Smith Journal – January 2019

057 SMITH JOURNAL

the sound and the fury

TIRED OF FAKE NEWS AND MEDIA BIAS, ARGENTINIANS ARE TAKING TO

THE AIRWAVES WITH THEIR OWN PIRATE RADIO AND TV STATIONS.

Writers Taz Liffman and Aaron Timms Photographer Anita Pouchard Serra

WALK A FEW BLOCKS WEST OF PARQUE
CENTENARIO, IN THE CENTRAL
BUENOS AIRES NEIGHBOURHOOD
OF CABALLITO, AND YOU’LL PASS A
DRAB, FOUR-STOREY BUILDING WITH
A SIGN EMBLAZONED ACROSS ITS
ENTRANCE: “EL ESPACIO DE CULTURA
Y POLITICA POPULAR”.

...........................................

The building, known affectionately as ‘El
Cid’, is technically owned by the Argentinian
government. But unlike most state-owned
offices, it isn’t full of public servants busy with
the task of helping the government govern.
In fact, climb the stairs to its second floor and
you’ll find the headquarters of Antena Negra
(Black Antenna), a TV station dedicated,
in part, to bringing the government down
(or at least making its rule more difficult).

In tandem with a network of pirate radio
stations, the volunteer-run group has
been producing a near-constant stream
of political reporting since the turn of the
century. Its intended audience is the large
swathes of Buenos Aires not catered for by
the mainstream media – including those
living in its slums. But despite its popularity,
or more likely because of it, Antena Negra’s
days may be numbered.

Martina, a long-time Antena Negra member,
sits among a clutter of camcorders, routers and
CRT TVs that litter the studio. “None of us has

any training in media or communications,” she

says. “But we’ve learnt by doing. Our motto is:

‘Everyone has something to teach, everyone

has something to learn.’” Martina asks us not

to publish her surname or photo – not out of

fear of retaliation from the authorities, but

because personal publicity runs counter to the

organisation’s collectivist principles. Decisions

are made as a group, she explains; no one holds

authority over anyone else. The same cannot be

said of the country’s centre-right government,

which has sought to disrupt Antena Negra’s

dreams of building “an alternative Netflix for

Argentina” since it came into power in 2015.

To understand why the government would

want to silence a motley group of TV producers

• or better yet, why a bunch of people with no
  background in media would start their TV and
  radio stations – you first have to understand a
  few things about Argentina. For starters, the
  country stretches some three million square
  kilometres, making it the eighth largest nation
  on Earth. It has many remote towns and
  barrios, each with its own particular needs
  and challenges. Despite this, the country has
  just a small handful of major media outlets,
  most of which towe the government line on
  the stories of the day. And it’s this line that
  so many of the country’s poor, working class
  and left-inclined feel the need to contest.

The story begins in the early 2000s, when

Argentina experienced a grave economic

slump. “Things were desperate,” Martina

remembers. “Some people even started using

a barter economy.” It was a time of panic, but

some also saw it as an opportunity. For decades,

residents of Argentina’s slums had to contend

with a mainstream media that either ignored

them or painted them in a negative light; no

one was telling their good news stories. Now

with the nationwide catastrophe, more and

more people were starting to feel the effects of

poverty, including Buenos Aires’ well-educated

youth. And when they turned on the news, they

noticed those who’d overseen their country’s

economic collapse weren’t being taken to task.

“The media was selling lies,” Martina says. “It

was functioning as an organ of legitimacy of

the state, claiming there weren’t any members

of the political or business elite who should

bear responsibility for the crisis. And that

simply wasn’t true.”

To counter the #fakenews peddled by the

mainstream media’s narrative, Argentinians

across the country began broadcasting their

own takes on things through unregulated,

citizen-run, not-for-profit media organisations.

Starting with a 24-hour analog TV channel in

2001, Antena Negra programmed content that

mixed lighter fare (for a guerrilla punk outfit)

with more pressing news items on everything

from the economy to gender issues, and the

struggle of Argentina’s indigenous people

for recognition of their land and culture.

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