Television Academy President Crime Ebrego criticized the Congress for voting for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), in a speech paying tribute to the organization at Amy Awards on Sunday evening.
“For more than 50 years, CPB is the backbone of American public media, which is bringing us everything from ‘Tsem Street’ to ‘finding their roots’ and keeping free local stations alive across the country,” Abrego said in his speech.
“And in many small towns, those stations were not just a cultural lifeline, they were the only emergency alert systems family that could be trusted,” they continued.
“But at the end of this year, the CBP will close its doors as the Congress voted to blame it,” he said, the audience said, “And silence is still another cultural institution.”
Abrego said that this step by the Congress highlighted the power of storytelling to unite people, even in front of the cultural divisions.
He said, “And it reminds us how much our work matters here, especially at a time when partition … is in the headlines, we still have the power to unite to tell the story,” he asked to play applause.
Abrego encouraged television makers to follow the heritage of previous artists, who “seized the power of television to broaden the horizon, challenged the status quo and bends that arc of history for justice.”
“Television Academy and in this room we all should continue that power and erase it responsibly,” he said. “In such moments, neutrality is not enough. We should have voices for connection, inclusion, sympathy.”
“Because we know that culture does not come down from top,” they continued. “It rises from below.”
Congress, in July, Approves a bill to bring back Arabs Foreign Assistance and Public Broadcasting Fund, including the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and other foreign aids cut by about $ 8 billion, as well as more than $ 1 billion in cuts to CPB, which provides some funding to NPR and PBS.
