Re: WEVD (was WFAN New York)

[Rob Landry <umar@wcrb.com>]

On Tue, 5 Aug 1997, 'A. Joseph Ross' wrote:

> What if someone came to the station and wanted to buy time to run
> explicitly anti-semitic programming?

That has happened at a couple of stations where I've worked, although
never with the prior knowledge of station management

> The station licensee is
> responsible for what it broadcasts, and it has a great deal of
> leeway, especially nowadays, in determining what programming is in
> the public interest, convenience, and necessity.

Yep.

I think the question is where the line falls beyond which it can be said
that a station is illegally discriminating on the basis of someone's
religion.  To my knowledge WCRB, for example, has rejected some
advertisements because station management deemed the ads deceptive.  But
could the station legally reject one because of an advertiser's religion?

Both KDON and WBOS ran ads for L. Ron Hubbard's book _Dianetics_ back in
the eighties. Does anyone know of a station that has rejected such an ad?
Scientology would certainly take such a case to court, methinks.

> There have been some cases where the Globe has been upheld in its right
> not to run ads.  In one case, I think it was a Ralph Nader ad that it
> refused, and the court said it had the right to do so.

The Globe is not licensed by the public, nor is newspaper space a scarce
public resource, as is radio spectrum.

> Nor would this be considered discrimination.  There was a case several
> years ago in which the courts upheld the right of the Jewish Community
> Center not to hire someone who was qualified for a job but was not Jewish.

However, if a commercial radio station had done so, the decision would
have been different, I suspect.  Radio stations operate under EEO
requirements that are (in my opinion) excessive; it is almost impossible
to comply with them because on the one hand stations aren't allowed to
discrminate on the basis of race or gender, but on the other hand they're
required to recruit a certain number of minority and female employees. 

The only way out, it would seem, is to have less than five full-time
employees.

Rob Landry
umar@wcrb.com

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