[net.tv] The Day After - Why can't TV be political - it is privately owned.

bstempleton@watmath.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (11/19/83)

I haven't seen the Day After, but I have seen the director say that all
he made was a film about what they felt would happen to one town in
a full-scale nuclear war.  This is nothing new.  Films like Fail-Safe
(which have been broadcast on TV) espouse far more biased viewpoints than
I expect this one to.  What about Dr. Strangelove or Wargames (which will
be on TV eventually) or "If you love this planet" (which won an oscar
and was on TV here) or "War" by Gwynne Dyer.  Or any number of other
nuclear disaster books and films.  Why the big fuss here?

But even if the film is blatantly political and comes right out and
says the Military-Industrial complex is going to kill you, what of it.

ABC is a privately owned company, albiet with a public licence.  Surely
nobody is suggesting they should be disallowed from broadcasting things
that one segment of the population disagrees with?  If this is so then
perhaps the U.S.A. is better off nuked.

The War series by Gwynne Dyer was produced by public money up here
(The National Film Board of Canada) and shown, without commercials
(which is NOT the norm) on the CBC, a government owned network.
Yet there was no fuss about political broadcast, even though this
program made a vicious attack on the military-industrial complex both
here and in the USSR.  (Mind you, if somebody wants to make a documentary
in favour of war, they will probably be granted equal time)

So what's it all about?
-- 
	Brad Templeton - Waterloo, Ont. (519) 886-7304