The Real Thing

Can you listeners tell when you don't believe what you're saying to them? And do they care?

I used to think that they could and they do. Way, way back when I was a talk radio programmer, I advised hosts not to take positions they didn't really believe; I told them that I didn't care what their opinions were, as long as they were really their opinions. Taking extreme positions just to get a reaction or because it was what the hosts thought the audience wanted to hear was, I thought, hacky and contemptuous of the listeners. Just take an honest position, do your homework, present it in the most entertaining way possible, stick to it, let the listeners react. Simple.

(Sports radio was different. As the hot take style of talk became common, some of the most well-known hosts would clearly take positions that were entirely designed to get attention. But that was sports -- trolling to get a reaction is pretty much what sports fans do to each other, so doing it on sports radio was just reflective of that. No harm, no foul.)

I did think that listeners can sense when you don't believe what you're saying. Sports listeners don't care -- "oh, that's just (Skip, Stephen A., whomever), he's saying that to get a reaction" -- but I thought talk radio listeners did. I'm not so sure now. Yeah, we're talking about the Dominion case and the Fox News revelations; Fox hosts were apparently focused on giving the viewers what they wanted, despite knowing it was wrong and voicing very different opinions off the air. I'd bet that several talk radio hosts are doing the same thing even today, absent, I hope, the defamation part. It's dishonest, it's play-acting, it's pretty transparent... and for a core group of consumers, it's what they want. They want their world view confirmed.

So, I was wrong. At least, there appears to be enough of a core audience for that kind of talk to sustain the business, and, well, that's fine; Apart from, you know, libel and slander, you have a right to say whatever you want. The First Amendment doesn't, however, protect you from the consequences. A lot of people on Twitter seem to think that it does, but as I learned in law school (hey, I paid a lot for that degree, I should have a right to get my money's worth in flaunting it), the First Amendment applies to government speech restrictions (go look up "prior restraint" and "time/place/manner"), yet a private company has every right to control what goes out on its platform. If a station or network wants to air what you're saying, they can, and if they don't, that's their prerogative, too.

Moreover, if you say something and you get what the kids today call "cancelled," that's not a First Amendment thing. You can say what you want. Someone else can complain to your advertisers or call for a boycott or shame you on social media, and whatever you think of that, and however you handle that, it's fair game. Having been a PD when the crisis PR firm was brought in for something someone said on the air, I know how that can play out. (I'll save you some money on crisis PR firms: They'll tell you to apologize and give the complainer some air time while you donate to an appropriate charity. You're welcome.)

It's not all about that, though. It's a matter of what the industry loses when hosts are so afraid of their audience and the prospect of losing even the fringiest elements of that core that they resort to pandering and fakery. Talk radio currently subsists on an audience that is old -- elderly, really -- and, um, let's just say that it's not growing. Look at cume, not shares, and you'll get the picture. We're not talking long-term growth here. A larger audience ISN'T listening, just as a lot more people AREN'T watching cable news of all stripes than are watching Tucker Carlson (or Jake Tapper or Newsmax or "Morning Joe") and the number of people NOT listening to political podcasts dwarfs those who are. An audience of several million in the U.S. leaves over 300 million not tuning in.

It's also about this: Talk radio has become all about promotion of a particular political party or ideology. That is not what used to drive the format. Even in the Bob Grant and Joe Pyne eras, it was more about the entertainment factor -- you could disagree with the host 100% but enjoy when he would yell at callers to "get off my phone." Now, it's just confirming a listener's world view. I get the concept: consistency, knowing what you'll get when you tune in, nary a discouraging or discordant word. That's one philosophy, and it works, if reaching a less advertising-attractive audience is the goal. I suppose that since so many talk stations are on AM, reaching the audience that's available on that band is a good business decision. It's not always good radio, but it's one way to keep the patient alive.

It's not going to attract anyone who isn't a True Believer, though. That's why I liked doing things differently. I liked unpredictable radio, when you couldn't predict a host's position before you tuned in. I liked the emphasis on entertainment, not the particular political bent. I liked it when hosts put themselves and their personalities on the air, warts and all, totally honest and raw, unconcerned that someone would disagree -- welcoming that conflict, in fact. I liked it when hosts would vary their material so that you could get politics one hour, pop culture the next, and something that happened to them in real life at any time. That's what I was going for. I wanted reality. Maybe I was way, way off. Maybe I still am. But I'd rather hear someone being real, honest, themselves than somenone feeding me confirmation of my political or social views any day.

I might have it wrong. I PROBABLY have it wrong. And maybe that's why I don't program talk radio anymore. If telling people only what they want to hear and not what you truly believe is what the business is all about now, I wasn't made for that.

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Hey, we'll be talking about talk done a different way with Jon Grayson of KMBZ/Kansas City and Todd Hollst of WHIO/Dayton, and about where podcasting is going with Professor Steve Goldstein, at the All Access Audio Summit, and you can register for it here. It's all streaming, so you don't even have to go anywhere to see it. It's April 26-28 and we hope you'll join us. Please do.

Perry Michael Simon
Senior Vice President/Editor-in-Chief and News-Talk-Sports-Podcasting Editor
AllAccess.com
psimon@allaccess.com
Twitter @pmsimon
Mastodon @pmsimon@c.im