KCET airing of church film spurs furor.

KCET airing of church film spurs furor

KCET-TV Channel 28's decision to air the controversial "Stop the Church" short film on Sept. 6 continued to have repercussions for the station last week.

One station board member resigned; a leader of a politically conservative group announced plans to form a new local group to battle the perceived liberal bias at KCET; and the station was flooded with thousands of phone calls, sponsorship cancellations and checks from new supporters.

Station Vice President Barbara Goen said that as of Sept. 10, the station had received 4,700 phone calls about the broadcast, 2,300 of which were opposed to KCET's decision to air the film. Of the negative calls, 467 people said they were canceling their station membership and would no longer contribute to the station, but only 50 provided the membership information needed for formal cancellation, Goen said.

The station also collected $13,000 in donations from people who wrote checks in support of the decision, and another $7,200 was pledged in connection with "Stop the Church," Goen said. A total of 200 pieces of mail was reported early last week.

"It's impossible to tell about the fallout," Goen said. "We're still opening the mail."

KCET-TV aired "Stop the Church," an anti-Catholic film about ACT-UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power), after it was canceled by the Public Broadcasting System for inclusion in its POV (Point of View) series. KCET, which had been the victim of an ACT-UP "phone zap" (in which activists attempted to jam phone lines during pledge breaks), said it was airing the film because of the censorship controversy arising from the PBS decision.

KCET followed the broadcast with a panel discussion about the controversy surrounding the film.

Cardinal Roger Mahoney of the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles opposed the broadcast and urged people to reconsider supporting the station. KCET President Bill Kobin said he was going ahead with the show because the controversy had aroused public interest and, therefore, people should have the right to see the show themselves and make up their own minds about it.

On the day of the broadcast, KCET board member George Pla, president and chief executive officer of the Los Angeles-based Cordoba Corp., announced his resignation from the board, saying the program's contents "are offensive and promote hatred and bigotry."

"Airing this program is analogous to airing pornography; it represents a gross lack of respect for humankind," wrote Pla, adding that the production quality of the film was inferior.

Goen responded by saying only that the station was sorry to hear about Pla's resignation.

The church's position on the film also was supported by COMINT (Committee on Media Integrity), a group that has been fighting against what it claims is liberal bias at KCET. It has challenged the station's license renewal and tried to persuade corporate sponsors (through stockholder pressure) to withdraw their monetary support of the station.

"Now the counterculture that has captured KCET programming attacks Catholics and other Christians," said COMINT Secretary Richard Perkins, a Los Angeles attorney. "I think they enjoy offending people."

He added that the city should reconsider its support of KCET, which he said constitutes support of KCET, which he said constitutes support of "anti-Catholic bigotry." Just as the separation of church and state forbids spending public money to promote religion, public money should not be spent to bash a particular faith, Perkins said.

He also announced plans to leave COMINT soon and start a local group to focus only on efforts aimed at KCET. He said his new organization will be called Los Angeles for Reform of Public TV.

Perkins further complained that KCET's new Programming Policy Committee has refused to give him a list of its members and won't allow time at its meetings for public comment.

The Daily News in the San Fernando Valley last week published an editorial headlined "Air Time for Hate," also condemning the station's decision to air the film and saying KCET owes an apology to all its viewers. The Daily News labeled "Stop the Church" as "blatantly anti-Catholic propaganda, the electronic equivalent of hate mail" and said Mahoney had good cause to object to it airing on public television.

KCET, meanwhile, announced that its summer membership drive, which ended Aug. 26, garnered more than $1 million in pledges, a 6 percent increase over the 1990 summer pledge drive. The average pledge was $70.57, the highest in station history. Of the 14,304 people who pledged, 70 percent were new members, the station reported.

PHOTO : Bill Kobin: KCET president