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“Survivor” Touches “Third Rail”

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Critics Debate Relevance to Race Relations

 

 

 

The debut Thursday night of the controversial “Survivor” reality show season pitting same-race teams against each other drew 18 million viewers, according to the overnight Nielsen ratings, and while the cultural significance of the event can be debated, the commentary on the show did provide somewhat of a litmus test on race relations in 2006.

The 18-million-viewer count was “the good news,” John Eggerton wrote today for Broadcasting & Cable. “The bad is that is was still down 10% and 5%, respectively, from the previous two Survivor debuts and was not going up against new shows, as it will be next week.”

Naturally, CBS saw things differently. The rating was “pretty strong for a show in its 13th edition to have numbers so high,” spokesman Chris Ender told Journal-isms. “It’s sort of too early to tell whether the controversy has had any impact on the ratings,” he said. The show started in May 2000; each year consists of two editions. No ratings breakdown by race was available.

On Wednesday night, KPIX-TV, the CBS station in the San Francisco Bay area, featured a multicultural group of KPIX journalists interviewing people in their own racial group for reaction. On the set, Mike Sugerman, who is white, called race the “third rail” of conversation, best avoided. Robert Lyles, who is black, pressed Sugerman to acknowledge that white guilt over his ancestors’ actions might partly account for his stance. “Perhaps we’ve opened a discussion,” Lyles concluded, ending the segment.

Today, the reporters interviewed Sekou, the jazz musician who was voted off the island by his fellow African Americans. He said the contestants had no idea they were to be grouped by race until the day before the episode, and then, “nobody had that racial hatred. Everybody made jokes about themselves.” Still, “we wanted to win as a tribe.”

“Now you see what the real deal is with this season’s [S]urvivor, where the real fear comes from,” Melanie McFarland, television critic for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, who is African American, wrote on her blog.

“There are a lot of well-meaning people out there who have written about the potential ‘Survivor: Cook Islands’ has to provoke pointed, meaningful discussions about race, but let’s be honest here – ain’t going to happen. Not on any large scale. Our culture has managed to avoid that conversation up to this point; what would make you think ‘Survivor,’ of all things, would change that?

“No, this edition presents a more frightening proposition: self-examination. Everyone is going to watch in a different way, based on the baggage they bring to the couch every Thursday night at 8. Eventually we’ll all choose our favorite players based on personality, but this is the first time that a ‘Survivor’ season has me rooting for a team of black people because I feel like they represent me. They know as much.”

“Unfortunately, what last night’s show really revealed was that the excitement over the race divisions may be so much smoke and mirrors – first, because the tribes are mostly separated, so there’s little cross-group tension yet,” Eric Deggans, media critic for the St. Petersburg Times, who also is African American, wrote on his blog. “And secondly, because Burnett’s agenda seems to be proving that those who focus on race difference are wrong-headed (expect one member from each tribe to be put in another tribe before long, just to ratchet up the race tension),” he said, referring to “Survivor” creator Mark Burnett.

Deggans also said he had received a call from “infamous Apprentice contestant Omarosa Manigault Stallworth,” who, having appeared on another Burnett production — “The Apprentice” — said of Burnett, “”He’s so cynical about race anyway.”

On National Public Radio’s “News & Notes,” Mary Frances Berry, former chair of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, called the show’s concept “a representation of the actual racial group segregation that we see outside of the show,” as well as intra-group conflicts based on gender and class, though only host Tony Cox had actually seen the show. Glenn Loury, social science and economics professor at Brown University, said his class had just discussed racial groupings among prisoners. “The real world is a lot more structured along racial lines in certain situations” than we like to admit, he said.

White critics appeared to be nearly unanimous in denouncing the show, though sometimes with humor. Some noted the absence of Native Americans.

“I’m working up a pretty good outrage watching the first episode of CBS’s ‘Survivor: Race Wars’ when they cut to an ad in which Audrey Hepburn has been exhumed to sell skinny black pants, which I’m guessing are made in some Third World country, for the Gap,” Lisa de Moraes wrote today in the Washington Post.

“Audrey Hepburn is the patron saint of waspy white chicks. I am a waspy white chick. I am really angry. Oh, that’s probably how this show is supposed to work. Sure, CBS has taken one of the whitest shows on TV (which is hard to find in a reality series) and made it ethnically diverse, not because it’s the right thing to do, but so they can play the race card – dividing contestants into the African American tribe, the Hispanic tribe, the Asian American tribe and the white guys – in hopes the media attention will goose the show’s sagging ratings.

“. . . the contestants on ‘Survivor: Race Wars’ were dumb enough to let themselves be used by CBS to whip up the race,” de Moraes wrote.

“Audrey Hepburn, on the other hand, is dead; the patron saint of waspy white chicks did not get to choose. And it’s a crime and a sin what the Gap has done to her. I am a waspy white chick, and this is my tribe.”

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Baquet in Showdown With Tribune Co. Over Cuts

“The editor of The Los Angeles Times appears to be in a showdown with the paper’s owner, the Tribune Company, over job cuts in the newsroom,” Katharine Q. Seelye reported today in the New York Times.

“Scott C. Smith of Tribune Publishing had asked for budget cuts. In a highly unusual move, Dean P. Baquet, who was named editor last year, was quoted yesterday in his own newspaper as saying he was defying the paper’s corporate parent in Chicago and would not make the cuts it requested.”

Baquet is the paper’s first black top editor.

“The paper’s publisher, Jeffrey M. Johnson, said he agreed with Mr. Baquet. ‘Newspapers can’t cut their way into the future,’ he told the paper.

“The number of jobs at stake is unclear but the paper, the fourth largest in the country, has eliminated more than 200 positions over the last five years from an editorial staff that now numbers about 940.

“‘I am not averse to making cuts,’ Mr. Baquet told the paper. ‘But you can go too far, and I don’t plan to do that.'”

“. . . Mr. Baquet “made his opposition to further cuts clear and said there was no need for further discussion,” the paper reported.

“A spokesman for Mr. Baquet and Mr. Johnson said they would have no further comment.”

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Philly Veteran Beverly Williams Leaving Station

“Beverly Williams taped her last ‘Eye on Philadelphia’ program for CBS 3 last night,” Dan Gross wrote today in the Philadelphia Daily News.

“The longtime news personality will air her last show on the station Sept. 24.

“The Sunday-morning show will be replaced by an extended morning newscast from 5:30 to 9. Williams anchored the news for KYW -TV from 1975 to 1981 and again from 1989 to 2003, becoming the first African-American female anchor in town.

“Between stints at Channel 3, Williams worked at CNN and at WTNH in New Haven, Conn. CBS 3 will host a farewell party for Williams at the station Thursday afternoon.

“‘I am exploring a number of options,’ Williams, 59, told us yesterday.

“‘But I know one thing’s for sure. There won’t be a rocking chair in my future. . . . I have a twinge of sadness, but I never say goodbye; I only say so long.’

“The former anchor sued her station in 2003, alleging age, sex and race discrimination. Her ‘Eye on Philadelphia’ program debuted shortly after the suit was settled out of court.

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Jean-Jacques Taylor Replacing Blackistone in Dallas

Jean-Jacques Taylor, the Dallas Morning News’ lead writer covering the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys for the last 12 seasons, Thursday was named to replace sports columnist Kevin Blackistone, who is taking the paper’s buyout offer. Both are black journalists.

“He has helped SportsDay dominate the most competitive sports beat in our market and one of the most competitive in the country,” Bob Yates, assistant managing editor/sports, and Garry Leavell, sports editor, told the Morning News staff in a memo.

“He has had numerous scoops, including recent stories on the team fining Terrell Owens for being late to meetings and the NFL’s suspension of Marcus Coleman. He also was the only writer to speak with Quincy Carter on the day the Cowboys abruptly cut him during the 2004 training camp.

“A graduate of Skyline High School and Ohio State University, Jacques began as an intern here and never left. Jacques hasn’t forgotten his intern roots. He has remained a mentor and confidant for those who followed after him.

“When Jacques joined our staff full-time, he became our lead high school writer and then moved to the Rangers and the Cowboys.”

Taylor, 39, told Journal-isms, “I think KB, being a Northwestern graduate, did a fantastic job of tackling national and global issues and breaking them down with a unique perspective. As a graduate of The Ohio State University, I’m not quite as worldly.

“My strength will be having an opinion daily. That’s my goal. It sounds simple, but it’s not always executed. My Dad has always told me, ‘Come strong or don’t come at all.’ That’s what I plan to do.

“I am pumped and have been prepared by 11 years and one game on one of the most competitive beats in the country.”

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Editor Says Media Fell Short in Five Years After 9/11

In the commemorations of the five-year anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, at least one editor, Chris Peck of the Memphis Commercial Appeal, concluded that since then, “newspaper editors and TV news directors would have to agree they fell short of accomplishing what the media are entrusted to do in times of crisis and national confusion.

Peck wrote Sunday that, “In the last five years:

“The media failed by not shedding light on dark, distant places where our readers and viewers don’t live.

“We fell short of our best work by not having the courage to ask enough tough questions after the attacks.

“We dropped the ball by not keeping the public’s attention focused on what matters, and instead diverted their attention to what was entertaining, easy, or cheap.

“I’m not proud of these failings,” Peck said.

“In fact, these failings by my profession likely have made our world less safe and our society more closed.

“Five years after the twin towers fell, my hope is that fellow editors and media executives will rise up.”

There was this continuing commentary:

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National Journalists Said to Take U.S. Money, Too

“Nationally and internationally known journalists for English-language newspapers and magazines have ‘for many, many years’ received payment from the U.S. government to appear on Voice of America radio programs, El Nuevo Herald reports in today’s edition,” Casey Woods reported Thursday in the Miami Herald.

“Among them have been a nationally syndicated columnist, a former opinion page director for The Washington Times and the Washington bureau chief for the Hartford Courant of Connecticut.

“The El Nuevo Herald article followed a Miami Herald article published Friday that disclosed that at least 10 South Florida journalists, including three from El Nuevo Herald, have been regularly paid by the U.S. government to participate in programs on Radio and TV Marti

“. . . In today’s El Nuevo Herald article, written by reporters Gerardo Reyes and Joaquim Utset, several national journalists defended taking payments from the government for hosting or taking part in Voice of America shows.

”’I do not cover the State Department or the Pentagon or any governmental agency,’ David Lightman, the Hartford Courant’s Washington bureau chief, told El Nuevo Herald. ‘Second, they pay me very little, and they pay me because I am a professional and they remunerate me for my time. In general, I do not cover the topics we’re talking about.”

“. . . Other journalists who acknowledged payments from Voice of America programs included Tom M. DeFrank, head of the New York Daily News’ Washington office; Helle Dale, a former director of the opinion pages of The Washington Times; and Georgie Anne Geyer, a nationally syndicated columnist who appears in 120 publications, El Nuevo Herald reported.

“Miami Herald executive editor Tom Fiedler said in a separate interview that accepting such payments violates widely accepted standards of journalistic ethics.”

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How About Those “Oxymoronic ‘Fighting French'”?

Charles Trimble, writing today in Indian Country Today, says he could agree up to a point with writer Ronald Toya, who argued in the same publication that too much is being made of the debate over Indian mascots.

“I agree with Toya that the issue should not be as big or as time-consuming as it is, and perhaps we should just try to understand the weird customs of the colonizers,” Trimble wrote. “First of all, we’ve got to recognize the importance of the name to a team’s image, and the psychological effect it is supposed to have on opponents.

“For instance, if the name of that famous university were in English instead of French, their famous victory march wouldn’t ‘shake down the thunder’ for ‘Our Lady,’ which is how Notre Dame translates into English. So they chose their mascot name, ‘Fighting Irish.’ It was an obvious choice over such possibilities as, let’s say, the ‘Fighting Ladies,’ or the oxymoronic ‘Fighting French.’ But they made the most of it, adopting the Irish nickname and charging on in the name of Our Lady, in French, and leaving a bloody trail of vanquished foes in stadiums across America.”

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6 People of Color on Gay Journalists Board

Six people of color were elected to the board of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association at the group’s annual convention last week in Miami Beach.

Elected for two-year terms were Mel Meléndez, Javier Morgado and Deepak Saini; reappointed for one-year terms were Akilah Monifa and Hassan Sudler; and Christine Romero was appointed to a one-year term. Some 650 attended, according to Thomas Cashman Avila, deputy executive director.

Meanwhile, the 2006 NLGJA Excellence in News Writing Award is to be awarded to Tina A. Brown and Elizabeth Hamilton of the Hartford Courant for “From Pain, Family.”

The two wrote about “poor, urban African American and Hispanic women in search of intimacy, love, safety and stability” who “are increasingly finding those things with each other.” The full list of winners is to be released in October.

Also at the convention, CNN anchorman Thomas Roberts acknowledged that he is gay while on a Sept. 8 panel. Coincidentally, on Monday, CNN Headline News announced it was eliminating the 4 p.m.-6 p.m. newscast anchored by Roberts and Kathleen Kennedy. They will remain at the cable news channel in as-yet-unspecified roles, the network said.

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Founder of AOL Latino Leaves Company

“David Wellisch, the founder of AOL Latino, has left the company,” Nancy Ayala reported Wednesday in Marketing y Medios.

“Based at AOL headquarters in Dulles, Va., AOL Latino was formed in 2004 under the direction of Wellisch, who proposed the launch of the Spanish-language Internet provider to Time Warner Inc., parent company of AOL. A replacement will soon be named to fill the role of vice president and general manager.

“‘After successfully conceiving and building AOL Latino, David Wellisch has decided to move on and embark on new business ventures. His replacement will be named shortly,’ said an AOL spokesperson, via e-mail.

“Earlier today, AOL Latino announced new original programming slated for Hispanic Heritage Month, which begins Sept. 15 and runs through Oct. 15. Interviews are on tap with Hispanic actors, as well as special areas dedicated to Latino history, culture, sports heroes and political endeavors. Bilingual blogs, a fact-filled interactive map of Latin America, a food guide for various parts of Latin America also are planned.

“A reenergized AOL Latino portal will launch Oct. 23.”

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