The role of ethnic television media is to provide informational programming, which pertains to the needs of the various cultural communities within Canada. The information provided by these programs gives these communities information that the mainstream media does not provide. Their programming is mostly produced in Canada with a few shows from the various diasporas. In May 2012,
Rogers Media announced the purchase of CJNT from
Channel Zero, with the intent to affiliate the station with its primary television system
Citytv rather than affiliate the station with Omni Television. Another Canadian ethnic television service is specialty cable channel
Telelatino. Serving
Italian and
Spanish Canadian audiences, the station is available in 3.5 million Canadian homes on the second tier. In a focus group of Iranian immigrants conducted in Vancouver one participant stated “If I’m really looking for information I will turn to CBC…if I want serious information I wouldn’t watch
Channel M.” Other participants of the focus groups deemed ethnic channels as “fluffy” or not providing information relevant to them. What is more is, these participants felt that multicultural media did not represent their lives in a less reductionist manner than mainstream media. Thus the audiences of multicultural media still do not feel their cultures’ complexities are represented accurately or at all. The ethnic broadcasts that focused on cultural events did not serve their needs and the ethnic audiences wanted more “inclusive and representative storytelling”. The ethnic television stations lack of legitimacy in mainstream realm further affects the minorities’ view of them. By tackling this issue of legitimacy, the ethnic broadcasters will not only help their image to mainstream audiences but also to their target audiences.
Grey Market Satellite Systems Recently, Canada has seen the advance of the “
Grey market satellite system”. These are subscription based TV services not owned by Canadian companies but have subscribers in Canada. In September 2002 the President of the Canadian Cable Televisions Association estimated as many as 700,000 illegal satellites were in Canada. Most of these dishes are not purchased from Canadian companies. This revenue could have gone to licensed Canadian companies such as
Bell ExpressVu or
Rogers Digital Cable. Immigrants who want and need programs and stations from their native home countries purchase many of these dishes. The figures point to a need for an expansion of third-language media as well as a lack of satisfaction of existing third-language media in Canada. Despite the need to grow third-language media further, in 2003 the government rejected adding more foreign-language broadcasters. In the same year, the CRTC stated in a report “Canadians enjoy access to a wide variety of ethnic services”. This statement was extremely problematic as at that time, though there were 93 foreign-owned channels licensed for broadcasting in Canada but only 10 were in languages other than English or French. Also, though most third-language broadcasters are approved by the CRTC they do not have carriers, making them inaccessible to Canadians. Furthermore, in the 14 largest TV markets, only 4 analogue specialty services were available which only catered to Italian, Spanish, Cantonese, South Asian and Greek communities. With the limited numbers of ethnic programming provided by the legal means, the immigrant and ethnic communities’ reliance on “illegal” satellite services only grows. In February 2004 there was an attempt to amend the
Radiocommunication Act to increase the penalty for transmitting or decoding unauthorized satellite signal. As the CRTC refused to add more third-language channels to the existing cable and satellite services, many saw this amendment as a direct attack on the minorities whose needs were not being met by the framework set in place. The amendment did not go through as it was seen as an attack on cultural diversity. By mid-2004, the CRTC allowed access to more third-language channels but only to subscribers who already paid for ethnic channels based in Canada.
Al Jazeera Al Jazeera English was approved for broadcasting in Canada by the CRTC in 2004. There was support for the station by the Muslim and Arabic communities in Canada. However, the
Canadian Jewish Congress was less than enthusiastic about the networks availability in Canada. They stated “Under the guise of a seemingly legitimate news agency, Al Jazeera has provided hatemongers and terrorists with a platform for their view.” Ultimately, many in the Jewish communities found the station allowed and promoted
anti-Semitic sentiments. The CRTC eventually concluded that though Al Jazeera had not promoted any such hateful views yet, it could potentially. This finding is extremely problematic as it gives any community or lobbyist the power to influence what channels are and are not approved by the CRTC. Any station can potentially promote hateful or spiteful messages. To allow any segment of the population to influence the CRTC’s decision on an ethnic channel can keep any third-language station off of Canadian airwaves legally. In the case of Al Jazeera, the CRTC made it the responsibility of the cable and satellite distributors to alter or delete any “abusive comments” made on Al Jazeera programming. The censorship power is otherwise forbidden to distributors. The authorization of this censorship can be seen as an act of racism on behalf of the CRTC as they only granted this censorship authority for this Arabic station. This marked the Arabic message as a deviant and ultimately uncanadian message, further perpetuating a growing Muslimphobia in the post 9/11 landscape. Furthermore, by passing the responsibility of censorship to distributors, the CRTC ensured the network would not receive carriage by the Canadian cable and satellite distributors. As
Shaw Communications President Peter Bissonette explained by taking the responsibility which came with Al Jazeera, meant having a human monitoring the channel for 24 hours, who was fluent in Arabic, and knew contemporary broadcasting standards. Due to this demand in human and technological services, Al Jazeera is still not viewed on television in Canadian homes legally. == Multicultural and ethnic media organizations ==