... wondering about the CBC and the Cultural Dividend

This week, faced with declining revenues from advertising, the CBC approached the government about getting a bridge loan, Since the CBC does not make cars, the government said no.

Yep, I think this is a bad thing as do a lot of other people.

Meanwhile there are others, like Prime Minister Harper, who think that the free market should dictate the CBC's fate. If times are tough and it cannot generate ad revenue, it should put its own house in order and the make entertainment that is more suited to general tastes i.e. more popular. He's not the first to claim this.

He's also not the first to completely miss a subtle point about the CBC: It's entertaining, but not entertainment. Big difference. The mandate of the CBC is work as a public service and help define a cultural identity. It's not there to find the next 24 (Zombie Jesus help us all). It's not supposed to be a commercial enterprise, and in fact is supposed to be immune from that so that it can actually seek out those things that pay a greater Cultural Dividend. The problem is that those in government, especially in this government, are bottom line people. You can't pay out a Cultural Dividend on the bottom line.

The Cultural Dividend the amount that the population gets back for its investment in the arts. These arts can be books, paintings, rock music, anything that is created as part of an artistic process. How this differs from other dividends paid is that the generation in question will likely never collect on it, while the one that follows will. I've argued about this before on The Luddite Times in regards to CanCon: you can say that it produced mediocre talents, but the real benefit of it is what effect is has on the next generation, the generation that grew up listening to it. Consider this: The Velvet Underground and Big Star sold a grand total of zero albums between them (adjusting for inflation). But if those bands had never existed, if there was no medium for them to ply their trade and people willing to underwrite them with no guarantee of getting their money back, then the state of rock music, well, it wouldn't exist today. Who was selling at that time? Bands like John Fred and his Playboy Band, the Lemon Pipers, and the Strawberry Alarm Clock. Which artists made more money, which ones paid a greater cultural dividend, and which would you rather listen to today?

There is also the populist angle to this in that people will point to waste and middling to poor end product and say that they don't want their tax dollars paid to support that. While some could argue that CBC Television has had a spotty track record of either making lacklustre programming or wasteful spending, the first truth remains: the CBC is not there to entertain you. CBC Radio, on the other hand, is quite good. I feel the big difference is advertising. Allowing advertising on CBC Television has made a camel out of the horse that the CBC is supposed to be, while the absence of it on radio has allowed the CBC evolve into what it was intended to be.

But I want to address one issue here: People who say they don't want their tax dollars to go to x, y, or z. This is an argument I am frankly tired of because it shows just how self-involved we are becoming. Tax dollars, no matter how they are collected, are like insurance: we all pay into a large pot for the common good so that services that we might require in the future will be there. Is there waste? Yes. It's called entropy and it happens in nature as well as bureaucracy. There are a lot of things I don't like the government spending money on: I'm a pacifist, so I rank military adventurism right up there. I don't like showy displays of patriotism, so big ceremonies and statues and single purpose museums really anger me. I think Don Cherry is a hate monger and a bigot, and don't like that my money could be subsidizing his salary.

What I do is vote for the party that best reflects how I would like the money to be spent, and I petition the members of that party and the government to hear my case. If they do, great. If they do not, it's unfortunate but I have to accept that I have to work to bring others over to my view point. It's one reason I have this blog. But to insist that everything that the government pays for (be it broadcasting, the military, health care) be something that I have 100% support for is crazy. There's a common good, and to quote George Costanza "We're living in a society here".

I believe in consensus, and compromise, and that people can give a little. I believe that sole purpose of anything is not to make a dollar and a cent and that it can generate a revenue that we cannot and will not be able to quantify. I also know that all those things mean that if I want everyone to be given a fair chance to pursue their bliss and make something of themselves, that means that I might have to live with some things that I don't agree with. And that's fine, because they have the exact same rights and privileges, and neither of us will ever know who is right.

That's why the CBC should not examined in terms of profit and loss. It has be looked at in terms of benefit and disadvantage. So long as we make sure that it's benefits to Canada outpace its disadvantages, then future generations will keep reaping the Cultural Dividend.