TV5’s Treatment of Life’s Silver Linings

PARANOIA OR MEDIA BIAS?

By Jeanette Wansing, President of Life’s Silver Linings, Inc.

Three times TV 5 invited Life’s Silver Linings to participate in their “Window on St. Louis” and three times they cancelled us at the last minute due to “weather”. Finally TV5 admitted that they had cancelled us for being “politically charged”. Keep in mind that TV5 called and invited US - we didn’t call them.

Life’s Silver Linings is a non-profit educational corporation that promotes the positive value of all life from womb to tomb. We are pro life. Life’s Silver Linings is NOT mean, rude, pushy, does NOT promote drug use nor are we
gun-toting terrorists. We are not a political organization.

In April 2002 Life’s Silver Linings received a call from KSDK TV5’s “Window on St. Louis. TV5 invites (only) non-profit organizations to stand outside the program’s large picture window during TV5’s early morning newscast. Viewers can see through the large picture window to the organizations that are on camera standing in the background. At one point during the newscast each group has 30 seconds to provide their name and phone number. I asked, “How did you hear about Life’s Silver Linings? We’re the best-kept secret in St. Louis.” She replied
that she had a directory of non-profit organizations in which we were listed. I later decided to accept the invitation and a date was set for June 12th – Life’s Silver Lining’s tenth anniversary of incorporation.

In preparation for the event and the 30-second live interview (that never happened) we spent a total of $530.54. We did a mailing, bought balloons and a large full color banner. We purchased a special carrying case for the banner
since we worried that someone might mistake the original PVC carrier as a pipe bomb. We even chose NOT to bring a cake knife with which to cut the cake. Instead we brought a serrated server. We went out of our way to avoid even the appearance of being “trouble”. We purchased a half sheet cake to share with TV5 and the other organizations that would be present. This does not include the cost of gasoline, parking, the time, effort and inconvenience for the numerous trips downtown and hours of phoning.

On June 12th I spoke with Ava Ehrlich, TV5’s Executive Producer of Special Projects (since the confirmation letter gave her as the contact) to verify arrangements due to bad weather. She then pointedly quizzed me asking “Who are
you, what do you do?” I responded that we are a non-profit educational corporation that promotes the positive values of life. She said “Yes, but what do you do, do you do programs on prenatal development, are you against
abortion?” I responded that we are an educational corporation and ONE of the things we do is a program on prenatal development. Ms. Ehrlich sounded irritated as she asked again, “But are you against abortion?” I responded, “We do not support abortion.” Ms. Ehrlich curtly replied, “We have a policy that we don’t take a stand one way or the other on abortion and we do not have groups that do take a position.” I asked, “Are you telling me we are uninvited?” She sharply responded, “Yes.” When I said, “I’ve got over 20 people coming tomorrow and we’ve spent over $300 for this thing in the morning.” Ms. Ehrlich asked me, “What are you going to say?” I replied, “Well, it won’t be much since I understand we only have 30 seconds. I’d give our name, our web-site…” Ms. Ehrlich cut me off excitedly stating in an elevated voice, “You can’t say that!” I replied, “You’ve got to be kidding! I was told we could give our web address. I’ve got a big banner here with our web address on it.” Ms. Ehrlich said, “That’s okay, you just can’t SAY it because we have a policy that ONLY TV5’s web address is given.” She asked me again, “What would you say?” I replied, “I’d give our name, phone number and explain that we are an educational corporation that helps people to promote the positive and navigate the negative.” Finally Ms. Ehrlich said, “I just want you to know that in the future you will not be allowed to participate.” I asked, “So I’ll see you at 5:50 in the morning?” She replied, “Yes.” I thanked her and we hung up.

At 4:20A.M. on the 12th I called the newsroom to see if we were still to come down since the weather was bad. The response was, “Yes, we’re doing ‘Window’. Come on down.” As I entered TV5’s lobby a young male employee told me that we were being cancelled. I had him recheck since I had just called before I left. When the report came back that our appearance had indeed been cancelled. I asked, “When was it cancelled?” the reply was “Right after you called.” He offered to re-book us for the following day as well as for the afternoon show called “Show Me St. Louis” that is the same type of venue. He said that Life’s Silver Linings would be placed in the prime front location. We were rebooked for “Window on St. Louis” for the next morning, June 13th AND “Show Me St. Louis” on June 21, 2002 from 2:30-3:30PM. Our faxed confirmation for “Show Me St. Louis” arrived at 11:06 the same morning (on June 12th). Before leaving I jokingly whispered to the TV5 representative, “We don’t even own an oozie”. He responded, “We were worried about that.” I was shocked.

Thurs. June 13th, 4:35 A.M.: We received a call from TV5 saying we had been cancelled for the SECOND time. He said that even though there was no “weather” here (it wasn’t raining at the station), there was weather in the area and “they” wanted to use the computer. I asked, “Does this have anything to do with who and what we are?” He replied, “No, no, no, no, no.”

When TV5 offered to re-book us yet again for a third attempt the NEXT morning I replied, “Let’s see how the 21st goes first.” I was given a business card on which he wrote his name, phone number, a secondary phone number and fax number and invited me to contact him anytime.

Sometime between June 17th and 19th, while I was out of town the following telephone message was left by TV5:

“Hello, this message is for Jeanette. This is Becky Reichart I am a co-producer of “Show Me St. Louis” and I’m calling about your June 21st booking for Life’s Silver Linings. Unfortunately we’re going to need to cancel and the reason why is because we don’t usually do groups, well, we never do groups who are politically charged and I believe your group is considered pro life. I do apologize uh, we should have taken care of this earlier if you could give me a
call back at 314-425-5319 and I can explain in a little more detail but for “Show Me St. Louis” it’s mostly fun places to take your family, new restaurants and stuff like that. So we stay away from anything that’s politically charged.
Again this is Becky with ‘Show Me St. Louis.’ Thanks, bye-bye.”

At this point I decided to write to the Federal Communications Commission. Their response states in part:

“…because of First Amendment considerations and the no-censoring provision in the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, our role in overseeing a station’s programming is very limited …While licensees are expected to air some programming about community issues, the Commission is not authorized to dictate to broadcasters the manner in which their programs should be presented. Our approach has been to increase and diversify program choices through fostering more competition and outlets for _expression in electronic media. This procedure
is premised upon the belief that the public good is better served through a multitude of voices than through any kind of governmental program selection. Your letter will be associated with the license file of station KSDK-TV.”

How “politically charged” can it be to give your name and phone number? TV5 missed several opportunities: to meet a super organization and the special people behind it, and missed an opportunity to build a positive image about themselves and the media industry. We hope they enjoyed our anniversary cake.