Re: Police Misconduct

Dear Mr. Davis:

Before Dr. Amos Wilson made his sudden transition, he penned Blueprint for Black Power. With respect to “power,” he cites Rollo May: "[T]he ability to cause or prevent change." The people at the top of the totem pole enjoy power. The people at the bottom of the totem pole suffer from an abuse of power. Currently, the forces of power are waging battles against those groups that are powerless.

At the center of this problem is the media. Medgar Evers diagnosed this problem in 1954. He was fighting censorship in Mississippi. Racial lynchings were the problem. See, for example, Emmett Till and Rev. George Lee for starters. The Till lynching ignited the modern Civil Rights Movement.

There were no leading Blacks and no Black selected officials in the Magnolia State. Mississippi did not have a Sandra Bookman, a Lori Stokes, a Rob Nelson and a Carolina Leid to cloud the issue of censorship but censorship still prevails, nonetheless, at WABC-TV. The white media only covers stories, which it determines, that we should observe.

If WABC-TV's "Here and Now" had been permitting a full hour of uncensored, public affairs discussions on Sundays involving key issues in the Black community, Akai Gurley, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Sean Bell, Ramarley Graham, Amadou Diallo, Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice and Jordan Davis, among so many others, may still be alive today.

Public affairs programming is lacking in all television markets in the United States that are supposed to be serving the Black community. The airwaves belong to the pubic. Broadcasters are given licenses to only promote the public interest. These licenses are renewable. The Federal Communications Commission fixes the period for a license. Any renewal of a license is subject to administrative and judicial review.

Immediately after the demise of "Like it Is," I started "Friends of Like It Is" to militate against "Like It Is" being watered down. No media rights organization exists in the tri-state area of Connecticut, New Jersey and New York. The demographics may also be a problem giving rise to lack of media coverage.

Currently, I am focusing my attention on the Freedom Party. Like media education, political education is also necessary in the Black community. The mere fact that I have not made a complaint recently only means that I do not enjoy deep pockets. The media is big business.

Public affairs programming can make a difference. Policy-makers, public officials and activists could sit down and discuss the problems of the Black community for a full hour. In recent times, there would have been uncensored discussions about stop, question and frisk, the chokehold as a crime, judicial gerrymandering and grand jury reform.

A discussion of these issues may have likely ushered in an indictment of the rogue cops who were responsible for the chokehold death of Eric Garner and the retaliatory action against Ramsey Orta, the videographer who gave us a lasting memory of Garner's death. Orta is now facing a criminal prosecution in Staten Island. Black legislative officials have offered not a single piece of legislation on any of these issues.

It is interesting that the only attorney who opened the door to special prosecutors in Howard Beach and in Tawana Brawley is now a victim of "judicial bullying." He has never been convicted of any crime; he has never betrayed any client and he has never been held in contempt of court. On the other hand, he gave the Black community its only legal voice free of any cost to anyone.

His "crime" was angering the New York Legislature, the New York State Attorney General and Steven Pagones, who was found, by a mostly all-white jury in Dutchess County, to have attacked Tawana Brawley. This is a matter of public record and it is subject to public inspection. These were the only disciplinary complaints against him. Now, Pagones is picking her pocket in Virginia under the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. Of course, these facts are subject to censorship over WABC-TV.

Very truly yours,
Alton H. Maddox, Jr. 
AHM:sr
cc: Tom Wheeler
Chairman, FCC

FROM:

Alton h. Maddox, jr. Tel.: 
United African Movement
P.O. Box 35
Bronx, NY 10471
December 8, 2014

TO:

Dave Davis
President and General Manager
WABC-TV
7 Lincoln Square
New York, NY 10023

SOURCE:

[SmaiTawi] Digest Number 3387
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/SmaiTawi/conversations/topics/47290%3b_ylc=X3oDMTJzOWk5ZjNjBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE1BGdycElkAzIwMzQ5NDUxBGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTYxMTIxNgRtc2dJZAM0NzI5MARzZWMDZG1zZwRzbGsDdm1zZwRzdGltZQMxNDE4MTE4MDM1

You need to be a member of TheBlackList Pub to add comments!

Join TheBlackList Pub

Votes: 0
Email me when people reply –

Replies

  • Why was Ida B. Wells so successful in her campaign against lynching?  She owned her own newspapers.  We cannot rely on mainstream media to tell our stories.  We need to own and produce our own media. 

    In an age when there were no computers, no internet, no Facebook, no fax machines, no text messaging, Ida B. Wells influenced many thousands of people. At a time when women did not even have the vote, Ida B. Wells had a huge influence on public policy.  When necessary, she even travelled abroad (to Britain) to get the word out.  Click here to read more

This reply was deleted.
https://theblacklist.net/