Rush Limbaugh was Targeted by a Major Advertiser Boycott -- Did it Work?

Make no mistake Limbaugh was an effective broadcaster able to speak extemporaneously and convincingly in whole sentences on the topics of the day His background was in Top 40 radio and he used many of its wellestablished signifiers to create excitement and drive home his points Although talk radio is largely associated with conservatives like Limbaugh it39s a medium also used with skill by figures on the left especially Amy Goodman of Democracy NowBut there39s a dark side to Limbaugh39s success one he shares with other talk show hosts In 2012 Limbaugh called a Georgetown University law student named Sandra Fluke a quotslutquot and quotprostitutequot after she testified before Congress urging employer health plans to cover contraception Here39s the full statementquotIt makes her a slut right It makes her a prostitute She wants to be paid to have sex She39s having so much sex she can39t afford the contraception She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sexquotSome 140 advertisers pulled their sponsorship including AccuQuote Life Insurance Service Magic PolyCom Hadeed Carpet Thompson Creekamp160and Bridgeport Connecticut39s St Vincent39s Medical Center Two radio stations also nixed his show It was plain that advertisers love high ratings but they hate any damage to their brand reputationFar more than any political blowback there were 100000 signatures to a condemnatory online petition the advertiser boycott hit home and led to a very rare Limbaugh apology The talk show host saidamp160thisquotFor over 20 years I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity three hours a day five days a week In this instance I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation I did not mean a personal attack on Ms Fluke amp8230 My choice of words was not the best and in the attempt to be humorous I created a national stir I sincerely apologize to Ms Fluke for the insulting word choicesquotThe spin control over ad boycotts aims to quotput the incident behind usquot That39s what Premiere Networks immediately attempted to do quotIn an attempt at absurdist humor to illustrate his political point Mr Limbaugh used words that unfortunately distracted from the message he was trying to conveyquot the network said adding that he quotdid the right thingquot by offering quothis sincere and heartfelt apology to Ms Flukequot Of course the sincerity of the apology was somewhat undermined by Limbaugh39s accompanying and rather longer defense of his positionFluke is now president of a nonprofit called VoicesforProgressorg and she tells MediaVillage quotMy sympathies go out to Mr Limbaugh39s family for the loss of a loved one amp8230 I firmly support advertiser boycotts as a way of holding accountable prominent media figures who spread hatred and division to interfere with a civil debate in a democracy where all are heard and respectedquotFast forward eight years to 2020 Now the host is Tucker Carlson on Fox He refers to Black Lives Matter demonstrators as quotcriminal mobsquot and mocks a Sesame Street special on racism Again advertisers boycott including Disney Papa John39s Poshmark and TMobile The advertisers were attracted by ratings Carlson39s show the night he made those statements about Black Lives Matter had 42 million viewers making it the mostwatched TV show in the US that night On Fox he was then higher rated than Sean HannityThe list goes on Bill O39Reilly lost 47 advertisers including Allstate and MercedesBenz in 2017 after accusations of sexual misconduct and his show which generated 446 million in ad volume from 2014 to 2016 was canceled on Foxamp160A year later Fox39s Laura Ingraham went after Parkland High School shooting survivoramp160David Hogg also targeted by Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and lost Wayfair Hulu Johnson ampamp Johnson and Nestle She took a week39s hiatus and apologized on TwitterThe nemesis of most of these hosts is Media Matters for America which functions as a fact checker and posts lists of their advertisers and those that have pulled out Here39s the Sean Hannity list quotTell advertisers to drop Foxquot Media Matters says quotAdvertisers will get burned if they continue to associate with Hannity plain and simplequotIt39s hard to compare the long record of ad boycotts against rightist talk radio with the leftwing competition because Amy Goodman hosts the only nationally successful leftleaning radio show on 1400 radio and TV outlets and doesn39t accept advertising or corporate underwriting Air America an attempt at answering the right with a liberal radio network that included hosts such as Al Franken Robert Kennedy Jr and Ron Reagan lasted only from 2004 to 2010 Financial woes shut it downBut in what may be a titfortat exchange MSNBC39s leftofcenter Rachel Maddow was targeted by Hannity in 2017 He urged advertisers to boycott her program and enlisted the Media Research Center MRC and Media Equalizer to help out Hannity had himself lost five advertisers after claiming that year that Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich had been murdered Decrying liberal smear campaigns against conservative radio MRC39s Brent Bozell said quotToday is the day the conservative movement fights backquotMedia Matters President Angelo Carusone told MediaVillage that he doesn39t think that Maddow actually lost any advertisers as a result of that campaign especially since there was no precipitating incident on her partBut Carusone is insistent that Limbaugh was hurt worse than it appeared by the 2012 Fluke incident quotThe collateral damage was really stunningquot he said quotWABC dropped him and that was where he started For two years you couldn39t listen to Limbaugh39s show in New York City Cumulus Media dropped him in 38 markets because it was hemorrhaging advertising revenue He really lost a substantial footprint Part of the problem was the weak apology and that the show couldn39t offer assurances that such incidents wouldn39t happen againquotIt39s not all political In 1994 when Tejano singer Selena was murdered Howard Stern mocked her played her music with gunfire in the background and said Hispanics had quotthe worst taste in musicquot The Hispanic community threatened a boycott and Stern issued an apology in Spanish Don Imus thought it was funny to make a racist remarkamp160about a player on the Rutgers University women39s basketball team in 2007 He later apologized profusely Advertisers dropped the show in droves and his shows got canceled on both CBS and MSNBCIn gauging the effectiveness of these boycotts let39s note that Rush Limbaugh emerged only temporarily set back from the 2012 incident and Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham are still on the air Don Imus and Bill O39Reilly never recovered but Howard Stern did Carusone also points to aamp160conservative broadcaster named Dr Laura Schlessinger who was a toprated host until she used the nword 11 times on the air in 2010 She had her years in the wilderness but is now on Sirius XM with less politicsSo a mixed record for advertiser boycotts but most assuredly a powerful tool capable of bringing down even the highestrated radio and TV programs It39s interesting to speculate what would have happened to Rush Limbaugh if he39d slimed Sandra Fluke after the rise of MeToo a phrase first used in 2006 but only rose to prominence in 2017Click the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNetamp160

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Rush Limbaugh was Targeted by a Major Advertiser Boycott -- Did it Work?

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Jim Motavalli

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