Thursday, October 4, 2012

Everyone Loves Big Bird

*Please note, the views are my own, and not affiliated with or associated with PBS or NPR or The Lakeshore

“We are very disappointed that PBS became a political target in the Presidential debate last night,” said PBS in a statement regarding Mitt Romney’s promise to cut the federal funding of PBS. PBS, in case you’ve been living under a large rock for the last 42 years, is the Public Broadcasting Service, which is America’s non-profit public broadcasting television network. If you lived under a rock for only the last few years, and perhaps, the last few days, Mitt Romney, the Republican Presidential nominee, has said that he’ll cut the federal support to public broadcasting, “I’m sorry, Jim, I’m going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I’m going to stop other things. I like PBS. I love Big Bird. Actually, I like you too. But I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for us.”

Romney, however, doesn’t realize the positive effects of public broadcasting and how wide ranging they are. Kids are exposed to more educational programming, because public broadcasting is required to air at least three hours of educational TV. Educational TV can “help young children with number and letter recognition, in addition to developing oral vocabulary,” according to Adrian Grahams of eHow.com. That whole mandatory requirement of at least three hours of education television, put forth by the Children’s Television Act of 1990, really actually matters. Why? Reports indicate that American children watch at least three hours of television daily (Grahams, Ingegerd Rydin). Kids watch more TV “as a consequence of more national channels as well as the deregulation of the television market, which have led to an increased output of globally distributed commercial children's programs, such as animated cartoons and action adventure series,” according to Rydin.

 

Public broadcasting in Europe is on the same par as their commercial television (Rydin). Rydin also writes that public broadcasting is a central pillar of European broadcasting. Is Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, or The Disney Channel a central pillar of American broadcasting? Well, actually, yes. However, does Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, or The Disney Channel provide the same level of educational programming that public broadcasting does? I’ll give you a hint. It’s “No.” In America, those previously listed stations are commercial broadcast stations – out to make money and provide content to fill the airwaves, not the minds of the viewers. Only “34% [of people] agree [that] cable TV is trusted and safe for children” – SPOILER ALERT: More people think PBS is better than cable – (PBS). When companies only have to report to demands of the stock holders, and not to the general well-being of their viewers, well, their beings in front of the TV aren’t much of beings. But, on a positive note, PBS does have a larger prime-time audience than HBO and A&E (PBS). So they “have that going for [them], which is nice” – Bill Murray.

 

It wasn’t just America’s Children’s Television Act of 1990 that had an effect on educational programming for children. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which became binding in 1989, has pushed for more educational TV in the school systems of America and Europe (Rydin). Public broadcasting has been called “America’s biggest classroom” and airs over 500 hours of arts and cultural programming (Cervantes, PBS ). PBS states that “88% [of people] agree that PBS is a trusted and safe place for children to watch TV and visit online.”

Romney was lucky enough to grow up in an affluent area, with a wealthy family. That’s something a lot of children didn’t, or still don’t, have the option of having. They didn’t have access to the schools that Mitt had. They couldn’t always go outside and play, because their neighborhoods weren’t safe, like Mitt’s. But, those kids were given a chance when it came to early education, with the creation of “Sesame Street.” It was thought that “Sesame Street” could help kids out, who lived in poor areas (Rydin). Coming through on any working TV in pretty much any country (and not quite the original version of “Sesame Street”), including besides the United States, are Brazil, Germany, Israel, Spain, and Sweden, children had access to education and early socialization (Rydin). Here’s some numbers for Mitt, so he can learn, but so can you! See how fun this is? 91% of American televisions tune into their local PBS stations (there’s roughly 360 stations), according to PBS. I’ve jumped to a pretty safe conclusion that the 9% of televisions that don’t tune into PBS stations are all of Mitt Romney’s TV’s. Of kids between the ages of 2-8, 81% of them are viewers of PBS.

PBS’ budget is roughly 1/100th of 1% of the Federal budget, according to PBS. Want the actual dollar amount? Yes, yes you do. $444.1M, which is about 0.012% of the federal budget (Cervantes). According to Tom (great first name) Karlo of KPBS, “170 million Americans turn to a network of 368 public television stations, 934 public radio stations and hundreds of public media online services for non-partisan news, cultural programming and educational programs.” That’s a really good turn around for 1/100th of 1% of the budget. Trying to squeeze Big Bird and his buddies “to help balance the Federal budget is like deleting text files to make room on your 500 Gig hard drive,” according to Neil deGrasse Tyson. PBS reported that Hart Research and American Viewpoint, two bipartisan research firms, found that 2/3rds of American voters in 2011 disagreed with cutting funding for public broadcasting. Mitt, that’s roughly 207,727,944 Americans! Did you know that, according to Public Policy Polling’s poll results, more voters trust PBS than any other TV news source?! I didn’t, and Mitt sure didn’t, because, if he did know, he wouldn’t have alienated so many potential voters. So, PBS is more trusted than FOX News, MSNBC, CNN, HLN, and CNBC. Congrats, PBS, much love and mad props.

Even Congress thinks it’s a bad idea to pull funding from PBS, and they can’t agree on anything, (PBS)! Except how to roadblock each other. Cervantes says that cuts could cause some public broadcasting stations to go dark. Living in Indiana, and working for a PBS station, I saw first-hand, stations across the state go dark, when according to Cervantes, “PBS received just $22.3 million of CPB’s total $429 million appropriation” during the 2011 fiscal year. Congress says that pulling the funding from PBS would cripple the system and bring public broadcasting to an end (PBS). That would be like not giving the American auto manufactures a bailout. Good thing no one listened to Romney on that one. But, let’s say the funding gets pulled, and PBS goes the way of the Dodo bird. Whose company would they join? I’m so glad you asked, because I was going to tell you anyway. GS Industries, KB Toys, Dade International, DDi Corporation, Sensata Technologies, Armco Steel, American Pad and Paper (AMPAD), Stage Stores, and several other companies all closed their doors because of Bain Capital (which is not the bad guy from Batman). But, my hands got tired of typing, so I ended the list there.

The cost firing Big Bird won’t save the budget – it won’t even be a drop in the bucket. Did Mitt grow up watching PBS? If he did, he would know what kind of positive effect Big Bird and Bert and Ernie and Cookie Monster and the Count and all the other puppets on Sesame Street have on kids, and he’d realize how much educational programming really does help children and adults. If Mitt watched PBS growing up, he’d be a little nicer.

2 comments:

Julia said...

I still remember how surprised I was when I found out that every show that came into the station had to be looked at for certain content that would be objectionable. I have to admit that as an Adult without children or grandchildren at home I do not watch PBS much anymore, but I am a very big supporter of what it brings to the public. My children are over 30 years old and I still sing some of the songs occassionally :)

Tom said...

Yet, you know full well the benefits of the public broadcasting system in America. I grew up on it, and watched PBS daily. Granted, I didn't start listening to NPR until I got to college - but, I knew the positive effects of public broadcasting long before then.