform in media and where can you go to find out more? Listen and get inspired to help women everywhere tell their stories in their own authentic voices...or better yet...tell your own! You know L-Word is great. In fact I love it and I know a lot of you do too. That’s just ONE TV show. ONE place we see a reflection of some of us in the media. By far it doesn’t reflect many of our lives but it sure is entertaining. We’re starved for this kind of thing. What if we could turn on the radio and hear lesbians reporting the news from our perspective. What if we could get on the main stream sunday talk shows and discuss how anti-gay legislation creates more hate crime and is a tool that the right uses to get religious right wingers to the polls at our community’s expense. What if we could go in any video or record store (before they’re all gone) and go right to the lesbian music section? What if we could just live in the world authentically and be acknowledged for who we are and what we do. What a concept. Maybe the world I’m talking about doesn’t exists but the one we have is an authoritative, homophobic patriarchy that is right now undergoing some change. Tiny change...but it is a start. People are getting fed up. I’m fed up. I’ve talked to a whole lot of you that are fed up. Do something with me to help it along. Let’s tell stories. OUR stories. E-mail me. Give me your ideas. Give me your stories to share. Let’s make more people fed up with the way things are. Let show them what living as a second class citizen in the free-est country in the world feels like. That’s a pile of crap isn’t it? Let’s be that squeaky wheel that gets the grease...grease is good...circles are good... peace & love Val Listener Feedback: Comment on 23rd Podcast   Speaking as a disabled lesbian I find the changes in terminology for minority groups rather strange. In my lifetime I have been called "crippled", "handicapped", and "disabled" (and probably a lot of other things!). I must say I wince at "cripple", but let it slide past...it was usually a much older person (there are fewer of them now!).  Just as I wince at "queer", which in my neck of the woods is definitely intended as an insult.   Like St. Petersberg, Petrograd, Leningrad, St. Petersberg etc. I think "I wish they would make their mind up and call it just one thing, why do they have to keep changing the name". Get to the point, I hear you saying.   Well, all this was triggered by listening to the phrase "women of color" being repeated over and over again on the Podcast. "What color?" I wondered factiously. We are all some color. Why and when did "black" (leastways I presume this is what is intended) metamorphose into "women of color", which seems less descriptive and more cumbersome? Is this just an in-thing in New York, or is it now the 'politically correct' phrase generally? Don't you just hate the phrase 'politically correct'? There has to be a Ph.D. thesis in the evolution of sensitive group terminology. I suppose it is hopeless to plead for stability!   What I would say about alternative media is that it is the political hope of the future. It can be a truly democratic window on the world. Revising the existing media is an uphill struggle - why not bypass it and make it irrelevant for the next generation? To broaden the world wide Internet user-base we need to 'package' the material in a way that has wide appeal. 'Bagdad Burning' catapulted the anonymous blog author into world-wide fame, but we are not all right in the middle of dramatic world shaking events. You know what everyone forwards? Jokes or cute is what. Humour is a powerful weapon and has broad appeal. If we want to be more than small minority groups  using the Internet to talk to one another, if we want to actually make progress and change attitudes more generally, we have to get other folk to listen to our material...humour is one way. Sometimes we should take ourselves less seriously! When one of my straight friends forwards a lesbian Podcast link to me because they enjoyed it I'll know we are winning.   Blessings and Hugs   Antonia   i don't know if it's a new york thing. when i go to national lesbian, feminist type events i hear a lot more of that.  i hear it less here. yes we all have a certain shade of color...my daughter refers to herself as "black" of course she was raised by two "honky" white lesbian mamas so who knows if that's a guidepost. she's a pretty cool kid with a bad back at the moment. (dance class)  i don't like the term "queer" either. i guess it's the same with dyke. butch, femme etc. so many labels... i think your comment on using humor is dead on. (as long as its not at anybody else's expense) i hope to do some of here on the podcast too. (you attract more bees with honey than with vineger)  i told emily once i was going to make her famous telling her stories on the podcast. she is very funny. if i can just get her to slow down long enough to record her... i think alternative media will make mainstream media irrelevant eventually.radio is already threatened with internet podcasting etc.  the whole thing will evolve into a new form. what i don't want to see though is corporate control immediately start to take over when it's successful. 2 of the top sites in the U.S. (myspace & you tube) have both sold to big media in the last few months so the trend is moving into the alternative media world too. women are still getting left out of alternative news as sources etc.  I think we can build on the alternative and still reform mainstream at the same time. This is the first time in years we've been in a position to change anything. maybe a trip back to the sherman anti-trust act would do do the trick with a little fairness doctrine thrown in. just a thought... care if i paste this discussion in the blog? still haven't figured out how to set up the blog for the comments section. but soon! For more liberal talk podcasts check out all the great shows at: www.progressivepodcastnetwork.org peace, val Join the discussion over on the AVALON FARMBLOG! Comment about this week’s podcast!http://www.freepress.orghttp://www.progressivepodcastnetwork.orghttp://avalonfarmblog.wordpress.comshapeimage_1_link_0shapeimage_1_link_1shapeimage_1_link_2
AVALON FARMCAST
Monday, January 29, 2007