Big Bird: Fried or Baked?

Trey Smith

It's clear by now, after several repeats of the same cycle, that the right doesn't really want to defund PBS. And the left, unfortunately, isn't truly interested in saving PBS, either.

Why would the right defund? For a tiny investment – about a hundredth of a penny from each federal dollar – the GOP gets a leash on public broadcasting that ensures that it will never fulfill its promise to serve as a real alternative to the commercial networks.

As long as public broadcasters are forced to go before Congress, hat in hand, to beg for another annual appropriation, their leaders will make sure not to do anything that will put them on the Republicans' "naughty" list – keeping PBS safe, bland and right-of-center, rather than the home for experiment, controversy and the unheard opinion that noncommercial TV was envisioned to be.

PBS's progressive friends, on the other hand, do it no favors by reflexively rallying around it, holding up Big Bird as the emblem of public TV at its most innocuous. Sure, Sesame Street is great – but if that's all we demand of PBS, that it continue to teach children their ABCs and how to share, that's all it's going to give us. The familiar cycle of threats from the right and unconditional support from the left guarantees a public broadcasting system that increasingly toes the establishment line.

What really needs saving is PBS's soul.

~ from The Right Won't Defund PBS – and the Left Won't Save It by Jim Naureckas ~

When I was very young, I used to watch public television, if for no other reason than its dearth of commercials. But PBS ain't what it use to be. Though they aren't called "TV ads," they run them just the same!

Not only that, but due to lack of adequate funding, PBS seems to be in a perpetual fund drive. The few times I watch PBS these days, the program I've tuned into is so cut up by pitches for funds that it completely breaks the continuity of the subject matter. It's almost as bad as late night cable!

The final straw for me is that PBS no longer challenges established ideas. There are few programs that are left-of-center or even sort of liberal. If I want to watch something of that ilk, I need to watch the community access station out of Olympia.

I agree with Naureckas that PBS's soul needs to be saved...if it even can be at this point!