NOTE: Read this blog entry for the setup and context— and once again, note my full-on, unbridled intellectual sneer at that fantastic “conservative”, the Conservative Defence Minister Peter MacKay, and that genius Conservative Party “strategist” Geoff Norquay, for their help in leading the charge against one of the only conservative-tolerating mediums available in Canada, with their asinine, knee-jerk, purely populist, effete, leftist-appeasing outburst, which is partially responsible for this. (I’m sure “conservatives” like them call this being “moderate” or “pragmatic” or something.)
From: Ask Jim
Sent: Saturday, May 09, 2009 8:54 AM
To: [Joel]
Subject: RE: Ask Jim Feedback – Programming – ShowsHello Joel,
The issue brought up about the comment made on FOX News upset many Canadians. While we do not support the comments made in any way, we recieved a lot of concerns regarding it. We do still want to offer this channel to those customers who would like it however, the great unrest among the majority of our customers caused us to get a lot of feedback demanding that the channel be removed from the air completely. Rather than doing this, we opted to offer an option. If you would like the channel, you can get it at no extra cost in the bundle that it has always been a part of, however if you do not, that is also an option. We apologize for any inconvenience.
Should you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us.
Thank you for choosing Shaw Direct (formerly Star Choice) and have a great day!
Shannon B.
ACCOUNTABLE BALANCE CUSTOMER FOCUSED INTEGRITY LOYALTY POSITIVE, CAN DO ATTITUDE TEAM PLAYER
Please consider the environment before printing this email.
And here’s an email reply I drafted but never bothered sending, since with Shaw, I am up against a “great unrest” from a “majority”.
Hello Shannon B.,
I think you should recognize a fleeting emotional outburst orchestrated by a committed conservative-hating and Fox News Channel-hating liberal-left activist segment of the population. I think you should also know what almost all soldiers—Canadian and others—and all those like me who truly support our troops and their mission, all know: that Fox News Channel is the one TV media organization that is reliably pro-military and supportive of the troops and of what they stand for and of the mission in Afghanistan.
This “unrest” among the “majority” you speak of is nothing but a sham propagated by a vocal, political, anti-war left minority, jumping on the first excuse they can find to silence Fox News Channel for their political reasons. They do this all day long.
Just as I have been told about the socialist CBC and its Newsworld channel and its hate-filled web site, if I don’t like it, I can simply not watch it or not go to it. And I fail to understand why you would not advance that same option to that “majority” sharing the “great unrest” among your customer base, vis-à-vis Fox News Channel.
You mentioned you “do not support the comments” made at Fox. Do you support the comments made on the CBC, as found on their associated CBC web site, which I provided for you in my original message (comments such as “This is what they deserve!” in reference to killed Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan)? Those comments also “upset many Canadians” to use your words, including probably the families of the soldiers; and other upsetting comments occur all day long on CBC and every other channel.
Perhaps you should read this article from the weekend: “Critics not laughing over CBS analyst’s ‘disgusting’ joke”. I’m sure that won’t garner your support either. Will CBS now be “opt-in”?
If, as I suspect you’ll tell me, nobody complains about them, then I think you might view that as a clue as to the real nature of this politics-based, orchestrated complaint against Fox News Channel, which uses as a poor, ridiculous excuse, that one, tiny, isolated, asinine comment by one fool at Fox News Channel in a hardly-watched midnight comedy show. For which he later apologized. Your response is out of proportion, on steroids.
You simply insult and cause the loss of respect amongst those of us in what you seem to claim is the minority of your customers (I believe you’re mistaken if you think we’re the minority), by doing what you’re doing now.
I think is an almost purely emotion response on Shaw’s part, and it makes you all at Shaw look small to my eyes, and indeed, politically motivated. And I’m sure that wasn’t the desired effect.
Sincerely,
Joel J.
And here’s an email I received from “conservativegal”, who first brought my attention to this action by Shaw/Star-Choice, by way of her followup:
Date: Sun, 10 May 2009 08:02:46 -0700 (PDT)
From: “conservativegal”
Subject: Re: Star Choice and FOX News
To: “ProudToBeCanadian.ca”Hey Back Joel,
Your comments were just as blistering as mine – I pointed out to them that the only other “opt in” channel on their lineup was “OutTV” – and I’m sure you can guess what that’s all about – the poor girl who took the brunt of my wrath was somewhat bamboozled by my comments and like you, I demanded that CBC be made opt in, knowing full well what the response would be. This one actually had the gall to ask me if I knew “why” this was being done and of course, she let the door open to me giving her a full discourse, ending with me telling her that I was a proud Legion member, Naval Association member, on the board of the Navy League of Canada, how my parents served in WWII, well, you get the picture.
I’ve passed your post on to all of my friends who have Star Choice (and the ones who don’t as well) and they were all quite shocked at what happened.
Here’s a Shaw/Star Choice contact form: http://www.starchoice.com/english/contactus/default.asp
FUND RAISING FOLLIES:
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Like many of you, I have been bombarded recently (and constantly over the years) by the Conservative Party, for more and more of my already scarce “leftover” money, supposedly to help fight for that Conservative cause, and to help fight the next election. The Conservative Party is rich —they are flush with cash. I’m not. You’re probably not. And if my cash is to support “conservatives” and official Conservative Party actions like those of MacKay and Norquay and their browbeating of Fox News Channel over utterly nothing; and their idea of how to help advance the conservative cause is to make Fox News Channel even less available in Canada, then I’ll stick to supporting actual conservative advocacy organizations, thanks. PTBC, for example, accepts contributions (no tax break, though!), and also sells $10 Canadian flag lapel pins, with the flag depicted as decidedly right-leaning, unlike some Conservatives, who are decidedly not right-leaning.
And alternatives to Shaw Direct (Star Choice) are available as well: Rogers Cable, Bell TV (formerly Bell ExpressVu) satellite services, and other smaller cable outfits like Eastlink all offer Fox News Channel. I understand some folks still use American satellite services even though, just as Fox News Channel used to be in Canada until recently, that kind of consumer decision is strictly banned in our ostensibly free country by our ingenious government, which of course knows better what’s good for us.
UPDATE 6:00 PM PDT
EXTRA BOILERPLATE
Here’s the reply to “conservativegal’s” feedback form:
Hello [conservativegals’ real name removed by PTBC],
We do apologize for the inconvenience to you with regards to removing the Fox News Channel. We are aware that this does come across as a means of suppression to free speech. However, at the time of this controversy Shaw Direct was faced with many customers upset with the comments made on one of the programs shown on Fox News. Many wanted the channel completely removed and were upset at the time that we did not have that option. We at Shaw Direct made the decision to remove the Fox News channel and then give our customers the means to add it back to their service at no cost if they wanted it back. This option although is inconvenient to some of our customers does allow us to meet the needs of both sides to this situation. We have also added back the Fox News channel to your service and once again apologize for any inconvenience that this may have caused you.
Thank you for choosing Shaw Direct.
Andrew L
Administration – Ask Jim Team
Notice that in the email from Shaw to conservativegal, “the great unrest among the majority of our customers” in their email to me was replaced with “many customers upset”. What happened to “the great unrest among the majority of our customers”?
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
Contact Mr. Johannesen about this article using this form. Please refer to article's title.
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