Historic Films Stock Footage Archive: NT-3338

00:00:01 1.75	WNET
00:01:29 89.36	Title Slate: The Eleventh Hour #338. Black Press. Rec: 4/490. Dir: Andrew Wilk
00:01:44 104.66	Blank
00:01:50 110.46	Funding for the program by announcer. Charitable orgs overlay The Eleventh Hour graphic.
00:02:08 128.53	Show Opener
00:02:30 150.25	Host Robert Lipsyte in studio sitting in frnt of 4 small tv screens with Black Media in large letters. He talks about tonight's program. With more than one quarter of New York's population Black, the Black newspapers and radio station's have new clout now, how will they use it?
00:02:44 164.73	Lipsyte welcomes viewers to the show and introduces himself. He talks about the guests coming up on tonight's program and cuts to an off site segment at New York's City Hall.
00:02:58 178.59	Pan down on New York's City Hall to the steps leading into entrance of building.
00:03:05 185.54	Host Lipsyte interviewing Bill Lynch, Deputy Mayor Intergovernmental Affairs (and former Campaign Manager for Mayor Dinkins), sitting across from Lynch in his office at City Hall.
00:03:07 187.15	INTERVIEW - LYNCH Robert Lipsyte: being elected mayor, Bill Lynch very important. Let me just say that I think that it helped to, to get our message out in the African American community. They were very interested in this race. They covered it extensively. And I think they bought a kind of sensitivity and understanding of what we were trying to do that that at least in the early part of the campaign that might not have been there in In other media outlets. Robert Lipsyte Well, how important is the black media in general? Bill Lynch I think very important. I think the African American community itself reads the black press extensively. They want to get that slant that interpretation of of what's being said out there? Robert Lipsyte Are they getting out a different message or slant? As an example, how would the black media's slant about the appointment of Dr. Woodrow Meyers inform the black community in ways that the mainstream press might not? Bill Lynch Well, let me say that not to say that the mainstream press didn't do this, but in the appointment of you go back and look, they talked about his appointment in in broader terms, and what I mean by that a lot of focus got put on the controversy around the AIDS and HIV crisis that that we have in this city that also affects the African American community, but we're also having problems with infant mortality and tuberculosis. And, you know, this report about the life expectancy of a male in Harlem is is is less than a male in, in Bangladesh. That was of interest to the to the to the African American community that and and the African American press talked about that. That is that is there is there going to be a health commissioner, not only concerned about AIDS and HIV, but are there going to be concerned about these other health problems that that are plaguing the African American community Robert Lipsyte in the the growth of the beautiful mosaic? And as minority so called minorities become majorities in the city? Do you see a change in the role of the black press? Bill Lynch No, I think that the only thing I could say is that I think that the the majority community in particular majority, community, opinion makers and media pay more attention to what is printed in in the African American press.
00:05:57 357.94	Cutaway back to Robert Lipsyte in the studio. He announces and welcomes his guests to the show: Gary Bird, Host & Executive Producer of "The Global Black Experience" on WLIB which broadcasts at the Apollo Theater; Stanley Crouch, Writer - The Village Voice, Esquire, New Republic; Wilbert Tatum, Publisher and Editor - The Amsterdam News; Andrew Cooper, Founder and Publisher, The City Sun.
00:06:51 411.44	INTERVIEW Robert Lipsyte: to putting David Dinkins in City Hall. How important will it be in shaping the agenda of his administration? Gary Byrd Well, I think that that's going to certainly depend clearly on the continued listening, that will occur at City Hall now that the Mayor Dinkins is in office. I think that in terms of black radio, specifically, one of the things that we're able to do besides the idea of just reporting what's going on at City Hall, is that we can give City Hall the opportunity of hearing exactly what people are saying about how they feel about things going on at City Hall. So it's a matter of how close that ear of City Hall is to the people, which is pretty much with black radio. Robert Lipsyte Did you have any sense yet of how responsive that he was going to be? Gary Byrd I think people are sort of maybe getting to a point where they want to know specifically in the areas of police brutality, how things are going to be handled by the mayor's office. And I think that they are waiting at this point, to hear something forthright on the issue of racial bias in the city and how the city feels about that. I think that that's pretty much where it comes from our audience almost everyday literally Robert Lipsyte Bill Tatum. What role does the Amsterdam news is going to play in in shaping this administration? You've always been kind of close to Dinkins. Wilbert Tatum David happens to be a friend. But he's the mayor now and fair game. I've got to go back a bit to the 12 years of Ed Koch. I was not welcome at City Hall. Nor did I walk into the mayor's office for almost 12 years. As a matter of fact, when I told Koch that I refuse to give him free space to write a column in my newspaper. I was persona non grata there. I had difficulty even getting various and sundry commissioners to talk to me. And very often my reporters, there was no room for black in room nine at that time, though, that's not handled by the mayor's office, but by the inner circle, that all has changed. And it's a welcome development because we can perhaps get closer to what is going on in the city as a consequence of a new policy having been generated by the by the election of an African American mayor, who is sensitive to the needs of all the people. Robert Lipsyte Andrew Cooper, the city son has been critical of David Dinkins, certainly during the campaign. You were Andrew Cooper Yes, we were. And we're not going to we're not going to change a great deal. Although I must say that we've been extremely kind lately. I think that we will not change our posture at all. I am not persona non grata at City Hall, but I'm not welcomed with open arms. I haven't been before even though David is a friend of more than 30 years. It just seems to be that when you elect to criticize any politician, you have to understand that they do not greet you with open arms and that is probably what is to happen in the future with the city son?
00:10:02 602.83	Robert Lipsyte What do you think that that as, as members of, you know, the black media, that your approach towards this mayor who is a black Mayor should be different that your responsibilities are in one way or another different from that of the so called mainstream media, Andrew Cooper I think our responsibilities may be a little different. But bottom line as a newspaper paper, I don't trust the government, whether that government is black or white, or any other color, it is our job to make sure that the government stays honest. That's what we're all about as a newspaper, simply because we're Black doesn't change that to any large degree. Robert Lipsyte Now, one of the things that bill Lynch talked about in in the interview was slant and attitude and nuance which he felt that the black media could offer the black community that the mainstream cannot, why can't Stanley crouch, a smart observer who writes basically for the mainstream press give us that attitude, nuance, can't you? Stanley Crouch Well I think what I think what you get in the kind of material that I do is often more I think the intellectual depth is a little bit rigid, and much much of what we get in the black press that I say that's because the people who are added to the black press don't necessarily have equal depth. But it seems to me that oftentimes the people that they are capable of affording don't necessarily do the best work. So it seems to me that one of the fundamental questions is whether or not people in black media are able to take on the challenge of being as good as anybody in media period. And it's not a matter of like, I don't want to sink down into this us and them them vision that a lot of people use to the detriment it seems to me the black community. I mean, I think that people like Mason Maddox and sharps have abused in us and them kind of an idea so often really to put Robert Lipsyte Would you hold that thought, because I want you to get back to it, because I thought I heard you say that you would be writing for Cooper and Tatum, if they could pay you as much as the voice of the Amsterdam. Yeah, this morning. So we're talking about the kind of money that they're able to afford. Stanley Crouch Yeah. And I think also, it's something I think also often the black press is more of an advocacy press than it is like a real minister than a completely serious press that is that. Oftentimes, black people feel that their their job is to carry a banner of some sort for the cause Robert Lipsyte Andrew Cooper, do you agree with that? Andrew Cooper No, I don't. But I noticed that Stanley from The Village Voice, and I fully understand what he's saying, I don't agree with him. I like his work. And I like what what he writes, but I don't agree at all, the black press history is that it is a protest press. That's how it started started out. And that's what it is today. Its job is to give the black audience its constituency news and information that it doesn't get elsewhere. You do not get a dimension in the mainstream press, if you will, the kinds of stories the dimension of the kinds of stories that you get about black people in the black press. That is why we exist. That is why we existed, going back to the early 1900s. And it is focused today. Robert Lipsyte That's your existence alternative on on Gary Byrd's program this morning. It was an amazing discussion about a PBS PBS documentary on Adam Clayton Powell, which which used more critics to attack him than to tell us exactly what he was about. I mean, that's really what the black media is about, isn't it? Gary Byrd Well, I think so I think in listening to Stanley's remark was interesting to me, because there's a place where I get the impression that one would think that the general market press doesn't have its own agenda. And I think that if one looks at the general market press from the New York Times, to the daily news to the polls, there is an agenda. And I think within the context of where we come from as a people, it is very clear that that agenda is not an agenda that is in our interest. So to think that they actually are doing some kind of impartial journalism or something, I think is a bit of a joke, really Robert Lipsyte You mentioned the New York Post and one of the stories that we've been covering a group named CEMOTAP that has been successful in getting black clergymen to become so called post busters. Because of their hiring policies in the way they cover stories,
00:14:38 878.75	Gary Byrd Not so much black clergymen, what they're attempting to do is to have the black community involve itself in the campaign if they agree that the post has been Robert Lipsyte But the clergyman on Sundays are giving Gary Byrd No, no, not sermons. They will they will actually give the individual members some CEMOTAP the opportunity of presenting the information to those congregations. For them to then decide, Robert Lipsyte yeah, I'm sure you're accepted. We've shot on tape. The Reverend Calvin butts giving a sermon, attacking very personally attacking the New York Post. This this kind of story. We're bill Tatum, this kind of story of CEMOTAP a grassroots organization. boycotting the New York Post has not yet surfaced in the mainstream media. Wilbert Tatum Yes, it has. You've seen, there have been stories in several newspapers, including the observer, but they've been very tiny stories, but they've surfaced in the mainstream media. But I wanted to give an example, based upon what Gary said about mainstream press having its agenda, white press, not mainstream press, because that's precisely what I mean. Just recently, I returned from South Africa and from Sweden, where I met with Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo. It just so happened, they had been they had invited a man named Jesse Lewis Jackson, to come to Sweden, and to meet with Oliver Tambo, and Jesse Jackson, at haga castle. Now, mainstream media was in Stockholm at that particular time, not one word, not one word. And the American press total about Jesse Jackson's visit invited by two of the most prominent figures of our time. Robert Lipsyte What does that mean to you? Wilbert Tatum It means a well, when I go up to Ethiopia, to the the African Congress on economics, the mainstream presses, they're never almost never a word. It means to me that Jesse Lewis Jackson was blacked out if you forgive the expression, blacked out of the white press. He was invited. Mr. Baker, our secretary went down to Johannesburg. Mr. Sisulu did not wish to have him there. Jesse Jackson, who got 7 million votes in America running for president was invited. He was also invited to Namibia almost ignored complete climbing by the white media Robert Lipsyte If you're a consuer of journalism, black or white, you're not getting obviously that kind of information. Are there other stories that that are being printed in the black press or broadcast and black radio, that black and white, you know, people are not getting Wilbert Tatum in number for number of arenas too Robert Lipsyte what would be an example. Andrew Cooper First of all, I think that the new Bob, and this program should be congratulated for doing the CEMOTAP story because it just is not widely disseminated at all, in terms of what is being printed, printed and not being printed, printed. My Report Porter, who was who is also the managing editor of the paper, you trace lead was in the courtroom of the opening statement by Alton Maddox around the shop and trial. Alton Maddox did a magnificent job in presenting in an opening statement statement what that trial was about. Absolutely fantastic. You never saw a word about that in the daily price press. And you're not going to say anything about the magnificence of this man who is a consummate lawyer, an excellent lawyer, you're never going to see that. You're never going to hit hear that unless you see it in a black newspaper. And unless you hear it on a black radio station, the gatekeepers of the news in this town in mainstream media, white meat media's bill accurately says our white males, they have an agenda. Black people are not on that agenda at all Robert Lipsyte Stanley crouch you have you are feeding several camps. Is it as black and white as that Stanley Crouch Oh no, I think that's absurd. I think one of the things is this is that I mean, if you I've listened to Mr. Maddox many times on WLIB By the way, or like I said, this is a codename for it not as a joke is called w MMS w Mason, Maddox and Sharpton. I mean, I've heard Mr. Maddox often saying that into just hysterical name, call it now whether or not that was what he did in courses. I was not there is not the question. But one of the things that I raise often in my book, is this. I mean, it seems to me that when something is wrong, as with the Tawana Brawley case, you know, I mean, a very serious questions that have to be raised about that case, and the way that those people were treated in black media, you know, and it seems to me that, to a large extent, black media was embarrassed, you know, because people tended to avoid addressing certain kinds of fundamental questions that had to be raised about what those guys were doing, how they were doing, how their demands constantly changed. Initially, people forget, they demanded that Abrams that Abrams prosecute the case himself, when he said he would do it, then they said he didn't have he didn't have enough trial experience. And it seems to me that that that what black media should be doing is not speaking solely to the black community, but to the condition at large. I mean, it seems to me that what the fundamental issue is this, you affect policy Finally, by converting enough of the electorate to your position to have an effect on how policy is changed. Now, whether if people want to constantly talk about us in them, that's not how politics works. The way you get bills passed, the way you get agendas changed is by convincing enough people that it is in their interest at large as people as citizens of New York or the state of New York, or the country at large. See when for instance, Cuomo got up and said of the Tawana Brawley case when it seemed like it was a serious case. Initially, when he said I look at Tawana Brawley as though she is my daughter, you know, as though this is something that all people should be concerned with. That, to me, is what the job of serious writers series broadcasters are supposed to be doing, not to pretend that there is not racism, it is not police brutality, that they are not double standards and hiring practices. But to be so strong in clarifying the issues that someone doesn't, you don't give a person the freedom to say, Oh, that's just those black people with their stuff.
00:21:28 1288.21	Robert Lipsyte And you feel this is not happening now in the black media. Stanley Crouch I feel like it happens up and down. I mean, finances on WLIB I think that the the the news that they give, you know, where you get a lot of things about, about the Caribbean, about African politics, about a number of issues around the country, are very important. I think that there's often an irresponsible freedom that that demagogues and rabble rousers are given and that other people who have opinions that are that do not fall into those those categories, Robert Lipsyte Let's ask Gary Byrd, when it your station, particularly Is there a particular responsibility? Gary Byrd Well, you know, it's an interesting thing, when I hear the question of responsibility, because in the very broadcast that Stanley just mentioned, in the lobby of the broadcast, and we didn't allow them into the theater, where we were actually doing the broadcast, we're about maybe 13 members representing all the major press corps in New York, who were there to cover the same event now in the context of whatever they had to say, we don't know whatever they're going to say if it's a major story, we're covering the story, whatever their positions are, the positions that they're presenting. So it's an odd thing to talk about us actually covering the story and being irresponsible, giving them the coverage, when the same press corps that I assume he's from, is actually waiting outside to cover the same presentation and would have covered it inside the theater with us at the same time. So what we do is we attempt to give a voice to various segments of the community, it's a it's a difficult thing to somehow imagine that we are on the air as much as we're on. And with all the different dimensions that are exposed over Li B, that somehow as as as Stanley put it, that we beco Robert Lipsyte Also the assumption that you're listening or your readers are only listening or reading to you. I mean, they're probably with all due respect, more black readers of the Daily News than of the the sun in the Amsterdam News combined. So so there's a different function. Mr. Tatum, in the sense of being an alternative voice, you are yet another voice from what most of your readers aren't you? Wilbert Tatum I would suggest that we are the one of the alternative voices, because what you see in our newspaper about the very lives of people, you see, if you were to read the mainstream press, we don't. We're not born, we don't die. We don't go to school. We don't get married, we don't have a life of our own. Part of that is the function, the black press that says we do in fact exist. The mainstream press of the white press does a magnificent job and telling us how many basketballs somebody scored, how many footballs in threw a how somebody punched somebody out, or how much dope somebody took. But if you look at all these newspapers combined, you find that in terms of what we do, is either singing, or dancing, or criminality, or sports. There are other dimensions Robert Lipsyte And even in even in the black press, it's not a monolith. I mean, the Amsterdam News and the City Sun have very different newspapers. Andrew Cooper Well, we have different styles. And although the the rumors abroad that bill Tatum and I are dedicated enemies is not not true at all. We Wilbert Tatum Andy, you started that Andrew Cooper I promoted it. It sells papers. But anyway, we are not dedicated enemies. We're just we're just enemies. And I take pity on on Mr. Tatum because he's fat and old. And it just so happens that I'm young and strong. Robert Lipsyte your circulation figures are about the same? Andrew Cooper Well, yeah, but we're only six shows us well, I'm a big baby compared to the old man. So I'm very proud of the fact that we do compete, and we do compete very well. And we have different styles. And we take a different angle. And there certainly are enough black readers out there to support us both in magnificent style in the style that Mr. Tatum is supported in and the one that I would like to be supported in. However, we have a problem. And we have a similar problem problem. When the white press discovered they could not get stories in the 60s with a white press corps. It was an entirely segregated press corps. They went after the black press, best reporters and they got them. They got them because they had money. And they they paid for it like they paid for it. Like they pay Stanley Robert Lipsyte , we're almost out of time. Let me ask you this. And this is a critical question has have those black reporters in the white press made a difference to the to the white press. Wilbert Tatum Let me take that not really not to listen to black out in their silence. Talk about writing stories or sending in dispatches that don't get in or that are altered by the gatekeepers is a degree of sadness, I can hardly stand because they say they want the meaning the white press want what they have decided they want before they ever go out. And when they then when they write what they see. It is sometimes altered or they don't get the assignment or they write it and they don't say anything that they don't get these kinds of Robert Lipsyte this is a subject we're going to have to talk about some more Wilbert Tatum Gary Byrd, Andrew Cooper Stanley Crouch. Thanks very much for being with us. That's the 11th hour. I'm Robert Lipsyte.
00:27:15 1635.94	Interview concludes, Lipsyte thanks each guest.
00:27:18 1638.47	Lipsyte announces the show and introduces himself. Show ends.
00:27:25 1645.23	Credits overlay show graphics
00:28:21 1701.25	Funding by announcer. Charitable orgs overlay The Eleventh Hour graphic
00:29:02 1742.34	End Reel.