Coalition Campaigns Against Cable Company Coercion, For Consumer Choice
by Bill Fancher and Jenni Parker
May 6, 2004
(AgapePress) - Pro-family advocates have formed a coalition in an effort to urge cable companies to give families more choice concerning the channels that are transmitted into their homes, rather than forcing them to accept whatever channels come in pre-packaged bundles.Several pro-family groups are demanding that cable companies begin allowing people to select the channels they want to have in their own self-designed cable packages. Among these groups is Concerned Women for America (CWA), which released the results of a national poll yesterday revealing that 80 percent of the American people think cable customers should not "be required to pay for a basic package of programming that might include channels they don't want to view."
Jan LaRue, chief counsel for CWA, says Americans are fed up with paying for someone's else's choices and want to pay for what they choose to watch and nothing else. "Having to block out programming you pay for is no choice -- it's a rip-off," she says.
The national poll, conducted last month by Wirthlin Worldwide, also asked non-cable subscribers whether they would be more or less likely to subscribe to cable television if they could choose the programming to be included in their basic cable package. Of those surveyed, 66 percent responded that they would be "more likely to subscribe" under those terms, and 39 percent of those said they were "much more likely to subscribe."
In an effort to encourage consumer calls to Capitol Hill, CWA has joined a national advertising campaign designed to raise awareness for channel choice. That campaign is already in full swing: Americans United for Cable Choice has purchased a full-page ad in USA Today calling on U.S. citizens to voice their support for cable choice. And Citizens for Community Values, a Cincinnati-based pro-family group, will continue the action alert with radio ads running this week during the National Cable Telecommunications Association Convention in New Orleans, Louisiana, and across the nation throughout this month on the Salem Radio Network, ESPN, and ABC Info/Entertainment network.
Family Research Council President Tony Perkins joined with other coalition groups to unveil the ad campaign at a Wednesday press conference on Capitol Hill. In a statement to the press, Perkins noted, "The FCC's recent crackdown on indecency after this year's Super Bowl half-time show has prompted a major discussion in almost every American household about cable choice. The public has a right to control what comes in and out of their homes, and what comes out of the family budget."
Meanwhile, Arizona Republican Senator John McCain has added his voice to those calling upon cable companies to be fair to consumers. "When I go to the grocery store and I want to buy a dozen eggs, no one requires me to buy a loaf of bread and a pound of hamburger or anything else in a package in order for me to do that," the senator says.
But that is just what the cable companies are doing to subscribers, McCain contends, and he says it is past time to let the people have a say in the choice of channels that come into their homes.
And Georgia Republican Representative Nathan Deal is another political figure who feels families deserve this ability. "Families are requesting that they be given a choice about what comes into their home," he says. In light of the recent public "furor" over the issue of indecency, the conservative congressman says many people feel that "if they have the ability to select the channels that come into their home, they can by that selection process deal with much of the material that they might otherwise find objectionable."
But for the time being, U.S. cable companies are getting away with forcing many families to take channels that contain programming they neither approve of nor desire, simply in order to get the channels they actually want. Deal has written legislation that he hopes will address that issue. Until then, he says, it is up to families and concerned groups to keep up the pressure on cable companies to allow choice.
