Good post, sandintoes.
I'm with you on that and I think virtually all of us would agree with your message.
I want to say I agree 100%, but I'm afraid it's only 99 44/100%.
The trouble point (to me): "I'll switch off every TV station that tells me I'm not thinking the way they want me to think, I'll stop buying the products who sponsor this ..."
That's good! It's forceful. Consumer boycotts do have an impact. It can be a weapon for justice. I might agree 99 44/100% of the time.
BUT... in the extreme...
It politicizes the airwaves. It prevents minority opinion from being heard. It tramples the rights of free speech. A 'politically incorrect' view that you feel strongly about, but a brainwashed majority don't want to hear, may never get expressed because no corporate sponsor may not want to offend "the masses". It stifles innovation because no one understands (and then endorses)processes that bring about change. It undermines needed dialogue.
[I take no stand on abortion, but if the pro-choice advocates boycott the pro-life sponsors and the pro-life advocates boycott pro-choice sponsors, the end result is no sponsors, no dialogue, no way to resolve an issue that divides society. That's simply one obvious example.]
In the end, an organized boycotting of sponsors because we disagree with the content of a program they pay for is a bad thing for our society and for our constitutional rights to espouse unpopular viewpoints. In one sense, I'd like to separate the media content and the payment aspects much as we separate church and state - and for the same reason, to protect the equal rights of the minority.
On an individual basis, you and I have every right to not buy any product for any reason we choose, including sponsorship of viewpoints we don't agree with. It's a right we should cherish (individually).
The problem is that when we try to galvanize a community to act with us with us in a boycott, we are unleashing dangerous forces. We are, in effect, a lynch mob. Even a guilty person deserves a trial, a dialogue. An organized boycott of a sponsor of a viewpoint we disagree with ends up suppressing a viewpoint that has every right to be expressed. Freedom to make our opinion heard - even a grossly unpopular one - is what defines us as "America". Having that freedom is what makes us proud to be American.
That is why I have that 0 56/100% disagreement with your posting. |
