The work of building a media reform movement began long before Bob McChesney and I started writing about issues of media monopoly, the decay of newspapers and the current crisis in journalism, and it will go on long after we put down our pens â?? or, in this digital age, shut off our computers.
But the past decade has been a critical juncture in the growth of media activism, as the movement to free up and democratize our communications has gone from strength to strength. That growth has been made possible by the diligent engagement of some remarkable people who recognized early on that the media are not just something that happens to us. Media are a constant in our lives that we the people can, through enlightened policy making, shape and influence to serve human and civic needs â?? as opposed to merely enriching speculators and the CEOs of media conglomerates.
Madisonâ??s Cynthia Laitman, who has died in her early 70s after a nasty bout with brain cancer, was a pioneer in turning that recognition into activism at the local, state and national levels.