Why is the City of Dallas Broadcasting Fire And Brimstone?
Tuned into WRR-101.1 yesterday morning and heard a fiery sermon on city-owned airwaves. I’m not saying whether I agree with the content of what was said, but I think it’s interesting that the City of Dallas’ normally classical music station also transmits Christian programming. This definitely opens questions regarding the separation of Church and State. Does that mean WRR is open to broadcasting all types of religious content? If so, I’d love to hear what the druids have lined up for us…
12 Comments to “Why is the City of Dallas Broadcasting Fire And Brimstone?”
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WRR’s been doing that for years, and all the religious institutions that broadcast services pay a decent amount to WRR to do so.
It’s not just Christian churches, either. For a while they broadcast a Jewish affairs talk show hosted by Brad Sham, but it never got traction due to funding issues or somesuch.
Thanks, mediawonk. I’m sure the Druids are way underfunded.
Underfunded? Nobody even knows who they were … or where they came from. But oh, how they danced! the little people of Stonehenge!
WRR has been broadcasting PHPC’s 11am service for decades.
I hear tell the Pagans have WRR lined up for a live remote of their Yule baby-roasting festival December 21. (Yum, yum! Better than chestnuts!)
Nat “King” Cole is rolling in his grave right now. Thanks, Joan.
Joan,
You have no idea what you’re talking about.
I can’t speak specifically with regard to the Dallas market, but it’s not uncommon for radio stations to play Christian programming as a PSA. Normally a station will play PSA’s only during the (very) early morning hours on the weekends, but WRR would be fully within their rights to play a normal 11am Sunday morning service. Most stations play their PSA’s in the early morning hours because no one is listening anyway.
Radio and TV stations are required to devote a certain amount of broadcast time to PSA’s in order to maintain their FCC licenses. Even though the station is owned by the city it still operates under the same FCC guidelines as a privately owned station and so the PSA requirement applies.
@Edward: The station manager tells me the religious broadcasts are paid spots. He didn’t know off the top of his head how much the city gets for them.
So much for doing a little homework before trying to play Woodward or Bernstein.
On WRR, listen to the 9 a.m. service live from Landover Baptist church or check out its Web site, http://www.landoverbaptist.org.
Now *this* is a church with spunk!
WRR is a commercial station. While it is owned by the City of Dallas, it is not tax payer funded, but generates income for the City (and for the owners, the tax payers).
There is no issue with “Separation of Church and State”.
You might as well complain about the Dallas Symphony performing Handel’s “Messiah” at the City-owned Meyerson concert hall next Easter.