A. Triviality
Every media outlet shares the same principal aim: to expand its share of the
market. It does this by seeking to grab and hold onto people's attention. This
is why the media concentrates so much on events rather than issues, and especially
trivial, flashy and colourful events. Most journalists are convinced that people
can't concentrate for more than a few seconds. This is mainly because they can't
concentrate for more than a few seconds.
On the face of it, this is a major disadvantage for us, as our aim is to make
people aware of big and important issues.
B. Bias
Many outlets have a secondary aim: of pandering to the prejudices of their proprietors.
As most large news-gathering organisations are run by perverse billionaires
whose interests are at odds with those of the rest of society, this makes life
still harder for us.
In practice, it means that there are some outlets we simply have to avoid: there's
no point in approaching the Sun, for example, unless you're appealling to narrow
nationalism or are prepared to get your tits out. Stay well away from the Daily
Mail, unless you're highlighting an animal rights issue which doesn't involve
a confrontation with big business/landowners/hunters etc.
But there are often a surprising number of opportunities for making use of other
parts of the right-wing media: some of the things that occasionally slip past
the editors' noses at the Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph, for example, are pretty
unexpected. While their editors and proprietors may be total bastards, a lot
of journalists are not bad people, just weak and cowardly. Many of them want
to help, and will look for opportunities to do so without upsetting their bosses.
Newspapers are allowed to be partisan, and expected to be by their readers.
But the broadcast media are legally obliged to be balanced and fair. In practice,
as we know, this isn't always the case, and there are certain programmes, such
as Littlejohn, which you should avoid at all costs. More importantly, their
concept of fairness is a narrow one: as long as both Labour and Tory politicians
have had their say, balance is seen to have been achieved, even if the view
from Westminster represents just a tiny part of the political spectrum.
Most broadcast outlets are also very conscious of the views of their advertisers,
and even more trashy than the printed ones. The result is, once again, conservatism:
broadcast journalists appear to be terrified of telling their audience something
it doesn't know already.
C. The Game
Another way in which we're up against it is that we take our campaigns seriously,
while interviewers tend to see their work as a game, whose political outcome
is immaterial, but which must be played by a set of rules. These rules are,
at first sight, obscure to people without a lot of media experience. If you
don't play by the rules, it's a foul and you're sent off. As our only objective
is to win, regardless of etiquette, we tend to foul more often than other contributers.
As a result, sometimes we come across very badly.
That's the bad news, but there's also plenty of good news: we have several significant
advantages over our opponents.
PART 2: OUR ADVANTAGES
A. Integrity
We're genuine people, not hired hands defending a corporate or institutional
position. This shows when we allow it to: an open and straightforward appeal
to commonsense can cut through the clamour of self-interest and spin-doctoring
with a powerful resonance. When we keep our message uncluttered and get straight
to the point, we can be devastatingly effective.
B. Articulating Public Sentiment
People are increasingly prepared to listen to what we have to say: many know
in their heart of hearts that things are going badly wrong, and could be very
much better. Activists in the media have often been able to reach parts of the
public psyche that no one else can touch, as they articulate sentiments that
have never been put into words before. Hard as it may be to believe, a lot of
mainstream journalists are secretly sympathetic to the causes we espouse.
C. Inherent media friendliness
We're colourful, fun, outlandish and outrageous. Much as television executives
might claim to hate us, television cameras love us.
PART 3: HOW TO GET THE PRESS TO COME TO YOUR ACTION
News doesn't just happen; it is made to happen. News, in other words, is managed
and manipulated. And if we don't manage it, someone else will.
A. Coordination
Media work tends to be tacked onto actions as an afterthought, with the result
that there's almost always too little of it and too late. Invariably, far too
much is left to chance, which means that actions often end up alienating more
people than they reach or, even worse, get completely ignored. If we built our
tree houses with as little forethought and care as we conduct our press work,
there would have been some pretty gruesome accidents by now.
Reaching the media is as time-consuming, as demanding and as necessary as building
lock-ons or digging tunnels. If we don't start tackling this task with the efficiency
and creativity that we bring to the rest of our work, we'll be worsted again
and again by our opponents.
This means that every action aimed at altering public opinion must have a dedicated
media coordinator, whose job is to ensure that the activists' point of view
reaches the wider world. She or he must be responsible for planning a press
strategy, drawing up a hit-list of journalists, preparing press releases and
briefing spokespeople. Ideally the coordinator will build up a small team, including
someone who stays behind to write and despatch up-to-the-minute press releases
and people who will meet and escort the journalists who come to an action.
Not everyone is going to be good at handling the press. To do the job well,
you need to be confident, sociable and pretty mouthy. At least one person on
the team should be able to write well. But media skills, like any others, can
be learnt, and surprisingly quickly.
B. Timing
Is critical. You have to give journalists enough notice of your action or initiative,
but not so much that they forget about it. A good time to put out a first, advance
press release, for example, is about ten days beforehand, with a second one
sent out two days beforehand. Journalists don't only have a three-second attention
span, they also have a three-second memory, so you've got to keep on their case.
The day of the week is also important. A great day for an action, from the point
of view of publicity, is Sunday, as not a lot happens on Sundays, and journalists
need something to put in Monday's papers and in Sunday afternoon's news programmes.
If you can do it before lunch, so much the better. The later in the day something
happens, the less likely the newspapers are to cover it, as they can't get it
to press on time.
If you really want your action to be ignored by the press, then do it on Budget
Day. In other words, look out for what else is happening that day. If there's
a huge story pending, you don't want to be competing with it. Nor do you want
to be competing with another alternative event: they won't cover two protests
on the same day.
C. Pre-publicity
Most journalists are also astoundly unimaginative and cowardly: they don't want
to touch an issue unless it's already been mentioned in the press. If you can
pull it off (and it's not always possible), it's very useful to get a friendly
and trustworthy journalist to flag the action up a week or two beforehand, without
giving too much away.
The best way to achieve this is:
First find your journalist
Invite her/him to your meetings, under what are called "Chatham House"
rules. This means that they can't make use of anything they hear there without
your permission.
Create an atmosphere of secrecy, excitement and intrigue, which only that journalist
(or, as a maximum, two or three journalists) is privy to. All journalists love
to imagine they're in the Famous Five.
Be very nice to them and make them think they're part of the gang.
Once it's been mentioned in the press, you'll find that there's a lot more interest
from other reporters. Pathetic really, but there you have it.
D. Press releases
Journalists speak only one language, and that's their own. If you're going to
reach them you have to speak that language too. This means that your press release
should mimic the format and style of a news story. It's a simple and straightforward
formula and (sorry to be dictatorial) it MUST be applied. If it isn't, your
press release won't work. Period.
Here's how to do it:
____________________________________________________
(from top of page)
i. Your contact details
ii. Embargo
iii. HEADLINE (NO MORE THAN EIGHT WORDS)
iv. First paragraph: one sentence which tells the whole story.
v. Two
or three
short paragraphs explaining the story.
vi. Contact details (again)
(bottom of page)
____________________________________________________
(new page)
vii. Notes for journalists
____________________________________________________
Here's how to fill it in, section by section:
i. Your contact details. No journalist will run a story without them.
Essentials are:
The name of your organisation/disorganisation (preferably big, bold and across
the top of the page)
One or more contact names
Contact number(s): where contacts are DEFINITELY going to be for at least the
next two days (mobile phone numbers are useful).
i.An embargo means that you are instructing journalists not to publish or broadcast
the information in the press release before a certain time. There are several
good reasons for an embargo:
Journalists will know they aren't going to be trumped by anyone else getting
in before them.
It creates a sense of event.
Timelines concentrate journalists' minds.
You know when to expect publicity, so you can plan subsequent news management
around it.
NB: An embargo doesn't mean that journalists won't be stupid enough to phone
the police or the company due to be occupied and ask what they think. So don't
stick anything on your press release which you don't want to be generally known.
This is the usual format:
EMBARGO: 00.01am, Friday 15th May
00.01 is a good time, as the papers can then keep up with the broadcasters,
and it's less confusing than 00.00.
DON'T put on an embargo if you've got some immediate news, that you want on
the radio or TV straight away. Generally, you'd embargo a press release giving
advance warning of an action (till about 24 hours before the action's due to
start), but not a press release which comes out once the action's started.
i.The headline must be short, pithy and to the point. Avoid mystery,
elaborate puns or being too clever. The purpose of the headline is to grab the
journalists' attention and give them an idea of what the press release is about.
If it doesn't do both of these things, they'll read no further and dump it in
the bin. It must be NO MORE than eight words long. Use a big, bold font.
Writing headlines isn't easy, and generally takes a good deal of practice. So
practise. Look at how they do it in the papers, then try writing headlines for
imaginary actions, or real ones which aren't going to happen for a while. Remember:
in this as in all writing, a straightforward, plain style is best.
ii.The first paragraph. This isn't easy either but, like the headline,
it's essential to get it right. You've got ONE sentence in which to tell the
whole story. If the journalist doesn't get the jist of it, she or he won't read
on.
There is nothing so complicated that its essential point can't be summarised
in a simple sentence. So work out what you're trying to say, then boil it down
to its essence. As before, look at the news stories in the papers and see how
they do it.
iii.The rest of the text. Must be no more than two or three paragraphs
long, each of which should be no longer than one or two straightforward sentences.
They should expand on what you say in the first paragraph. Keep it simple and
avoid jargon. Assume (and you won't be far wrong) that journalists know nothing.
If there is other essential information which you can't fit in, put it in the
Notes for Journalists section. (see below).
Above all, make sure that the first and second paragraphs have covered all the
five Ws: WHO, WHY, WHAT, WHERE and WHEN.
iv.Your contact details again. Remember: most journalists have a three second memory, are wilfully blind and very, very stupid, so you have to keep on their case.
v.Notes to journalists. This is optional. Preferably they should
be on a separate page. Journalists have got very little time, and the sight
of a huge block of text which is hard to digest will put them off. They want
to look at the first page and know that the essentials of the story are there.
If they want more, they can turn over and read on.
Generally, you'd write no more than four or five paragraphs of notes (and certainly
no more than a page). They should give more details about the rationale for
the action: eg facts and figures about genetically engineered soya, DBFO roads
etc. In other words, this is the place for the complex information which might
put journalists off if it's on the front page.
Number the paragraphs in this section, as it makes it them look easier to digest.
E. What makes a press release effective
News, of course, is meant to be all about novelty, so emphasise what's new about
your action. This shouldn't be difficult as the DIY movement is so creative
and innovative: people are always coming up with exciting new approaches, so
all you have to do is make sure the press hears about them.
Take the Birmingham Northern Relief Road protest, for example. A headline like
"Protesters occupy trees along route of new road" will consign a press
release straight to the bin, as most journalists will imagine they've heard
it all before. But "World's longest sermon threatens to stop new road"
(telling the story of the vicar who has discovered that it's illegal to interrupt
a priest during his sermon, and intends to preach continually in front of the
threatened trees) will make them sit up and wonder what it's all about. If you
want to mention the tree-sit, you can do so further on in the text.
There might also be a new political aspect of the story you can use to attract
the journalists' attention to your protest: "New road could destroy region's
economy, experts say" would, for most journalists, be counter-intuitive
and interesting (which shows how much they've been paying attention).
If your action's outside London, and you're organizing transport to get there,
say so in the press release, pointing out that journalists are welcome to join
you on the coach. Many reporters are so lazy that they won't bother turning
up unless everything's laid on for them.
F. When to send press releases
The most critical press release is the one that goes out about two days before
the event. Without it, you won't get much coverage, if any at all. But it's
a good idea to put one out much earlier than that as well - about ten days prior
to the event - so that when the journalists get the second one they should be
ready to respond to it.
It's also important to send out a third one the moment the action begins, telling
them you've succeeded in stopping work on the bypass/locking Group 4 in their
offices etc.
If it's a one day action and your press person has still got the
energy and resources, it's no bad thing to send out a fourth press release saying
how it all went. A journalist's interest is pretty unpredictable, and could
be stimulated at any time.
If the action lasts longer than one day, send out a new press release every
day, as long as you've got something to say. Once the event's in the press already,
there'll be plenty of opportunities for follow-ups. This is the time when you
can sometimes get them to cover the issue you're trying to highlight, rather
than simply the event.
G. Who to send them to
The secret of all successful press releasing is getting them to the right people
- so find out who the right people are. Make a list of:
Media outlets you want to reach
Individual journalists who seem to be interested in/sympathetic
to the cause
The more you can reach the better, of course, but, unless you're just aiming
at the local press, realistically you want to try to press release at least
forty places.
If it's a national action and you want national publicity, they
must include the following:
All the broadsheet newspapers
BBC newsroom
ITN/Channel 4 newsroom
Newsnight
The Today programme (on Radio 4), plus PM, The World at One, The World Tonight
Radio 5 Live
NB: You should adapt the tone and contents of your press release to the media
you're trying to reach. "Road protesters come to Romford" might be
of interest to the Newham Recorder, but to get to the nationals you'd need something
more like "New front opens in road war".
H. How to send press releases
Faxing is still the best way to send them, and a fax modem is invaluable. Some
journalists are beginning to emerge from the Neolithic, so they might be contactable
by email, but on the whole the communications industry is the last place to
use up-to-date communications (except the Department of Trade and Industry,
which runs the government's Technology Foresight programme, yet can't use email).
Don't use snail mail: it invariably gets lost/disregarded/placed on the bottom
of the pile.
To get fax numbers, simply phone the papers, TV and radio stations in question and ask for the fax number of the Newsdesk. If you also want to send your press releases to named journalists at the same organisation, it's best to get their fax numbers off them: reception will often give you the wrong fax number, or one that's been out of date for months. Keep all the fax numbers you get for future reference. Best of all, load them permanently into your computer, so, once you've decided who should get what, your fax modem can contact them automatically.
I. Following up
One thing of which you can be absolutely certain is that something will get
lost in the newsrooms you're targetting: either your press release, the journalist's
concentration or the essence of the story. This means you MUST follow it up
with a phone call.
Just a quick one will do. Ask: Did you get it? Will you be covering the action?
Do you need any more information?
They're likely to be rude, gruff and unhelpful. But don't be put off - they're
paid to be like that. Make sure you're ready, if need be, to summarise the story
in one or two sentences; the first question the journalist will ask is "wot's
it all about then?", and her/his attention will wander if you spend more
than ten seconds telling them.
However rude they are, never fail to be polite and charming: at
the very least, you'll put them to shame.
PART 4: HOW TO DEAL WITH THE JOURNALISTS WHO COME TO YOUR ACTION
The whole media-exploitation process is about news management, and this is just
as much the case once journalists get to the action as it is when you're trying
to attract them. You've got to give the best possible account of what you're
doing, and provide the clearest possible explanation of why you're doing it.
This means:
A. Make sure the right people talk to the journalists.
Different people do different things best. Some are brilliant at building treehouses
or digging shit pits, but not much good at being charming to the running dogs
of the counter-revolution. Some people will have just dropped a tab of acid
or have last night's vomit stuck in their hair. This won't endear them to journalists,
who, in most cases, will be having enough trouble crossing the cultural divide
as it is.
Talking to the press is something of an art form: you must be charming, persuasive
and well-briefed. Best of all, you'll have practised, by persuading your friends
to pretend to be hostile reporters.
B. Be careful, but don't come across as suspicious.
Some of them will be there to help you, others will be there to get you. Sometimes
the ones out to get you will pretend to be out to help you. The only real safeguards
are:
to know who they all are. Ask them who they are and who they work for. Some
journalists are notorious for dissing the movement (eg John Harlow, James Bartholemew,
Sebastian Sebag Montefiore). You should find out who the dodgy ones are before
the action, so you'll know to be ultra-careful if they turn up.
not to say anything stupid or risky
be friendly towards them, whoever they are. Bite your lip. Don't put their backs
up even if you hate the bastards.
C. Be a tour guide.
Take them round the site, show them what you want them to see, and steer them
away from what you don't want them to see. Introduce them to the people who'll
get on well with them, and keep them away from the people who won't be able
to restrain their contempt. If it doesn't seem like a major intrusion on their
privacy, stay with them, in a friendly way, and talk them through everything
they see.
D. Be ready to deal with the ones who don't turn up
However good your publicity, lots of journalists won't be able to make it, but
might still be interested. They'll want to know what's happening and how things
are going, so there should be at least one person on site with a working and
charged-up mobile phone whose number has been posted on the press release. Journalists
are suckers for on-the-spot reports, so when they ring, put some excitement
into your voice. Give them plenty of colour, make them feel they can see it.
PART 5: BEING INTERVIEWED
Interviews and studio discussions are a bloodsport, and you, the interviewee,
are the one of the combatants. People watch or listen to them in the earnest
hope that one or other of the participants will be gored to death. Like any
other fight, you win not through brute force but through skill. And, like any
other sport, there are rules you have to follow.
So here are the rules and tactics. Try them out on your friends. Practice, as
in any other sport, is absolutely critical. If you haven't done many interviews
before, get someone to pretend to be the interviewer a day or two before you're
due to go on, and get her or him to give you a hard time. See how you do, and
find out which parts of your technique you'll have to brush up.
If you don't practise, expect to be caught out every time. If you do practise,
you'll find that all you have to do is repeat what you've been through already,
which isn't a scary prospect at all.
Rules and tactics
i. Be informed. This is the golden rule. Remember, this is an information war, and the best warriors are the ones with the best information. Don't go into a studio unless you're confident that you know your subject better than the person you're up against, and can head her or him off if they try to outfox you with some new facts. This means lots of reading. Make sure your information is reliable and stands up to critical examination.
ii. Be calm. However much the issue, or your opponent, winds you up, you mustn't let it show. Generally the calmest person is the one whom the audience sees as the winner. This doesn't mean you can't be passionate and enthusiastic - indeed these are good things - but your passion and enthusiasm must be tightly controlled and mustn't, repeat mustn't, spill over into anger. If necessary, take a deep breath before answering the question. Be polite but firm with everyone.
iii. Be concise. It's amazing how little time you get. You must know exactly what you want to say, and say it in as few words as possible, with clarity and determination. The main point must come at the beginning of the interview: you should summarise the whole issue in just one or two sentences before expanding on your theme.
iv. It's the answers that count, not the questions. When you go into the studio, you must know exactly what you want to say and how you want to say it. Don't be too scrupulous about answering the question: deal with it as briefly as possible, then get to the points you want to make. You must leave the studio at the end of the interview knowing you've made the most important points as effectively as possible.
v. Don't try to make too many points. You want to have a maximum of three main lines of argument. Any more and both you and the audience will get lost.
vi. Finish your point. If the interviewer tries to interrupt you before you've got to the important thing you want to say, don't be afraid to carry on talking until you've said it. Sometimes it's useful to say "Just a moment" or "If you'd let me finish". Be assertive without being rude. Don't let yourself be bullied.
vii. Simplicity. Make your points as clearly as possible. Use short sentences and simple words. Try not to use sub-clauses (a sentence within a sentence), as you might confuse the listener.
viii. Turn hostile questions to good account.
There are several ways of doing this:
Deal with the question quickly, then move on to what you want to talk about.
This is the simplest and safest way of handling tricky questions. A good way
of going about it is to agree with part of the question, then show that it's
not the whole story. "Yes, of course human welfare is critically important,
but that doesn't mean we should neglect animal welfare. At the moment, x per
cent of all dairy cows die before they're six years old because of the terrible
conditions they're kept in. Now that doesn't do them any good or us any good."
Or: "Yes, destroying the potatos will affect the farmer's livelihood to
a small extent. But the issues at stake are enormous. If these plants were allowed
to reach maturity …"
Deliberately misinterpreting the question. "You're quite right, there were
a lot of undesirable elements at the protest. In fact, there's an urgent need
to regulate the security industry properly. Do you know that a lot of security
guards have criminal records for violent assault? It's symptomatic of the whole
road-building industry: they don't care what they do or who they do it to."
Undermining the factual content of the question. In other words, don't let the
interviewer push you into a corner. (eg Q: "But, given that biotechnology
is necessary to feed the world, what you're really doing is putting wildlife
before humanity." A: "In fact you're wrong to suggest that biotechnology
is necessary to feed the world. By concentrating food production into the hands
of a few multinational corporations …").
But always, always, bring your answer back round to the point.
ix. Leave your notes behind. If what you want to say isn't in your head, you shouldn't be in the studio.
x. Project. You're not having a casual chat with the interviewer
or the other guest. You have come to make some important points, and you must
get them across in such a way that the viewer or listener can't possibly ignore
them.
This means that you should put more emphasis into your voice than you'd do in
a normal conversation. It might sound strange to you when you first do it (and
practice it before you do a real interview), but on air it'll sound fine. In
fact, if you don't do it, you'll sound flat and boring. TV and radio are all
brightness and colour, and you must sound bright and colourful to make an impact.
It's a bit of a balancing act, projecting well without ceasing to stay calm.
xi. Use your body. On TV a good rule is that your head and torso should stay fairly still (which makes you seem solid and trustworthy), but your hands should lend emphasis to what you say (they can help to drive your points home). Eyebrows are pretty useful too.
xii. Humour. If you can do it without making it sound frivolous or irrelevant, a bit of humour can help a lot to win your audience over. Gently satirising your opponent's position is often quite effective. ("Well, let's take a look at this Countryside Alliance. Its main funder is the Duke of Westminster, who, as his name suggests, is a horny-handed son of rural toil. Unfortunately, his rolling green acres in Mayfair and Belgravia keep him in town quite a bit, but at least that allows him to fight off the undemocratic tendencies of the urban oppressor from the benches of the House of Lords…").
xiii. Don't hate your opponent. This is perhaps the hardest task
of all, but it is absolutely necessary. Whatever you might think about the person
you're up against, you must leave your feelings at the door of the studio. If
you allow yourself to hate them, you'll lose your cool, lose focus and lose
public sympathy. One way of dealing with your feelings is to regard your opponent
as someone who has been misled and needs to be told the truth. Think of your
role as being to put them right, rather than to put them down, and you'll find
that when you go into the studio you'll be a lot less tense.
And remember - when you go into a studio, you are there to tackle one issue
and one issue alone, not to put right the ills of the whole world. Concentrate
on one task, and you'll make life a great deal easier for yourself.
PART 6: FOLLOWING UP
A. Keeping up your contacts
It's a good idea to write down the names and numbers of all the journalists
you meet, and maybe make a brief note of what they're like and how they treated
the subject. If you're going to be involved in a long campaign, keep the sympathetic
ones informed about it every so often, so that when the next event comes up,
they won't have forgotten what it's all about. Share your contact lists and
experiences with people in other campaigns: it could help them a lot.
B. Complaining
Activists are treated unfairly by the press more often than any other group
of people except gypsies, travellers and asylum seekers. The reasons are not
hard to divine: we are challenging powerful vested interests, we are prepared
to break the law and, above all, we can be discussed collectively without any
fear of libel, as we do not belong to incorporated organisations.
So, for example, the Sunday Times could claim that "eco-terrorist"
tree-sitters at Solsbury Hill booby-trapped buildings, attacked guards with
catapaults and crossbows and dug pitfall traps full of metal stakes, safe in
the knowledge that, as long as no one was named, no one could sue, even though
the whole bullshit story was refuted by the police. Had it, on the other hand,
made the same allegations about security guards, Reliance would have sued the
pants off it, even if neither the company nor the guards were named, as Reliance
was the only security company on site.
Redressing bullshit stories is difficult, time-consuming and often very frustrating,
but sometimes it works. If we don't complain, the media will feel free to do
the same thing again and again, so it's worth trying, even if it ends in failure.
Here are the options:
i.If you're fantastically rich, have been named in person and have lots of free
time, sue for libel. It's not an option for most of us, but if you know a lawyer
who's prepared to work for free and the case is a clear-cut one, it is worth
sending a threatening letter. If it's sufficiently convincing, it might prompt
the paper or programme to issue an apology and settle out of court: and a few
thousand quid for your cause never goes amiss. Don't try it without a lawyer:
they'll just laugh it off. There is no legal aid for libel cases.
ii.If you or your movement have been slagged off unfairly in the papers, but
there's no possibility of legal redress, there are several other options. None
of them are ideal, but they're all better than nothing:
Write a letter for publication. Make sure it's short, pertinent and not personally
insulting. Humour and irony are particularly useful weapons.
If you can bear to, talk to the journalist who stitched you up. Be ultra-reasonable
and put your case calmly and clearly. Just occasionally, this works, and she
or he will relent and write a follow-up piece, putting your side of the story.
This is very long shot but, if you've got good writing skills, see if you can
persuade the comment editor to let you write a column putting your case.
Appeal to the Press Complaints Commission. It's a voluntary body set up by the
newspapers themselves and is, as a result, pretty useless, even though most
of its members are now drawn from outside the press. Its code of practice includes
guidance on respect for privacy, the right to reply and journalists' behaviour.
The Press Complaints Commission, 1 Salisbury Square, London EC4 8AE. Fax: 0171 353 8355. Tel: 0171 353 1248
i.If you've been stitched up by the broadcast media, your prospects
are rather better. It's governed by quite a few laws and codes, which are supposed
to protect both the public interest and individual rights.
If you've got a small complaint, take it up with the progamme concerned: preferably
with either the producer or the series editor. If you don't get satisfaction,
try one of the following:
If it's a BBC TV or radio programme: The BBC Programme Complaints Unit, BBC
Broadcasting House, London W1A 1AA
If it's an ITV programme: The Independent Television Commission, 33 Foley Street,
London W1P 7LB. Fax: 0171 306 7800. Tel: 0171 255 3000. Email: 100731.3515@compuserve.com
If it's an independent radio programme: The Radio Authority, Holbrook House,
14 Great Queen Street, London WC2B 5DG. Fax: 0171 405 7064. Tel: 0171 430 2724.
If you've got a major complaint, contact the Broadcasting Standards Commission,
as well as one of the above. BSC, 7 The Sanctuary, London SW1P 3JS. Fax: 0171
233 0544. Tel: 0171 222 3172.
In all cases, make sure you include the name and date of the programme. Be prepared
for a long wait, and keep on their case.
Cumbersome and slow as it is, complaining about unfairness in the broadcast
media can be spectacularly worthwhile, as the producers of Channel 4's asinine
Against Nature series found to their cost. Following thousands of viewer complaints,
the Independent Television Commission delivered one of the most damning verdicts
in its history, with the result that Channel 4 had to make a humiliating prime-time
apology and the series director, Martin Durkin, had to resign from the company
he works for. With luck, he will never work in mainstream television again.
Remember: if they stitch you up and you don't complain, they'll do it to you
again and again.
PART 7: CONCLUSION
All campaigning is hard work, and exploiting the media is just as hard as any
other aspect. We've tended to neglect it in the past, and then wonder why no
one comes to our actions. Our movement needs specialist media workers just as
much as it needs specialist tree-climbers. The more there are, the more clearly
our message will come across, and the more people will be attracted to our cause.
This is how small rumblings turn into earthquakes. The revolution will be televised,
but that doesn't mean that it won't also be live.
index - organisation - attack - defence - other