-
8 Rethinking Media Activism: Why the Left Is Losing the Culture War
- University of Minnesota Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
RETHINKING MEDIA ACTIVISM WHY THE LEFT is LOSING THE CULTURE WAR The epic scale ofthe United States globalpower and the corresponding powerofthe nationaldomestic consensus created by the electronic media have no precedents. Never has there been a consensus so difficult to opposenor so easy and logical to capitulate to unconsciously. —Edward Said1 At the height ofthe recent arts censorship controversies, conservative columnist Patrick Buchanan wrote a column entitled, "Inthe Warfor America's Culture, Is the 'Right' Side Losing?"2 In this frequently quoted piece Buchanan claimed that while conservatives had been busy defending democracy around the globe, leftists had been infiltrating schools, the media, and the art world at home. It is no secret what happened next, as numerous legislators, religious figures, andjournalists cashed in on the publicity of the ensuing "culture war."3 It also should go without saying that the Left has never held "all the commanding heights of art and culture," as Buchanan asserted.4 Nevertheless, the myth of a radical juggernaut took hold, as manifest in countless outcries over arts funding, multiculturalism, political correctness, and school curricula. But close examination of the outcomes of these controversies demonstrates that they hardly represent progressive victories in a broad-based war. Instead they constitute a fewhighly publicized skirmishes (that the Left has actually lost) generated by ideology-driven politicians with little interest in movies or schools, but with great interest in diverting public attention from failing socialpolicies . Unfortunately, the scheme seems to be working. If the Left is winning the socalled culture war, why are musicians and record store owners now routinely arrested for playing concerts or selling CDs? If the Left is winning the culture war, why are museums and art galleries closed for showing "unpatriotic" art?5 Ifthe Left is winning the culture war, how can the reactionary figure Rush Limbaugh top the best-seller list? The nation's cultural sphere (both its "low" and "high" ends) has always been dominated by the wealthy conservatives. This is not to say that liberalism has not made its mark in education, communications,or the art world; it isonly 122 EIGHT to point out that these areas are strongly influenced by the moneyed interests that support them.6 Many conservatives now admit that the Left offers little real threat in the academy . As free-market apologist David Rieff wrote recently in Harper's, "Radicals on campus are no more dangerous than a display ofMao caps and jackets would be in Bloomingdales."7 Statistics bear this out. In a recent survey of college professors conducted by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, when given a choice of five labels to describe themselves (Left, liberal, middle-of-theroad , moderately conservative, and strongly conservative) a mere 5.8 percent described themselves as "Left" and only 33.8 percent as "liberal."8 Turning to communications,the near complete control of the U.S. communications industry by a handful ofmultinational conglomerates has been dramatized in numerous statistical analyses.9 Not surprisingly, these very same commercial media firms continue to hype the threat purportedly posed by the Clinton-friendly "Hollywood Left." Yet as Elayne Rapping asserts, this is another false alarm sounded by conservatives: The myth that these people have, in fact, any power at all over the contentof Hollywood films is ludicrous and serves to obfuscate, for an alreadyconfused public, the actual economicand politicalworkings ofthe movieindustry . ... Racism, sexism, and the glorification ofviolence in the service ofillegitimate power are thriving in Hollywoodas never before. And the Hollywood Left has absolutely no inclinationor power to do anythingabout it.10 In the arts the story is the same, particularlywhen publicmoneyis involved. The now all-too-common practice of censoring politically troublesome artists can be traced to the Reagan administration's 1981 Mandate for Leadership transitiondocument prepared by the Heritage Foundation. The publicationprovided both arationale and a plan for the systematic defunding of the cultural Left. As a result, the 1980s saw a dramatic decline of funding to activist media and arts groups, which drove manyout of business. Despite campaign promises to the contrary, Bill Clinton has given every indicationthat he plans to continue supporting onlyuncontroversial arts projects. Historically, there have been as many approaches to cracking this conservative hegemony as there have been "Lefts"—almost all of them failing for one reason or another. In this chapter I review a range ofsuch efforts during the past sixty years, with specific emphasis on the role of "alternative" or "independent" photography, film,and video.From its inception, photographypromised...