Pressure From A Social Movement

By Author: Friendhdx
Total Articles: 47
Comment this article

Social movements are more loosely organized than groups such as the PTA. In their early stages, social movements lack the structure to distribute information efficiently; they often lack identified leaders whose opinions are accepted by the media as representative of the opinions of the movement as a whole.

Social movements seek to produce specific changes in society. They also attempt to create awareness of issues, generate audience identification with their cause, and have their leaders recognized as spokespersons for larger constituencies not formally identified with the movement.
Social movements need to capitalize on Tag Heuer Replica journalistic norms and routines to accomplish these objectives. Ideally, they become part of someone's beat, their leaders are perceived as newsworthy by the media, their concerns become ongoing news themes, and their spokespersons are quoted on controversial issues affecting their constituencies.

As we indicated in our discussion of stereotyping in Chapter 6, the media are powerful purveyors of societal attitudes. ...
... African Americans and women, aware of this power of the media, have sought to increase their representation among news people. The civil rights and women's rights movements assume that female and African American reporters are more sensitive to sexism and racism and that their presence is a symbolic statement of support for these movements.

Changing the portrayal of women and minorities is also seen as a means of altering societal attitudes about these groups. In summer 1999, the NAACP and a coalition of Hispanic groups attracted widespread media attention with the complaint that the six broadcast networks were offering a fall 1999 season largely without African American or Hispanic actors. The evidence Media critic Jonathan Storm noted, "Of the 38 new shows . . . only one-fourth feature even one African American character in a major role; half of those shows are on one network, UPN. The pilots of only three new shows had Latino characters: a police officer, an emergency medical technician, and a street-punk bully." The protest was effective. Five of the six networks responded by adding actors of color to the casts of prime-time shows

The NAACP followed up with the promise that it would issue a diversity report card on the cable industry.15 If the results indicated a pervasive problem, then the head of the NAACP, Kweisi Mfume, did not rule out the possibility of a boycott. In January 2000 the NAACP and NBC agreed that the network had removed the threat of a boycott by promising to increase the number of minorities writing, producing, and directing its shows. ABC followed suit. As of January 10, 2000, deals with CBS and FOX were in the offing as well.

The potential impact of movements is seen in the dramatic changes in advertising that occurred as a result of the pressure of the women's rights movement, pressure that triggered industry self-regulation. The National Advertising Review Board, an industry-based board set up to monitor truth and accuracy in advertising, issued a re-port titled Advertising and Women in 1975. That report acknowledged that "the more vocal critics of advertising as 'sexist' are younger, better educated, more articulate women who often are opinion leaders. On the average, they have more discretionary income. As their numbers increase (with increasing educational and job opportunities), their challenge to advertising will probably become greater, unless constructive action is taken."

Political pressure and economic self-interest allied to produce ads in which women no longer appeared simply as housewives and Tag Heuer Carrera Replica mothers but also in their roles in business, the professional world, and community affairs. The board offered a checklist of principles to be used by advertisers to determine whether their ads treated women in an appropriate fashion.

The power of respected institutions such as the PTA as well as large social movements such as the women's rights movement resides in their ability to speak for a large number of consumers who might be persuaded to boycott products or programming if the demands of the movement or institution are not met.