I recently joined the ranks of the canceled after six years of my participation in a political talk show on a Santa Fe NPR affiliate. This was done absent of one single negative comment about my performance in over fifty shows. Why? Because I had the temerity to question the Progressive orthodoxy of NPR's 'personal pronoun policy.' It all started after the newly-named 'Content Manager' (CM) for the station wanted me to apologize for daring to question (in an off-air private conversation that was overheard by the sound engineer) that station's new 'woke' pronoun preference policy.
Without any attempt to speak to me in person or even over the telephone, the CM passed off the task of canceling me to the producer of the show (a very decent and professional individual) who forwarded me an email saying that I was now to be considered unwelcome at the station; was not allowed to participate in any of the station's future programs and was in his words, "…officially persona non grata here."
I would like to say that this was a complete surprise, but it wasn't. Like so many other NPR affiliates, this one in Santa Fe has been leaning arrogantly Left for a long time and will probably continue to do so for many years to come. That said, I was proud to have been a member of an esteemed panel that discussed a wide range of issues of interest to New Mexicans and was never once chastised or criticized for my honest, heartfelt and always respectfully-presented comments. Actually, I felt that this show was proof that there was still hope for free speech because the station had previously been open to airing often conflicting viewpoints without attempting to censor the commentators. Those hopes were dashed with my 'cancelation.' And while I don't dispute any station's right to choose its own programming and its own participants, what I am concerned about is the ideologically-driven single-mindedness of the station's management and the disrespectful and unprofessional way they handled my 'situation.' Dismissing honest voices of dissent - especially those made in private conversations - without so much as a by your leave flies in the face of fairness to say nothing of being really bad HR practices. Finally, there is the issue of this publicly-funded station's duty to serve the community's interests which I contend they have failed to do.
NPR's (and its affiliates') policies must be above reproach and be able to withstand the gaze of public scrutiny. They must live up to their charter in all ways and not favor one political group or ideology over the others. The supreme hypocrisy here is the fact that before I was banished from their (ours really) airwaves the CM wanted the producer to create an even more provocative program than the one I participated in for six long years! A reasonable person might ask, "How do you expect to tackle the controversial issues of the day when you can’t even debate a simple HR policy and then go on to silence those who would debate it? It boggles the mind. For my part, I've pushed this issue up the corporate pipeline to NPR corporate in DC in the hopes that they will act. I suspect, however, that they will send the issue back to the affiliate, using their favorite excuse - the principal of subsidiarity - a fancy word for passing the buck. If that's the case, it will be regrettable, especially since the issue deals with the capricious denial of free speech.
We gain no purchase in waging an ideological war with one another by using a heavy hand to silence debate and respectful dissent. Organizations that use coercion and the indiscriminate exercise of power are never successful in settling our differences… and that goes for NPR as well.
Stephan Helgesen is a retired career U.S. diplomat who lived and worked in 30 countries for 25 years during the Reagan, G.H.W. Bush, Clinton, and G.W. Bush Administrations. He is the author of twelve books, six of which are on American politics and has written over 1,300 articles on politics, economics and social trends. He operates a political news story aggregator website: www.projectpushback.com. He can be reached at: stephan@stephanhelgesen.com