Consider your sources

I wrote this answer to a test question for a course I took at the UofM Journalism School back in 2005. The info may be dated, but I think the message is as germane to social media now, as it was to TV broadcast news back then. 

(The photos have been added just for this blog post)

In light of 13 indictments issued yesterday for parties using social media to tamper with the 2016 US elections I believe this message may be MORE important now than ever before. 

Thesis: In this essay I use a “medium theory” perspective to analyze how the introduction of a new media technology, broadcast television, news in particular, influenced and helped shape the Civil Rights Movement in the United States.

Medium theory teaches us that the particular media used to convey thoughts, ideas, and events have a very distinct impact on the messages conveyed; as audiences change so do the social performances. Studies performed by the Roper Organization have shown that from 1963 to 1997 television was named most often as the primary source for Americans to receive their news. At the end of 1963 NBC and CBS were both broadcasting 30-minute nightly newscasts. It has been said, rightly so, that TV, in the 1960’s, was becoming our eyes on the world. The Civil Rights Movement in the United States was, I feel, dramatically shaped by the rise to prominence of broadcast television network news programs in the early 1960’s. With this major social issue, I believe the medium influenced the behaviors and actions of both those parties that were on TV and those who were viewing the TV newscasts. I hope to prove this case in the following pages by illustrating some basic points of medium theory and also providing observations of how TV news impacted the fight for civil rights in 1960’s America.

Noted media theorist Marshall McLuhan’s statement that, “The medium is the message”, is extremely applicable to television news in the 60’s. Neil Postman points out that the decline of the typography age due to the increase in television viewership irreversibly changed the content and meaning of public discourse because two differing media cannot accommodate the same ideas. Indeed, the ability of network news programs to bring the daily stories, combining words, sounds and pictures into the homes of America gave the stories richer content and a deeper feel than newspapers, Americans’ second leading source of news, or radio, the third cited source.

Stories broadcast on TV news gave the viewer of the early 1960’s the ability to better grasp the pulse or feel of those involved in the stories. Additionally, TV news’ ability to present stories in a more graphic way, I feel, forced many Americans to form opinions, to react or even take action, to stories that were being witnessed in their own living rooms. A newspaper account of the Freedom Riders in the South could be read, thought about and then largely ignored after that section of the paper was laid down. A news broadcast however would not only be a story with similar content to the newspaper article, but the broadcast with film including sound and fury would become an event that Americans and the children in their households would become witness to. 

With TV news, issues would now be brought inside the house where they would need to be dealt with rather than laying, wrapped in a neat bundle, between the front and screen doors as newspaper stories of that day arrived. Broadcast news reports changed racially tense situations from issues to be dealt with in far away Little Rock, Arkansas, Selma, Alabama and Oxford, Mississippi, and dropped them squarely, albeit awkwardly, in the lap of ALL of America. While TV at that time did not have any version of the Editorial Page to which one could write a letter to the editor, as many socially responsible Americans did and still do, in reaction to newspaper stories, TV news caused discussions, debate and compelled many viewers to take more active roles in the Civil Rights Movement. Indeed, the medium was a major component of the message.

“We are here today to say to the white men that we will no longer let them use their clubs in dark corners. We are going to make them do it in the glaring light of television.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. seemed to realize the power that TV newscasts could have in helping to form public opinion regarding the Civil Rights Movement. By proclaiming the above-mentioned statement and issuing a solemn mandate for non-violent civil disobedience Reverend King strove to show all of America that the poor and disenfranchised minorities of America were not trying to rip apart the very fabric of our society, rather they merely wanted to alter views and show the world that blacks only wanted the rights and freedoms which our Constitution guarantees.

True to King’s beliefs, in most cases the network news broadcasts effectively illustrated the ignorance, hatred, and terror displayed by the dogs and firehoses of Sherriff Bull Connor in Selma, and the Ku Klux Klan throughout the southern states. I recall powerful, moving, film of black Americans being dragged to waiting police vehicles for merely wanting service at a lunch counter, or disembarking from a bus that was fire-bombed to keep them from attending a peaceful demonstration in another city. I feel the TV newscasts shed a glaring light on the situation that existed and helped Dr. King convince blacks and their supporters that non-violence could be an effective way to make progress. In this way I have always felt that TV newscasts not only reported the stories, but also helped to shape the issue. That is, not to say that TV newscasts were the sole reason for Dr. King’s adherence to a non-violent stance, but, as explained, I feel non-violence was an easier case to make in light of the coverage provided and the public debate generated.

The graphic displays of violence and inequality filmed in the deep south and broadcast by the network news shows into our living rooms caused Americans from north to south and coast to coast to take action. From barber shops, coffee shops, and church pulpits, the call went forth to get involved.  I know of a particular United Church of Christ minister, my father, who was preparing to head south to support Reverend King and his cause but was counseled to stay north and continue attempting to rally support in our rural southern Minnesota town. 

It appeared as if there was open warfare in the streets of some American cities and responsible, conscientious citizens let their elected officials know that it was time that action be taken to curtail the bloodshed and mayhem. The mounting political pressure forced President Kennedy, in June of 1963 to go on national TV and declare that segregation and inequality in America were a moral issue and that he hoped all Americans would join him in attempting to get his proposed Civil Rights Bill passed and enacted. 

Unfortunately, Kennedy would not live to see that goal achieved. The bill was signed into law by President Johnson, but Kennedy’s framing the issue as a moral dilemma, a matter of right and wrong, with no gray areas helped galvanize the support in cities, towns, and villages across America necessary to get the bill approved. Network TV broadcasts, as well as the televised presidential address surely contributed much to the groundswell of support.

Television news, cited as the #1 news source by a majority of Americans from the early 1960’s through the turn of the century, and the expanding pervasive presence of television and network newcasts in early 1960’s America very effectively brought the fight for civil rights to the forefront of Americans’ consciousness, by painting vivid, memorable scenes that indirectly became a call to action for individuals who’s vision of America included equality and freedom for all. TV newcasts displayed these stories and situations in ways that could not be put aside as a newspaper article can be and were infinitely more graphic than a radio broadcast could be. 

Television, as the newer, more evocative medium had the power to elicit a more emotional response that stirred people to action, joining protests, and contacting politicians. TV helped to shape the issue, influencing the actions of some of its major players, Dr. King and his proponents of non-violence. Television gave President Kennedy the ability to effectively frame the issue and communicate a clear and concise plan to alleviate the problems. In these ways I feel that network TV broadcasts in the 1960’s changed the audience for the issues by broadening it to include most of America and thus changed the actions and social performances of all involved.