Morning radio is about nailing the basics and then delivering the “extra”. News, weather, and traffic remain important staples for the listener. That’s the foundation, and the host’s job is to smoothly and enjoyably navigate between them all morning. Beyond that, the differentiator is the added value – nuggets of information, moments of levity, and provocative conversations and interviews.
For the most part, I don’t want to pontificate, preach, or proselytize. There have been exceptions. For example, when Alex Jones was pushing the notion that the Sandy Hook school shooting was a fraud, that was a bridge too far. I have seen the families, and there is no doubting the still-lingering trauma of 20 children shot in cold blood while in school. When that trial was in full swing, there was no fence-straddling.
Generally speaking though, I find myself to be ruggedly independent, which means I want to look at an issue through my own eyes and not through that of a political party, affinity group, or religion.
That’s why a story like Israel/Hamas/Gaza is so challenging.
There is so much emotion involved. The images are awful. The history is complicated. Religion and ethnicity are involved. Since passion enters the conversation from all sides, it becomes difficult to freely share ideas.
There is so much energy out there supporting Israel that some difficult but necessary questions become politically charged.
What about innocent Palestinians who will be killed in Gaza? What about Gaza itself, considered by many to be an “open-air prison”? Does more violence solve anything? Is this a problem without a solution?
These are difficult, sometimes uncomfortable questions to ask on a news/talk radio show. However, if you extract the intensity of injecting strict analysis, they are important angles of the story.
Nothing can justify the grotesque events that happened in Israel late last week. However, that doesn’t mean the whole story is black and white.
There is no magic way to address the yarned ball of nuances in this story, but one thing is for sure: Running from it is a mistake.
The decision I made was to try and let other voices carry the discussion as much as possible. That doesn’t mean giving callers the chance to sound off. On an issue like this, that is too risky when time is so tight on a morning show clock. You need to have some control over the conversation. Plus, it’s too unpredictable and often not constructive.
Sorry. It’s just the truth.
In this care, it’s about bringing in a range of voices directly invested – academics, politicians, advocates – and ask them the difficult questions. Then, let their words round out the debate.
React. Push back. Follow up.
That’s where you earn your keep, and through that sequence and giving a diversity of perspectives, you can actually provide more clarity to the balled-up threads of ideas — and empower the listener to judge.
For the listener who simply wants to hear their own views reflected on them, they can wait for the opinion call-in shows. We’re going to try and pull in all of it, not just one part of it.
We have Yale, UConn, Wesleyan, University of New Haven, and Connecticut College, and if you do the work on booking, it’s not all ivory tower left-leaning academics. There are enough smart people out there to give all sides; you just need to go find them. And by the way, they all want to talk about it on the radio.
Some readers/listeners may counter that this is fence-sitting.
I live in Connecticut. I don’t have relatives in Israel. I don’t know anyone in Gaza. But there is no need to apologize for not being directly impacted by the events, especially considering there could well be global ramifications from what is happening.
What if Israel attacks Iran? What if the U.S. compromises support for Ukraine in order to help Israel? Doesn’t this story also add framing to our own border problem?
The point is you don’t need to be directly affected to have a vested interest. And it’s our job in news/talk radio to provide ideas, voices, and perspectives to make sure people understand that.
