Is It Time to Shut Down CBC2?
Last week, Ron sent me a copy of a mass e-mailing urging people to sign an on-line petition to protest recent changes to CBC Radio 2:
Second, I have been delighted that CBC Radio 2 has cut waaayyy back on its newscasts. There's no good reason for both CBC1 and CBC2 to run long newscasts, and given the biases of CBC news, the less news the better.
Third, I rarely listen(ed) to CBC2 at night. But I'm certainly willing to give up evening classical music if that means we can also get rid of the arts report.
Further, with web radio and satellite radio, there is far less reason to have the taxpayers of Canada support the performance and broadcast of classical music. CBC2 has traditionally represented a distinctly non-egalitarian redistribution from the taxpayers at large to elitist snobs. But with these technological developments, those of us who want to listen to classical music can easily pay for it and find it ourselves.
While we're at it, why don't we just shut down all of CBC Radio 2 and sell off their broadcast frequencies and equipment?
Related Digression: The television coverage of the World Curling Championships on CBC has been far less than satisfactory.
On March 19, 2007, CBC Radio 2 cancelled its excellent evening classical music programming, and the immensely informative Arts Report, and the award-winning Two New Hours. We consider that with these changes the management of our only national public broadcaster has compromised its tradition of providing stimulating and informed programming. We also believe that these changes are not consistent with the CBC mandate and the recent UNESCO treaty on cultural diversity.My reaction to the changes was a bit different. First, I have always hated the so-called "arts report"; it is usually a collection of special pleadings from the arts community for more gubmnt support.
The public voices of many dedicated and world-class Canadian writers, hosts, composers, producers and artists are being muted. If the changes are allowed to stand and the trend to continue, the CBC will have entirely squandered its unique capacity to represent the arts, with their inherent qualities of complexity, depth and order.
We, the undersigned, believe the new programming is a retrograde step, one that duplicates material readily available on other stations and compromises the cultural integrity of our public broadcaster. We respectfully insist that the current programming changes to Radio 2 be revisited, and the damage reversed by reinstating the type of intelligent, provocative and informative programming that has long been a hallmark of Radio 2.
Second, I have been delighted that CBC Radio 2 has cut waaayyy back on its newscasts. There's no good reason for both CBC1 and CBC2 to run long newscasts, and given the biases of CBC news, the less news the better.
Third, I rarely listen(ed) to CBC2 at night. But I'm certainly willing to give up evening classical music if that means we can also get rid of the arts report.
Further, with web radio and satellite radio, there is far less reason to have the taxpayers of Canada support the performance and broadcast of classical music. CBC2 has traditionally represented a distinctly non-egalitarian redistribution from the taxpayers at large to elitist snobs. But with these technological developments, those of us who want to listen to classical music can easily pay for it and find it ourselves.
While we're at it, why don't we just shut down all of CBC Radio 2 and sell off their broadcast frequencies and equipment?
Related Digression: The television coverage of the World Curling Championships on CBC has been far less than satisfactory.
Category: Canadian Affairs, Economics, Media, Music, PLO (Philistine LIberation Organization) Posted on
Monday, April 7, 2008 at 1:08am
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My wife still listens to CBC-1 on her morning commute. I gave up about 15 years ago, in favour of local (Wingham) AM Radio and some FM Country. It's too painful -- multicultural screeching, white angst, post colonial hair shirts, anti-US everthing, Bush Derangement Syndrome, save-the-murdering-Khadr "youth", Andy Asshole in the morning, "Guns are Evil" paranoia, "Announcer Girl", and the rest of the Toronto-centred crap.
I used to respect Paul Kennedy's IDEAS show, but even he's gone off the rails. I had nothing else to listen to late one night on the way home, so I tuned it in-- only to hear him make an outrageous statement to a guest about Bush being like AhmedAsshole of Iran in believing in Religion over Politics -- the guest had to slap him down on that.
It's long past time for CBC Radio to say "Good Night".