Talk about bad timing
Don't let Juan Williams make you hate KUHF
Juan Williams
Houston public radio station KUHF
Alec Baldwin does his part to support public radio.
Ira Glass, host of radio show "This American Life"
Anyone who tunes in to 88.7 knows it's pledge drive time in public radio land. Some listeners are hesitant to donate due to NPR's controversial decision to fire news correspondent Juan Williams last week. I say, don’t pull your support from KUHF just because of the Williams drama.
KUHF, the public radio station at the University of Houston, is separate from NPR. KUHF purchases popular NPR programming, such as Car Talk and This American Life, and broadcasts its own locally-produced segments as well, like The Engines of Our Ingenuity. Donations to the station pay for maintenance, employee salaries, and funds to purchase radio shows.
As most of the world knows by now, Williams was fired after making an anti-Muslim remark on the The O'Reilly Factor. After news of Williams’ termination broke, some angry listeners threatened to pull their support from NPR member stations completely. Many criticized the decision to fire Williams by citing his right to free speech. While NPR embraces free speech, views are expressed by those interviewed — not NPR reporters and analysts. When NPR journalists appear on TV or other media, they are to refrain from expressing views they wouldn’t air as an NPR journalist.
Basically, it wasn’t that NPR agreed or disagreed with Williams’ remark; he broke the code of ethics and undermined his credibility as a news analyst. It wasn’t his first such offense, either. Last year he (again on the O'Reilly Factor) compared First Lady Michelle Obama to "Stokely Carmichael in a designer dress" and suggested she'd soon go from "the next Jackie-O" to "something of an albatross." After this comment NPR requested that Fox News no longer introduce Williams as a NPR news correspondent.
Other listeners are furious that NPR employed the right-leaning Fox News commentator in the first place.
But don't feel too sorry for Williams. Fox signed him to a reported $2 million contract and promised him a lot more air time.
What's more bothersome than the Williams drama to some regular station listeners is the incessant begging for money throughout pledge drive time. (And to make it worse, KPFT-FM (90.1), which also carries such shows as the BBC News Hour and This American Life, is having its pledge drive at the same time.)
But for those irritated with the station's requests for money, consider this: The more you donate, the sooner the pledge drive will end.
This year actor and public radio supporter Alec Baldwin puts a funny spin on donation requests. In brilliant reverse-psychology, Baldwin urges listeners:
Don’t give. Let public radio sputter and die a slow, under-funded death. Let’s end this experiment in broadcasting from a sense of mission and civic purpose. Let’s return all radio in this country to its proper mission, which is selling advertising and making money. To all of you who have not pledged, to my brothers in this sacred struggle, I salute you. You listen day in and day out, and you never give. Through your sloth, your laziness, your indolence, you are making it that much harder for these people to do their jobs. Every minute you continue not to pledge, you lengthen this station’s pledge drive, keeping its precious news and information off the air. Nice work. This pledge drive, please, keep that up. Help me destroy public radio."
Listen to Alec Baldwin's pledge drive message here:
