July 07, 2005
Catching Up Around Town
A smattering of events here around town the last few days, so pardon the tactic of lumping together a handful of the best ...
Addie Wiseman took Houston MediaSource to task for some raunchy programming and got an earful in exchange. Houston MediaSource was on the docket due to an $800,000 line item on the city budget. The group airs on area cable outlets and serves as the rough corrollary to a public access station. The sticking points here are what expectation does city government have over the standards produced by something it funds part of as well as the fact that MediaSource airs over cable instead of the free airwaves. Since I likely won't get too many opportunities to say "Kudos, Addie" I'll do so now, because the first of those concerns trumps the second one. <soapbox>Free speech is just fine and dandy and I'm all for it. But shouldn't a publicly funded entity be expected to uplift the community standards instead of following the rest of the world into the gutter?</soapbox>
A mix of good and bad for Rev. Al Edwards. Look, I'm not going to short shrift him the credit he deserves for finally sticking with his party and the ideas he ran on in 2004 by supporting the Democratic education bill in the State House. And I'm still waiting on the vote tallys for final passage of HB3, but my guesstimate seems to indicate that he's voted it down, with the bulk of his fellow Dems. So credit where credit is due once more. But damned if he can't keep his nose clean. I mean, if I didn't know any better, I'd say he totally screwed over development on Old Spanish Trail in his district, complete with putting federal funding at risk on projects already planned for. Way to look out for your district, Al.
Last, but not least ... congrats to Roy Oswalt for winning the internet voting for the All Star game. Aside from the rare big name we import into an Astros uni, I'm still not used to an Astro being so popular that he wins the internet voting for really much of anything.
Posted by Greg Wythe on July 07, 2005 to Elsewhere in Houston
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"Free speech is just fine and dandy and I'm all for it. But shouldn't a publicly funded entity be expected to uplift the community standards instead of following the rest of the world into the gutter?"
no.
Media Source in particular is set up with the idea of giving anyone in the community who wants it a voice...some of those voices will be uplifting...and some of them will be bill & ted or their equivalences...
who decides what is uplifting?
Breasts on TV generally make me feel better about humanity not worse...
are human bodies and what they do things that belong "in the gutter"?
Mike, you're making a simple mistake here of confusing YOUR standards with COMMUNITY standards. I'm uplifted by a number of things, for instance, that I don't think are appropriate for 10-yr old kids to watch, sing, or perform on an animated video game. That's the difference, IMO. There already exists a forum for every bit of vice and virtue to be aired however one sees fit. But shouldn't tax dollars go towards highlighting those that show humanity at it's best instead of it's basest?