Why We Need Radio

When I was young, I had a radio on my bed side table.  At night, I would turn it on and listen.  Sometimes, I would tune in to local DJs in the Baltimore area but on some magical nights, my little bed side radio could pull in voices from Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and New York.  I fell asleep to voices reading the news or sports, talking to strange callers or playing music but I had to have a radio on – still do.  Predictions about the end of radio have been constant but radio persists and thrives. 

There were several things that drew me to radio.  One was the power of the voice.  The right voice can draw you in and spin a web you don’t want to leave.  I’m fascinated with voices and there are some I can listen to all day.  Dick Cavett has one of those voices.  He could be reading the ingredients from a milk carton and I would be riveted.  The voice can be a powerful tool and as a teacher, I’m conscious of my voice and how I come across to my students.   

When I worked in radio years ago, I wanted to have a signature voice – something people listened to just because it was me.  At the same time, it couldn’t be fake.  I’m speaking of both the voice and the meaning behind it.  That is what makes the Morning Zoo format that became so popular in the 1980s so appalling.  The fake congeniality and laughter distorted the most honest thing about radio – the voice.  It wasn’t just its fabrication but also the perversion of its honesty. 

The second thing that drew me to the radio was the feeling that the personalities were free – they could do as they pleased and seemed to be having a great deal of fun.  Growing up in Baltimore, I had a plethora of people I gravitated towards in the city.  WIYY or 98 Rock was a mainstay for young people, envious of the DJs who played music all day and goofed off in the process.  Chuck Thompson was the great voice of the Baltimore Orioles and he was, like Dick Cavett, possessing of a voice that could draw my hyperactive self to a stand-still.  His successor, Jon Miller, was just as magical and both projected the sense they had the perfect life and job.    

However, in something only radio can do, I could pull in stations beyond my burgh.  My immature teenage mind was taken by the Greaseman in Washington, D.C.  In other locales, Scott Ferrall in Pittsburgh and Don Imus in New York came through my radio and drew me in.  Ferrall on the Bench is and was one of the more pioneering baffling radio shows because certainly his voice had to be faked but it wasn’t.  Don Imus was the anti-Stern – irreverent but smarter.  Stern never fascinated me like the curmudgeon Imus.  As Mr. Imus’ show changed from “shock jock” antics to a more political and social satire, it fell in line with my political maturation and I was hooked.  When he landed on television, I watched but it was not the same as radio.  Of course, one of my other political teachers was the irreverent conservative radio giant, Rush Limbaugh.   

When one combines the radio qualities of the voice and the freedom of the medium, one comes to the third reason I was always drawn to radio – the use of my imagination.  As a teacher, I see that our students are not nearly as imaginative as they once were because they are not asked to be.  With radio, in trying to visualize the DJ’s antics and the broadcast of sports, imagination is key to truly understanding what is happening.  I still prefer baseball on the radio.  When they say the voice paints the picture, that picture develops in your mind.  Oriole broadcaster Chuck Thompson helped me “see” what was happening on the field.   

 

The point is that radio, often declared dead, has maintained a force in modern media and there is a reason for that tenacity.  My hope is that it is not just older people like me keeping radio alive.  It is a medium of the spoken word – not the image.  That alone places it in stark contrast with most modern media.  The spoken word requires thought – if not from the people on the radio then those listening.  It is the most intimate form of media and requires the most from the receiver.  That alone makes radio deserving of a future.

The Curious Case of Rush Limbaugh

I should likely make clear my affiliation. At the nascent stages of my political education, there were two people – William F. Buckley, Jr. and Rush Limbaugh. There are likely not too more different conservatives on the planet. One defines the intellectual, erudite and learned scholar of the political philosophy and the other defines the rather cartoon nature of radio and television entertainment. One spoke upon reflection and the other upon impulse. One’s objections were voiced in algonquinian verbiage and context while the other revels in the baseness and shoot-from-the-hip style that has earned him the reputation as one of the greatest radio broadcasters of all time. Yet, while the first of my mentors did not guarantee preciseness and economy of thought, the latter did not and has not guaranteed politeness and respect.

I understand what Mr. Limbaugh was trying to say. Unfortunately, that is not the point. The Democrats are really playing it up to mask their attack on the freedom of religion. That will keep the story going for a while. The 30-year-old woman seeking contraceptives from a private Catholic university that clearly does not agree with the practice has been turned into a small, frightened little girl, shocked and dismayed at the controversy and the vileness directed towards her. She is portrayed as an innocent who had no idea why her simple request of paid-for birth control would cause such a furor.

I get that the language towards her by Mr. Limbaugh was extreme. I’m a little confused at the people expressing outrage. Are these the same people who have heard conservative women called much worse yet expressed no outrage, barely even a peep of disagreement? Some writers have expressed and detailed the many cases of women like Michelle Malkin, Sarah Palin and others labeled in equal (or worse) ways. The recent death of 43-year-old Andrew Breitbart engendered a Rolling Stone piece by Matt Taibbi entitled, “Death of a Douche.” There was not much outraged there either though the conservative fire-brand left behind a wife and four small children who have to hear the pile-on and hateful rhetoric. No matter one’s opinion of him, I think we can all agree that the attacks are a bit beyond the pale.

I don’t mind people criticizing Mr. Limbaugh. He has it coming. However, it is the source of the criticism and the characterization of a patron saint of Planned Parenthood that dismays and confounds. Perhaps, at some point in the future, we will have the chance to view this without the hysterics and the hyperbole. Perhaps not.