Fox/BGH Trial Is A Wake-up Call For The 'Mainstream Media'

[Guest guest]

http://www.foxbghsuit.com/jasw080500.htm

Guest Editorial

Fox/BGH Trial Is A Wake-up Call For The 'Mainstream Media'

By BELLE ADLER

The media is on trial in Tampa, Florida this month but you wouldn't know it

if you read the local papers or turned on the local news.

While you've been reading details at this website reporting on the

Fox/BGH lawsuit reporters Steve and Jane Akre have brought against

Fox Television, the landmark trial has been given barely a notice in the St.

sburg Times or the Tampa Tribune.

There was an analysis piece (labeled as news) in the Weekly Planet,

the local alternative paper, but other than that story, the case has been

largely ignored in print.

Tampa Bay area TV stations, including Fox's competition, seem to

have sent this story into a black hole. I didn't catch even a " news

McNugget " on a case that has everything to do with how Tampa Bay news is

gathered.

To be sure, radio stations from Augusta, Maine to Adelaide,

Australia have generated international interest and the story has a global

following here on the Internet. But the media folks around Tampa town

apparently couldn't care less.

and Akre are claiming Fox pressured them to distort and slant

the news, then fired them both for resisting. The evidence shows pretty

clearly that Fox news managers and lawyers then suppressed important

information about BGH, information that might help viewers decide about the

safety of the milk they drink.

But in a larger sense, the trial is about the way a broadcaster,

using public airwaves, goes about doing business-and specifically its way of

doping investigative reporting. And the Tampa media doesn't want its

readers and viewers to hear about it.

Well, Tampa town, listen up.

Boylan, the former Fox general manager who fired Akre and

, has now testified that Fox's preferred style of an investigative

report is a presentation of both sides of an issue without any critical

analysis, or even any effort to test the facts presented on the air Huh?

Does he and Fox believe reporters are nothing more than

stenographers? Just broadcast whatever anyone wants to say and claim to be

fact? But how can the public trust what it hears, or know who is lying and

who is telling the truth without seeing the research and hearing the context

necessary to make that decision? Isn't that the reporter's job and his and

her purpose in our democratic society? Apparently, Fox doesn't think

so-especially when the report concerns a major advertiser like Monsanto.

Unfortunately, too many newspapers and TV stations agree with Fox.

They have relinquished their duty to be watchdogs in the public interest.

Wake up, you watchdogs! After all, if too many people notice you are asleep

on the job, they may soon not notice you at all.

Belle Adler is a professor of journalism at Northeastern University in

Boston, following a long and distinguished career as a news producer at CBS,

CNN and elsewhere. She has personally worked with Steve and was in

Tampa more than a week to observe the trial and offer support to the

plaintiffs.

Additional Coverage:

Weekly Planet story referred to in editorial above

The BGH Bulletin welcomes editorials or Letters To The Editor from anyone

who wishes to express any point of view on the Fox/BGH case or the issues at

the heart of it. All letters must be signed and should be sumbitted to the

publisher at: wilson@...