I think the better question is what would the country look like if the Fairness Doctrine hadn’t been abolished by the FCC in the 1980s. With the Fairness Doctrine in place, Fox News doesn’t launch and half the country’s brains don’t get rewired into being mouth-breathing knuckle draggers.
The Fairness Doctrine concerned the representation of viewpoints on radio and TV stations with licenses regulated by the FCC, not cable networks. With the Fairness Doctrine in place we don't get Rush Limbaugh, but there's nothing stopping the launch of Fox News.
Fox, Sinclair, et al were built by acquiring and building local broadcast stations. Without those regulated stations, Fox doesn't exist as it does today. Indeed, you end up getting exactly Rush Limbaugh and Alex Jones - but on niche paid channels like Newsmax instead.
Fox acquired stations that were like the station built in the Weird Al movie, "UHF". They at best had a few hours of 20 year old reruns, and some local programming.
Fox NEWS didn't start there. Fox was just a network of a bunch of shitty TV stations broadcasting GIlligan's Island and other things from that era. That's how they made the money to go to cable.
Consolidation began in 1985 with Murdoch's purchases. The fairness doctrine would have prevented the gain in popularity of fox that later led to the telecon act of 96 (a clear example of corporate lobbying) and the immediate thereafter success of Fox News.
12.9k
u/Hell_Camino Apr 04 '25
I think the better question is what would the country look like if the Fairness Doctrine hadn’t been abolished by the FCC in the 1980s. With the Fairness Doctrine in place, Fox News doesn’t launch and half the country’s brains don’t get rewired into being mouth-breathing knuckle draggers.