Anti-conglomeration activist
hosts workshop on campus
Paul Cienfuegos discussed
corporate control over local
mass media throughout
his two-day presentation
By Moriah Balingit
Freelance Reporter
Nearly 40 people packed into 44 Co
lumbia Hall on Saturday for Paul Cien
fuegos' workshop "Taking OUR Local
Mass Media Back From Large Corpora
tions: We The People Are More Power
ful Than We Dare To Believe!"
Cienfuegos' speech on Friday
night had an even larger turnout.
The workshop, which included
two speeches, was designed to facili
tate discussion on how Eugene citi
zens might work to decrease corpo
rate control over local mass media.
Cienfuegos pointed out that media
conglomerates Cumulus Media and
Clear Channel currently own 37 per
cent of radio stations in Eugene.
Cienfuegos also said he wants to
educate people about "corporate per
sonhood," which declares corpora
tions legal persons and gives them
property rights, free speech rights and
other rights normally guaranteed to
ordinary citizens. He described the re
sulting phenomena as "super person
hood," in which corporations exercise
huge amounts of power without pub
lic accountability.
"We're not going to beg corpora
tions for change; we're going to ad
dress corporations as subordinate
entities," activist and workshop
organizer Jill Schwab said.
Schwab, currently a campaign fi
nance reform activist, organized the
workshop with the hopes of creating
awareness about corporate person
hood and starting a campaign
against corporate domination of the
mass media in Eugene. She reiterat
ed Cienfuegos' point that this is not
a left-right political issue but rather
a "fundamental issue about Ameri
can democracy."
"We're not going to beg
corporations for change;
we re going to address
corporations as
subordinate entities."
Jill Schwab
Activist and workshop organizer
Krista Rojas, who is active in the
local branch of the Green Party, at
tended the workshop because she is
concerned by corporate control of
information.
"The corporations now control so
much of the information, not only
that comes to us over the media, but
also to us at the University level... I
think (the workshop) gave us some
hope and some tools to organize,"
she said.
Cienfuegos is experienced in bat
tling corporate power. In 1998, his
group, Citizens Concerned About
Corporations, developed Measure F,
which designated two town hall
meetings co-sponsored by the Areata
City Council to discuss the question:
"Can we have democracy when large
corporations wield so much power
and wealth under law?"
The second provision of the meas
ure provided for the creation of a
committee to advise the city council
about issues of corporate control.
The measure drew a considerable
amount of attention, receiving en
dorsements from linguist and au
thor Noam Chomsky and famed
populist and author Jim Hightower,
who said, "The shot heard 'round
the world in this case was a ballot,
not a bullet."
The measure passed, and the
meetings drew up to 5 percent of the
voting population. The Committee
on Corporations and Democracy,
created by Measure F, proposed leg
islation to cap the number of "for
mula restaurants" in Areata. The leg
islation passed, barring any more
chain restaurants from establishing
themselves in Areata.
Cienfuegos said he is hopeful that
his workshops will inspire similar
change in Eugene and elsewhere.
"My ultimate goal is to have citi
zens rise up in a democratic fashion
across the United States and insist
that local branches of these giant
media corporations either shape up
or we shut them down and replace
them with fully accountable media
institutions," he said.
Moriah Balingit is a freelance reporter
for the Emerald.
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