Monday, May 23, 2005
Kane Hall Room 110
7 p.m.
Admission free; donations accepted to support RTM’s Seattle cable franchise campaign
Jeff Cohen, founder of the media watch group FAIR, is a co-author (with Norman Solomon) of The Wizards of Media Oz, has been a distinguished media pundit with Fox and MSNBC, and a co-host of CNN’s Crossfire. Former producer of the latter network’s ill-fated Phil Donahue Show, Cohen also served in 2003 as Communications Director of the Kucinich for President campaign.
Once, mainstream news outlets transmitted controversy and debate, but today, they are increasingly the subject of controversy and debate which is a good thing, says Cohen: “People need to be skeptical of the news they get from the press, TV, radio and the Internet.”
Cohen offers tools to help news consumers separate media fact from media fiction, and to understand the trend toward tabloidism. “We live in the most media-dominated culture in the world,” says Cohen, “with a shrinking number of giant corporations wielding unprecedented power over the public mind.”
This event is presented by Reclaim the Media, and cosponsored by the Seattle Alliance for Media Education, the Center for Communication and Civic Engagement, the Northwest Center for Excellence in Media Literacy, Newground Social Investment and KBCS. For more information, see www.reclaimthemedia.org.