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Trouble on the treadmills: Y members object to Fox
Salem (MA) News ^ | 09/12/09 | Julie Manganis

Posted on 09/13/2009 7:17:04 PM PDT by raccoonradio

IPSWICH (MA)— An apparent effort to avoid controversy over the current health care debate led employees at the Ipswich YMCA to stop showing Fox News Channel on televisions in the gym this week, after several members complained that it was promoting "hate speech."

But the decision, made while the director of the County Road facility was on vacation, has been reversed, said Jack Meany, executive director of the YMCA of the North Shore, which includes six facilities in Essex County.

"We're very careful as an organization to be apolitical," Meany said yesterday, shortly after learning of the situation. "The Y, at its best, is a big tent and everyone's welcome under it."

Ray Morley, an Ipswich selectman and the owner of a local bed-and-breakfast, said he was shocked when he went to the Y to work out and heard about the policy from an employee.

"They gave in to a group of liberals and censored the television," Morley, who calls himself a conservative, said.

What touched off the controversy was a letter signed by four Ipswich residents who are Y members, which appeared in the local weekly newspaper Thursday.

The letter cited the role of the Y in promoting health, then went on to criticize Fox News for its coverage of the health care debate and called on the Y to drop the channel from the lineup available in the gym.

"We remain concerned that the 'unhealthy' debate on health care and health insurance is being abetted by organizations such as our own Ipswich Y that, despite its own stated mission, perpetuates access to the airwaves and audiences of some of the most negative elements of the health care discussion," the letter, signed by Carolyn Britt, Nancy Popp, Maria Wilkins and Patrick Patterson, reads. "This is not a case of freedom of speech — this is a member organization with a stated mission that is directly opposed to the ranting that it imposes on members."

The letter appeared in the Ipswich Chronicle.

The gym has three flat-screen televisions, Meany said, and members who are working out can request that a staff member tune to a specific channel. There are headphone jacks at each piece of equipment, and members can plug in and hear the sound from any of the screens — or ignore them.

"If the Sox are playing, people want to watch the Sox," Meany said. "If the news is on, people want to watch the news."

The choices are usually not controversial — the Y doesn't subscribe to premium channels like HBO, and staff members are advised to use their discretion when it comes to sexual content or violence, particularly if there are younger people present.

But the Y doesn't make selections based on politics, Meany said — or, at least, isn't supposed to.

The four letter writers, who could not be reached yesterday afternoon, contend in their letter that it's impossible to ignore "scrolling headlines and angry expressions" on the televisions when they show Fox News. "Even if it were, the fact that the Ipswich Y is still supporting the airing of angry, nonsensical debate is still at odds with the organization's mission."

"If a survey were done and most members wanted Fox News on," the letter writers say, "then those of us who find this unacceptable would have to make new choices."

Meany said staffers "saw the letter and they thought, 'Let's quell this controversy.'"

But, "You don't want to get into a situation where one person's rights interfere with others," Meany said.

Bill Wasserman of Ipswich, a member of the Y's corporate board, called the situation "a tempest in a teapot."

"I don't have any objection to Fox News being shown," said Wasserman, a retired newspaper publisher who describes himself as liberal. "I think if there are three televisions and Fox is showing on one of them, there's not a problem."

Meany said he was told that employees had also stopped showing Fox's cable rival CNN, though a staffer there said that was only under consideration yesterday and that CNN was still being shown.

Morley, who said he watches both channels, said he was troubled by the thought that one complaint could lead to censorship.

"They took away our right of choice," Morley said. "This is how we begin to lose our freedoms."

A spokesman for Fox News Channel did not return a call for comment by yesterday's deadline.

Asked what he would say to the four members who wrote the letter, Meany said he'd want them to know that "we would like to provide people with a choice."

"If something is on there that you find objectionable, you don't plug in your headphones and you don't have to look at it."


TOPICS: Miscellaneous; TV/Movies
KEYWORDS: choice; fox; foxnewschannel; glennbeck; ipswich; liberalfascism; talkradio; treadmills; ymca
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>>it's impossible to ignore "scrolling headlines and angry expressions" on the televisions when they show Fox News.

WAHHHHHHHHHHHH!

1 posted on 09/13/2009 7:17:06 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio

In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell


2 posted on 09/13/2009 7:18:53 PM PDT by Red in Blue PA (If guns cause crime, then all of mine are defective!)
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To: raccoonradio

Doesn’t Communist Party U.S.A. have a channel they could watch?


3 posted on 09/13/2009 7:19:36 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (Americans! "Behaving badly" since April 19, 1775!)
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To: raccoonradio

LA Fitness plays that CNN propaganda crap.


4 posted on 09/13/2009 7:20:06 PM PDT by Frantzie (Lou Dobbs & Glenn Beck- American Heroes! Bill O'Reilly = Liar)
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To: raccoonradio

Well, that’s it then...only QVC on the treadmill TV’s....
Settled.....


5 posted on 09/13/2009 7:20:12 PM PDT by libertarian27 (Ingsoc: Life, Liberty and the Department of Happiness)
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To: FlingWingFlyer

They have plenty...also in the Boston area it was just announced that progressive talk station WWZN-AM will broadcast two daily newscasts from WCVB-TV (ABC)—well known to be left leaning. Would WWZN have aired the Fox affiliate’s news? Nope!

And did these Y members complain about the anti-conservative, vitriol other stations air? How would they have reacted if the Y shut THOSE stations off?


6 posted on 09/13/2009 7:22:33 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio
Looks like some of the people in the village got their panties in a wad.
7 posted on 09/13/2009 7:23:29 PM PDT by allmendream (Wealth is EARNED not distributed, so how could it be RE-distributed?)
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To: Frantzie

The postal sorting facility where I work force feeds us CNN—and Headline News, at that. BREAKING NEWS!!!! from
Nancy Grace. We can’t change the channel (some people go by and unplug the set)


8 posted on 09/13/2009 7:23:34 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio

Actually, I understand their angst - I hate to be captive on a treadmill while ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, etc., is on. But scrolling headlines and angry expressions aren’t the problem. (Did they really whine about scrolling headlines and angry expressions? Yikes!)


9 posted on 09/13/2009 7:25:21 PM PDT by ElayneJ
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To: raccoonradio

They tried that at my club here in San Antonio. They actually blocked Fox News. Lasted one day. So many people were coming up to the counter and asking that the feed be fixed that I guess they gave up. It was back on the next day. Don’t mess with Texas.

Colonel, USAFR


10 posted on 09/13/2009 7:26:56 PM PDT by jagusafr (Kill the red lizard, Lord! - nod to C.S. Lewis)
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To: raccoonradio

If those wimpy treadmill ‘rats think Fox News is “hate speech,” they can’t handle the TRUTH!


11 posted on 09/13/2009 7:27:26 PM PDT by fullchroma (Obama: GET OUT OF MY DOCTOR'S OFFICE!)
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To: raccoonradio

A universal remote would fix the problem.


12 posted on 09/13/2009 7:28:15 PM PDT by Rebelbase
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To: raccoonradio

13 posted on 09/13/2009 7:29:45 PM PDT by Man50D (Fair Tax, you earn it, you keep it! FairTaxNation.com)
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To: raccoonradio

“We remain concerned that the ‘unhealthy’ debate on health care and health insurance ... “

Delete the word “unhealthy” and you have the liberals’ real concern.


14 posted on 09/13/2009 7:30:11 PM PDT by tumblindice (Momma said, `Stupid is as stupid does.')
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To: raccoonradio

comments on the article:

>>Fox is the only that comes even close to presenting both sides of the story. The other three local channels as well as the news-only (ha, now there’s a lie) force-feed their viewers with nothing but the liberal’s side of the story. Then the “news-only” stations feel compelled to tell us about who got voted off of American Idol last night. Come on, get with it people. Stop watching their trash and they will have to change.

-—They don’t get much more liberal than me, and I do watch Fox occasionally to understand “the other side.” Those four women ought to be ashamed of themselves. They make a mockery of true liberalism by encouraging censorship of ideas and speech the opposite of their own. Read the story — each person exercising gets headphones and can choose which channel they hear — they are not forced to listen to the Fox guys blaring into the exercise room. I’m shocked that the Y caved to these four, and hope this never happens again. Grow up, you four, and apologize for what was an outrageous attempt to stomp on free speech.

&&& It continues to amaze me how the left gets their panties in a bunch over Fox. Their highest rated show (O’Reilly) is seen by 2.5 million on an average night. Pretty small compared to the 10s of millions watching the left leaning nightly news on the broadcast networks. During Bush, it was all the trend to protest and question government. Now when we do we are nazis, racists, un american and other names. The bigger story is how the Y caved for 4 moonbats. That is a scary thought. What’s next?

>>That is precisely why I watch Fox. The regular networks joined by CNN , MSNBC ETC are so biased in their reporting they can no longer be viewed as news organizations. People like you aparently don’t see through their We’re for the people, We’re for the right, not the wrong hyberbole that you are swallowing hook line and sinker.


15 posted on 09/13/2009 7:30:15 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio

“We remain concerned that the ‘unhealthy’ debate on health care and health insurance ... “

Delete the word “unhealthy” and you have the liberals’ real concern.


16 posted on 09/13/2009 7:30:33 PM PDT by tumblindice (Momma said, `Stupid is as stupid does.')
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To: raccoonradio

I object to CNN at the airport.


17 posted on 09/13/2009 7:31:02 PM PDT by Drango (A liberal's compassion is limited only by the size of someone else's wallet.)
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To: raccoonradio

Liberals are only in favor of CHOICE when it allows the ignorant and irresponsible among us to kill unborn children. The Y needs to find a proctologist and have them removed.


18 posted on 09/13/2009 7:31:16 PM PDT by 70times7 (Serving Free Republics' warped and obscure humor needs since 1999!)
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To: fullchroma

Libs online refer to it as Faux News, Fox Noise, etc.

Yet ever notice the cable news prime time ratings roundup Drudge puts up? Most of the top shows are Fox ones...CNN, MSNBC, etc. all lag behind. People want and need Fox.


19 posted on 09/13/2009 7:31:45 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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To: Drango

Was pleased to see Fox News on at the airport recently (Manchester NH, I think) right next to my Southwest gate!


20 posted on 09/13/2009 7:32:40 PM PDT by raccoonradio
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