Ask Congress to Make Companies Offer Cable Choice

By Bill Fancher

July 28, 2005

(AgapePress) – Twenty-five organizations are taking on the cable industry over what they are calling a parents’ rights issue bill. Lanier Swann of Concerned Women for America (CWA) says it is time Congress stepped into the battle over who chooses what kind of cable programming comes into each subscriber home.

CWA has released a letter signed by itself and two dozen other national and state-based organizations addressing U.S. Senate and House of Representatives leaders. The letter calls on the lawmakers to enact legislation that would require cable monopolies to offer “a la carte” pricing to consumers.

Swann, CWA’s director of governmental relations, says the decision is not up to cable companies to say what programming should be pumped into U.S. homes. “It is up to the families,” she contends, “and over 80 percent of Americans polled believe that they should have that choice put back into their hands.”

In the letter, which was addressed to Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), Chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, and Representative Joe Barton (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, the 25 organizations urge Congress to get involved in changing how the cable industry offers its programming to consumers.

“We feel very, very strongly about re-igniting this topic on Capitol Hill,” Swann says. “The industry is touting its new $250 million campaign to educate consumers about rating systems and the v-chip, [which demonstrates] that the cable industry is missing the point. We’ve had a parental blocking system since the invention of the TV — it’s called the ‘off’ switch.”

What is offensive to the coalition and other pro-family consumers, the CWA spokeswoman explains, is that “cable operators essentially function as a monopoly in the communities they serve.” As such, she says, “they can get away with forcing consumers to subsidize programming that is obscene, violent, and immoral.”

Consumers should only have to pay for channels they actually want in their homes, Swann asserts — not “the filth that they force us to buy in their current bundles.” In the letter to Congress, CWA and the other organizations argue that the U.S. legislature needs to act now to compel cable companies to offer customers cable choice through “a la carte” pricing.

Bob Peters of Morality in Media agrees, another of the organizations that have signed the letter to Congress demanding cable choice. He says allowing subscribers to choose their own cable programming packages by individually picking the channels they want is a system that will work.

“I can’t imagine an ‘a la carte’ law that would prevent cable operators from offering great prices for packages of channels. That wouldn’t have to come to an end,” the Morality in Media spokesman adds. “But if a customer only wanted one or two channels in that package, they could subscribe for a reasonable price.”

Peters points out that Congress does not allow movie studios to force local theaters to show every movie produced. So in principle, he says, cable providers should not be allowed to dictate what subscribers must subsidize in order to get the channels they want.

Pro-Family Groups Ask Congress to Make Companies Offer Cable Choice