February 7, 2001
Page A4
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■ Opinion
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BET and Viacom: The New businesses of America
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B y F red M c K issack
In the 1976 movie "Network,”
talk show host Howard Beale
tells his audience that the world
is neither in the post-industrial
ing around larger corporations
who, in turn, revolve around gi
ant corporations, and this whole
endless, eternal, ultim ate cos
mology is expressly designed
for the production and con-
s u m p tio n o f u s e le s s
things.”
Som e 24 years later,
BET Holdings II, a small
corporation that owns sev
eral entertainm ent-related
brands, including 20-year-
old Black Entertainm ent
Television, will now be or
biting around Viacom, the
w orld’s third largest me
dia company. V iacom paid
$3 billion for BET in early
Novem ber.
B E T C h a irm a n and
C hief Executive O fficer
R obert L. Johnson and
Sum m er
R e d s to n e ,
V iacom ’s CEO seem to
be all smiles and love about
the deal. Johnson says that BET
has found a perfect home at
V iacom, whose roster o f brands
includes CBS, M TV, UPN and
Simon & Schuster.
Some black leaders - includ
ing the Rev. Jesse Jackson and
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Gary Ann Taylor
Fred McKissack
age nor the inform ation age.
‘We are now a corporate so
ciety, a corporate world, a cor
porate universe,” he says. “This
world is a vast cosm ology of
sm all c o rp o ra tio n s o rb itin g
around large corporations orbit
N A A C P P r e s id e n t K w e isi
Mfume - have expressed angst
that BET was sw allow ed by
Viacom. This is laughable on
several levels. First, Johnson
sold the com pany to Viacom;
fellas, this w asn’t hostile take
over. And, for all the carping
about black independent televi
sion vanishing because o f the
merger, let’s face facts about
what BET is and is not.
W hile 90 percent o f African
Americans who watch televi
sion know the brand name BET,
N ielsen ratings show B E T ’s
prime time shows gam er around
1 percent o f the black popula
tion, or a little more than 350,000
people. This despite the fact
that BET can be seen in more
than 60 m illion homes.
Why so few viewers? Simple:
The netw ork stinks, and it has
stunk for a long time.
W ell, not e v e ry th in g has
smelled. The news division (es
pecially Tavis Sm iley and Ed
Gordon) has been the high point.
And in m id-Novem ber, the net
work announced that its film
division, in association with PBS,
had begun production work on
“ A H uey P. New ton Story.”
The film is being directed by
Spike Lee, who will bring to it a
level o f cinem atic expertise the
subject m atter and audience so
richly deserve.
G enerally, however, BET has
been the king o f black m edioc
rity in the corporate-entertain
ment com plex. L et’s not forget
that earlier this year BET H old
ings II killed Emerge, a truly
independent and intellectual
m agazine.
In his 1999 book,"Color Bars:
T e le v is io n ’s D iv e rs ity D i
lem m a,” form er BET executive
Tom Jacobs scolds Johnson for
building and m aintaining his
empire on the electronic equiva
lent o f junk mail.
From sexually explicit videos,
featuring epic levels o f misogyny
and violence, to near endless
com edy showcases and celeb
rity infotainment, BET has never
lived up to the prem ise that
people believed was inherent in
its charter, a netw ork where
blacks could see reflections o f
them selves in m irrors not con
trolled by media outlets that
w ere o verw helm ingly v/hite
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male and tacitly unsym pathetic.
"Bob Johnson has m ade it
abundantly clear that he feels
no responsibility to use his busi
ness a vehicle for delivering posi
tive m essages or socially re
sponsible programming to Black
A m erica,” Jacobs writes.
Johnson apparently also feels
no responsibility to the people
that work for him, as w itnessed
in his insistence on not paying
equitable wages to com edians
who whooped it up on one o f the
n e tw o rk ’s s ta p le s , “ C om ic
V iew .”
These brothers and sisters
were m aking $150 per appear
ance, while BET was m aking
m illions in ad revenue. This
should have caused a ruckus
among black leaders and the
m asses, yet th ere w a s n ’t a
peep. If this had been a white-
owned network, there w ould’ve
been a boycott.
BET is proof that the business
o f business is the production and
consumption o f useless things.
Fred McKissack covers cul
ture fo r The Progressive maga
zine. He can be reached at
pmproj@progressive. org.
A sst . P ublisher
Michael Leighton
C
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Joy Ramos
C
r e a t iv e
D
ir e c t o r
Robert Parker
4 7 4 7 NE M artin Luther King,
Jr. Blvd.
Portland, OR 9 7 2 1 1
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Area Residents Urged to Speak Out Now
“T he leg isla tu re convenes
only six m onths, every two
year cycle. N ow is the p er
fect tim e d u ring the session
for c itizen s to get involved in
th e s e i m p o r ta n t i s s u e s ,”
G ordly said.
N ear the top o f the list o f
concerns are proposed cuts in
sen io r and d isa b ility services.
A ll told, the s ta te ’s long-term
care system w ould be reduced
by m ore th an $93 m illio n .
T h o u s a n d s o f s e n io r a n d
people w ith d isab ilities would
lose the a ssista n c e that helps
them rem ain independent in
th eir ow n com m unities.
“N ow is the perfect tim e to
get in v o lv ed ,” said State Sen.
M a rg a ret C a rte r, re g a rd in g
proposed laws that w ould posi
tively and negatively affect all
O regonians, e sp ecially those
in N orth and N ortheast P o rt
land. W ith the O regon L eg is
lature in its opening days, c iti
zen input in Salem is needed
now to m ake inform ed choices,
C arter said.
Sen. Avel G ordly, D -Port-
land, also w ants to em phasize
how crucial this stage o f the
le g i s la t iv e p r o c e s s is fo r
people in contacting th eir rep
resen tativ es and senators.
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“ W hat the legislators in this
building need to hear from their
co n stitu en ts is to bring back
continuing service levels for
these program s so that we can
p rovide esse n tia l support to
seniors and th o se w ith d is
a b ilitie s ,” C a rte r said.
A
p ro p o se d
O reg o n
C h ild re n ’s Plan has also re
ceived a great deal o f a tte n
tion. The program spends over
$60 m illion to screen all first
births in O regon for an id en ti
fiable set o f risk s that can
negatively affect a c h ild ’s life.
A nother im portant initiative
w ould require insurance com
panies to provide coverage for
b iith co n tro l expenses.
W om en pay sig n ific a n tly
m ore in health care ~osts then
m en, m ainly because o f the
cost o f co n tracep tiv es.
A n o th e r im p o rtan t health
care in itia tiv e is a proposal to
increase insurance coverage
for m ental health issues to a
lev el eq u al to fu n d in g for
p hysical health problem s. In
cluded in the category o f m en
tal h ealth issues are alcohol
and d rug dependency.
C a r te r c o n ti n u a ll y h a s
stressed the im portance o f this
issue.
“ W e need to recognize that
m ental health pro b lem s are
ju s t as vital to address and
take care o f as physical health
p ro b le m s,” C arter said.
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