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From: pptanner@watcgl.UUCP
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: 'Free' Trade? -- culture (from "Amerika")
Message-ID: <613@watcgl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 19-Feb-87 10:20:41 EST
Article-I.D.: watcgl.613
Posted: Thu Feb 19 10:20:41 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 20-Feb-87 01:11:41 EST
References: <12419@watnot.UUCP> <1469@hcrvx1.UUCP> <2740@hcrvx2.UUCP>
Reply-To: pptanner@watcgl.UUCP (Peter P. Tanner)
Distribution: can
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 53

The discussion on this newsgroup has covered only one side of
the free trade in culture issue - that of Canada's attitude
towards American produced media being consumed here.  There is a
counter issue that Canadians typically ignore, and that is the
American attitude to foreign produced media in their country.
The "right wing" contributers to this news group who rant and
rave that we should not restrict or otherwise control American
productions coming into this country ignore the fact that the
States permit very little foreign material on their air-waves.
Only 2% of US network television (unfortunately the most
important cultural medium) is foreign produced.  There are very
few countries, with the possible exception of Albania that have
so little foreign content.

One of the advantages of seeing foreign programming (and reading
foreign books etc) is the resulting improvement in understanding
of different viewpoints, how life is lived in other places, and
what their cultural influences are.  Most of the foreign
programs that are shown in the USA are BBC historical dramas
shown on PBS.  These do little to contribute to a knowledge of
what contemporary life is like in Britain, but reflect a
heritage that America (and Canada) share.  While most of the
world are quite aware of how middle-class America operates, (or
at least aware of television's portrayal of middle-class
America), American's have no access to portrayals of how others
live.  One can comment on how this leads to a distrust of
"aliens", but that is not the point of this article.

It is probably true that this censorship of nearly all foreign
programming in the USA is not initiated by the government, but
by the private television networks.  There are those who argue
that it is a mindset on the part of those who choose the
programs for the networks.  It would be very difficult to argue
that there are so few programs produced by the BBC, CBC and
private television producers in Britain or Canada that are not
appropriate for American audiences.

If we were to have free trade in media, we would have to be
guaranteed that non-duty trade barriers such as this
not-produced-here prejudice of American television executives
would not be allowed to prevent Canadian programs from equal
access to US networks.  Programs with good ratings in Canada
should be given the same access to the US market as US programs
are given to our market.

The CBC has requested money from the government to set up a
satellite television station to cover the US.  (France already
has such a station for North America, the BBC has applied for
funding for one, and the US has one in Europe.)  This will allow
us some access to their market, but as it is the large networks
that control most of what is consumed in the States, it is access
to their schedule that is necessary if a fair-trade situation is
to be set up.