Privacy? Actually, no.

The issue of privacy in the media is an interesting one. I wracked my brain to think of a case in which i felt the media delved too far into someone's personal life. I was having a hard time, which I know is silly, because I'm fairly confident that I've seen some information presented on the news that I know wasn't relevant or necessary.

I guess my issue here is that most of the times they talk about people's personal lives, the people are public figures. recognizable faces. icons. people "we" care about. I think of all the celebrity news. I can't help but replay "Leave Britney Alone" in my head. And you know what? I think celebrities forfeit their privacy when they allow their fame to carry them in that way.

I can think of plenty of celebrities who I don't hear much about, regardless of their popularity. This has got to be a consequence of lifestyle. The people who get their lives inspected with a microscope are the ones who don't mind. I'd even go so far as to say they invite it. I've never been followed by the paparazzi personally, but I'm sure its stressful and no fun and all that jazz, but I can think of a lot of celebrity who are not associated with the latest scandal, or any scandal for that matter.

If someone makes the choice to be in the public eye, then I believe it becomes their responsibility to maintain their privacy. They have the option. It's possible.



In CONCLUSION: no sympathy. Dig in. Lay it on: they're asking for it. Every celebrity who's name I see in the news shall be officially and forever labeled a willing participant in an excercise in personal unprivacy.



...After that, I find myself still incapable of finding an example of a case in which I learned more about a person than they deserved. I suppose the best I can think of is when details about suspects in crimes are released before the suspect stops being a suspect and becomes an official perpetrator. That's lame. If someone's minding their own business, then we shouldn't hear about the aforementioned business: it's theirs, after all.

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Patrick Germany is an active member of the SLo community. He is a promoter for Hip-Hop in the area and an activist. He also used to have a public access television show here, but due to issues with those in charge of the station, he and many other citizens of SLO lost their shows.

1. Why did you initially become involved in San Luis' public access television?

To present a dialog for change in a Community that was lacking from my point of view Culturally, in relation to the issues of color and social and economical divide. I produced two shows. One was called issues in our community, dealing with and addressing issues that most people felt they had no forum to talk about those issues affecting them and others. The second show was People around US which was a show where I meet people (everyday people) throughout the county and bring them on and introduce them to the community very interesting show.

2. San Luis Obispo County Public Access, Inc. is, as the name states, a corporation. How do you feel this affects the way they run?

Well as the name implies, Slo Public Access means the programming, the dialog, and content belongs to the public and should not be censored by any one individual or group just because they don't like what they hear or that it puts them in a different category regarding who gets the priority to have their programming in rotation first to last.

3. San Luis Obispo County Public Access, Inc. banned you from being on the air. What were their reasons for this, and what consequences did their actions have?

Well it started about two months after I started my shows. You could sense things were changing because of the content I was bringing people of color was unheard of in this Genre of T.V. They accused me of being a Ghost producer, meaning I had no knowledge of what was going on in regards to the guests and dialog even though you would see me on most of my show’s opening segments, closing, and interviewing guests. Anyway, here in this county and the impact of guest were a whos-who of college professors, and dignitaries of the areas from parole officers to teachers and organizations that had a conversation in there mouth about the issues surrounding people of color, low income individuals and students struggling in a county that professes to be a culturally sound community. So there lies the problem; some people had it out for the change and the format and the many areas of subjects we were covering and it is long believed Charter communications was a big part of these problems regarding this because more shows would mean they have to provide more free channels to the public. So you can see the bottom dollar is no way can this new machine of bringing more people to PATV as producers and hosts and the ideal of more colored folks airing their views about a lily white town that’s been pulling the wool over the visitors and tourists and college bound students that these issues exist here was not to continue (FEEL ME). So the biased remarks and the removal of producers who were about the community and seeking the betterment of the conditions in which we continue in a fashion of smoke and mirrors now affecting us now here and abroad was the alternative to dealing with the Us verse them scenario that is SLOCOPA.

4. Without a public access show, what do you do to stay involved in the community?

Well I was raised in a Civil Rights struggle type of family; we are rabble-rousers. As a little child I remember vividly the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King and the Kenny Bros. John & Robert. We were militant Black Panthers along with my Chicano Brothers and Sistahs the Brown Berets, so I don't sit still and let no government or system do me especially when you recognized how it’s going down; almost 50 yrs of being in the mix of the struggle, the Suppression, Oppression and the Genocide of the poor, the colored and the disadvantaged. Masses of people that I know all too well and Yes! we live amongst one of the Richest counties which boasts over a Billion dollars a year industry in just this county alone and connect it with the tricounties Ventura and Santa Barbara it’s probably a Trillion Dollar central coast that makes its money off the back of the immigrants and the people of color and the poor whites working in servitude areas (Hotel Industries, Fast food, retirement communities and tourism) until the percentage of elite, wealthy, and mansion owners die of old age so I find having events and visiting the Cal Poly campus from time to time to talk about it keeps me more than busy it keeps me coming.

5. How would your efforts to enact change in the community be strengthened if you were given your show back

I have a list of people power and resources waiting to appear on any show I put on the air. I am so ready to put things in perspective. Hands down I would just continue where I left off. I would explain the absence in a unique and expressive way. I would continue to bring guests from local, state, and national levels who could make the difference in how we make the difference. Believe this.

6. How has your being banned affected others involved with local Public Access TV?

It stopped the show point Blank; that being they had more people watching public T.V. because of the ground we were breaking with appearance of people of color, Young and Old age issues, gender, Gay and lesbian topics, and guest music; Rock, Hip-Hop, and out of town celebrity figures. When we started this new format in the late 2005 year it had been nothing but blank T.V. and infomercials and Alternative religious talking-head shows and now the community and the Non-profit organizations who would appear on these shows have no place to feature them during fundraising campaigns and the season of giving.

7.How have you been involved with Cal Poly over the years?

It started after my release from Prison and being placed here (shanghaied by the System). I realized the indifference of the loving standards of the different segments of the population and decided to stop talking and complaining about it and take a grass roots approach. I was told of the Progressive student alliance and started going to the meetings on campus and got assistance to do Rallies and Diversity protests on the campus and more and more made in roads and friends among the administration, cultural groups, and programs; Radio and Mustang newspaper and being invited to speak at events and meetings and continue to do so today.

1097 (excluding intro)

Thanks for this interview and your Interest;

Patrick Germany V.P. Sharing The Dream Org./The Cultural collective group of SLO

Banned Member and Producer PATV #2 Charter Communication of SLO County

CEO of AssHighAsTheSky Promotion and Venues

Also a small plug:

You're putting on a Memorial Day show this coming weekend. What are the goals for the show? Who's involved and who are you trying to reach?

To give a voice and a honor for the young Men and Women of the armed forces who I believe got caught up in a unjust War and like Vietnam, the General public is frowning on them and I just thought giving them a show that says we have your back as somebody's son, daughter, father, mother they may not get this later if they lose their lives or become maimed physically or psychologically. So I thought that both sides, whether you for the war or against, we can put down our signs for the moment and come celebrate or dialog about the reason why we feel pro or con about the issues of war.

Recent News and Such

The Yearning for Zion Ranch is a compound for members of the FLDS church. FLDS stands for Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints. They are a fundamentalist sect of the Mormon Church. The news has been littered with stories about how the Texas Child Protective Services has been handling the case. Numerous papers and websites have followed the case extensively. The New York Times has an entire page full of almost daily updates on the story. Every time anything changes, they write a story. I also looked extensively into the Salt Lake Tribune’s coverage of the story. It’s actually kind of funny. They come across as very sympathetic to the members of the church. This may or may not be because Salt Lake City is the very heart of Utah, which is the stronghold of Mormonism in the United States. Their local paper has as many updates on the case as does the more respected, well known, influential New York Times. The Salt Lake Tribune is obviously writing to an audience of Mormon readers, who want to hear more about the strife of the members of the fundamentalist LDS, as they sympathize. The New York Times handles the story far more objectively, focusing on the legal implications of the actions of the Texas Child Protective Services as well as on the treatment of the children and the legality of the actions of the church members. They are reporting to a group which is much larger and more diverse. This audience also does not hold stake in the religion of the people involved. I initially read about the seizing of some 400 children in Cal Poly’s own paper. I then read a couple stories in San Luis Obispo County’s The Tribune. This piqued my interest. I have some knowledge about the Mormon faith, having studied world religions in high-school. I tend to find it interesting when legal issues clash with religion in a country where we claim to separate Church and State. So from there I looked on line. I found plenty of background information on the FLDS and in particular the Yearning for Zion Ranch on Wikipedia and on assorted news sites. There are even interviews on Youtube with women who have escaped FLDS ranches. Many of the websites for actual newspapers include short video clips, most of which show members of the FLDS sect in their 1900’s period garb. The news seems to like to highlight standout features of the sect, like the fact that most of the children have seen little to no television or the fact that all the women are required to wear high necked, long sleeved, full length dresses at all time. All of the papers excluding the Sal Lake Times jump right to these striking, even shocking features to draw attention. It works.

467

The News that Matters to Me.

My name is Austin Mello. I am currently a Physics major. I am also currently attempting to switch my major to Journalism. I've realized that the part of physics that appeals to me most is the gray area where physics and philosophy begin to overlap. It just so happens that this is not the focus of the physics major. I get no fulfillment from crunching equations. I do, however, receive a some significant fulfillment from writing. Anyway, I'm 19 and I'm from the San Jose area. The last new story I remember being particularly impacted by is an article I read in Scientific American. The article discussed the upcoming completion of the Large Hadron Collider, a particle accelerator being built in Geneva, Switzerland. It is the largest particle accelerator ever built and will propel tiny particles at speeds currently unreachable. It will collide significant numbers of particles at very high speed, all of which will be recorded and documented constantly. This will afford the scientists involved opportunities that are currently not feasible. Scientists hope to isolate and identify particles which are currently only speculative and theoretical in nature. These kinds of stories and this kind of knowledge are important and often overlooked in the world. With the knowledge we have available it is imperative that we utilize the numerous systems of distribution for such knowledge. Scientific stories often go untold in mainstream media. This story was only accessible to me because I subscribe to science magazines and go out of my way for such knowledge. The general public needs to be informed now about breakthroughs like the Large Hadron Collider so that when the groundbreaking work begins and the discoveries roll in, the people will be appreciative of what this means and the impact that they have on our world. I could very well see myself pursuing this very kind of journalism in the future. I think I would find myself quite pleased to be a science writer. If I keep a physics minor, which I currently plan on doing, this would place me in a prime position to write with comprehension about significant changes in the science world.

359

Just for the hell of it, as far as I can tell...

So I'm currently of the understanding that we're supposed to be entering a post, but there's no semblance of an assignment as of yet. What is this business? The situation at hand is one of frustration and preponderance.