I am a faithful listener of CBC Radio, one & two. This started long ago when a guy named Lloyd Percival did a program on physical fitness and strength. I think that is the correct name, but not certain. We are talking 1965-66, I think. I would have been 13-14 years old. I played a lot of team sports and could run pretty fast, etc. but this guy was talking about solitary focus on kinaesthetic experience via the tech- nology of radio. It was a community of individual introvert home athletes. That appealed to me greatly. Radio was physical and visceral.
Gradually I found myself trusting news coverage on CBC Radio more than anything I saw or watched on television. The trance of television has never felt trustworthy. There is a level of pretending. The folks who use the programming to sell their commercial products control the ethical parameters for inducing experience of needing and wanting.
The psychological science of trance induction came from research in medical psychiatry and brainwave studies in psychology. It was made available to the producers of television advertising.
I have been furious with CBC Radio in the past few years, in reaction to the way that television aesthetics have invaded the tradition of radio journalism. This is not merely a conflict between innovation and tradition. It is an abandonment of the primary mandate of CBC as a public broadcaster --- which is to enlighten. To not hustle.
The moral dignity of the corporation has been trivialized and discarded. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the hiring and promotion of the "personality" of Jian Ghomeshi. I am sure that in recent years I written 8 or 10 times to complain about his radio presence. He always sounded like we should be sorry it was "only" radio, because he is irrisistable to women. Hell, okay, men too. Too bad this is only radio.
"I'm a celebrity. You're a celebrity. Let's jerk off on the radio! And the little people will love it." Such a top down delivery. The takeover by television people became so blatant. He interviewed television celebrities on the radio. I had to stop listening.
There are other examples, too. Local programming here in Montreal is a bizarre alternation between wothwhile listening and total garbage.
I have the latest television news package about JG and the sexual violence accusations, allegations. I have had it on bookmarks list for several days. I might not watch it at all. It might make me puke.
To say that I am spectacularly disappointed in CBC Radio is a big understatement.
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