Media Musings: Fighting to protect the little guy
For 27 years, Project Censored has listed the top 10 “censored stories” from around the country. It’s complied by 200 students and faculty from Sonoma State University and the stories are ones that have been deemed significant.
Fifth-ranked was the effort to make unions disappear, as had been reported in small magazines such as The Progressive and The American Prospect. Both are considered liberal publications.
Chicago journalist Lee Sustar pointed out that labor coverage today is almost non-existent in mainstream media. There are exceptions, such as labor talks with the big three automakers, which just concluded, or with the airlines as they try to renegotiate their deals with pilots and attendants.
Even there, Sustar argues, it’s always from the business side, even though unions still have 13 million members.
The New York Times does have a full-time labor reporter, Steven Greenhouse, but Project Censored noted that he’s an obvious exception to the norm.
Which brings us to Wal-Mart, just named the most admired company in the world by Fortune magazine. Also, the Walton family name appears five times in the top 10 wealthiest Americans list from Fortune, with a grand total of more than $100 billion.
An economist who studies in the impact of the company says its purchasing power saves the American consumer more than $1 billion a year. So powerful is this retail giant that it can force its suppliers to reduce their prices to Wal-Mart if the company feels its promise of “the lowest prices everyday” is in jeopardy.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is battling in China not to be unionized and it faces the largest sex discrimination lawsuit in history, with labor lawyers asking that 1.5 million women, former and current employees, be considered a class.
Wal-Mart has a solid reason to not want unions in China. Union dues are paid directly to the Communist Party. Also, no employee has asked to be a union member, according to the company’s spokespersons.
The problem is not a Wal-Mart problem alone. It’s across most of retailing. I talked with a bright, engaging woman in retailing late one afternoon about her wages, hours, and working conditions. She complained of only one problem: wages. If she met the goal set by her department manager she was paid one wage. If she didn’t, she earned a lower wage.
“I missed by a few dollars this time and so it’s the lower wage and I can’t live on it,” she said.
“How about a union?” I asked.
“Union? One whisper that you’re talking about a union and you’re history.”
Oh, yes. She has three children and her husband is a construction worker.
It should not go unnoticed that all of the Wal-Mart lawsuit stories will come from official sources. It should not go unnoticed that the business press will cover it and that TV won’t until there’s a settlement and it could run into millions if the giant loses.
It should not go unnoticed, also, that the old role of a vigilant press as advocate for the voiceless is diminishing everyday. But then, I seem to forget that the American press is now corporate America, as big and powerful and wealthy as the barons of business.
(Ed Kimbrell is a professor in MTSU’s School of Journalism.)