Talk:Citizen Koch

Disputed references

I removed a sentence which could only be justified as a synthesis of questionable interpretations of the three sources given. One or more of the three clauses is supported by each of the references, and some of the connections, but not all the connections are supported.

In addition, none of the four references referred to the film as "Citizen Koch". The first sentence could be sourced, but only referring to the film by its real name. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:25, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Moving disputed material here per WP:PRESERVE -- Kendrick7^talk 02:08, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Not sure how you are getting the references don't refer to the film.

The first reference refers to a piece of commentary by Stephen Colbert in which he explicitly mentioned the name of the movie; the name of the movie is also used as the title of his segment. Here's a low res screen cap:

[1]

The second reference, well, it does require you to hit the "transcript" button to get the full text of the radio program (or audio to get the audio), but it certainly mentions the movie. For example:

They'd gotten green lighted for $150,000 in programming, and they were getting -- I've looked at a paper trail on this. They, too, as documentarians, kept everything. And basically, they were getting all kinds of good feedback until the Gibney film ran into its problems in New York. And suddenly, they hit -- all kinds of alarms went off because they had decided to name their film "Citizen Koch," which was -- because the reporting they were doing, they were looking particularly at the Wisconsin's politics, where the Koch's political organization, Americans for Prosperity, was a major player. And so the narrative had naturally -- the reporting had led them to reporting about the Koch brothers' influence on politics. But they -- this happened just as Gibney's documentary was angering David Koch in New York, and WNET is the largest station in the network of PBS affiliates. It's an incredibly important station. And the little, tiny part of PBS that creates independent films had been yelled at by the head of WNET and -- because he felt blindsided by the earlier film. And basically, one thing led to another and the film "Citizen Koch" got killed by ITVS. And according to all kinds of phone calls that have been documented by the documentary makers, they were told to change the title, get the Koch's name out of the title, change the storyline to deemphasize the -- its focus on the Kochs. And basically, eventually, they were told that it was a no-go, and their film was killed, not funded. And so there was kind of chain reaction that followed from the Gibney film that ended up in killing another film in the pipeline about the Kochs. So you can see that there, you know, from -- at least the filmmakers feel they were censored for political reasons. Gibney feels that Koch was given special privileges and -- to criticize his film without seeing it on air. And basically, the sense is there was -- that the filmmakers have is that there was, you know, undue influence used by one of the funders.

My bold. ITVS is a department within PBS, FWIW.

And here is the 3rd reference

According to a deeply depressing report in this week's New Yorker, David Koch withheld a "seven-figure" donation to New York's cash-starved PBS affiliate, WNET, after a documentary critical of the Kochs aired in November. Jane Mayer, somewhat of an authority on the Kochs, reports that Koch's influence essentially killed the airing of another film on PBS entitled Citizen Koch.

Again, my bold.

The fourth reference you removed was just the first reference; are you disputing that the film was accepted by Sundance? I don't think your contention that the sources don't mention the name of the film hold water, and I believe I've done a fair synthesis of the material. -- Kendrick7^talk 02:28, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

My mistake about Sundance. It's not connected to the other entries. However, the three clauses are:

1. The film became controversial

   I would claim it was already controversial, but the connections need more work

2. after ... PBS

   "America's public broadcasting network" is both wrong and irrelevant

3. which periodically receives millions of dollars in funding from David Koch

   Probably true,

4. reneged on a plan to air it.

   (emphasis added) That requires that there was a definite "plan" to air it, which is not established.

Ignoring point 2 as being factual and non-controversial (without the phrase "America's public broadcasting network), no source connects points 1, 3, and 4; and "reneged" implies there was a definite deal to air it, which has not been established. I see a claimed connection between points 3 (and, changing "reneged on a plan to air it" to "declined to air it") point 4, but it clearly was already controversial. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 06:02, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Additional info as to what the film authors claim took place. – Miranche ^T C 17:10, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Disputed material

The film became controversial after America's public brocasting network, PBS, which periodically receives millions of dollars in funding from David Koch, reneged on a plan to air it. The film was accepted by the Sundance Film Festival.

Removed references

I removed the following references (2-6) from the article as they no longer (after AdventurousSquirrel's edit of July 11) support any of the text in the article. Furthermore, the description of the film as written, although almost certainly correct, is disputed, and is not in any of the references. Furthermore the quote in reference 1 no longer supports any of the text in the opening sentence in the article. While I was forbidden from editing the article, I was considering combining all the unnamed references for the controversy (2-4) into a single reference tag, but that makes no sense now: The references do not support the text of the article.

1. The messages from ITVS officials grew confusing. Aguilar again praised the film as "great", and said, “I think you've preserved the anger of the film, which I love." Other officials, though, kept urging the filmmakers to change the title, add negative material about Democrats, and delete an opening sequence that showed Sarah Palin speaking at a rally sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, the Kochs' main advocacy group. Several times, Lessin and Deal asked ITVS officials if Koch's trusteeship at WNET was a factor. During the phone meeting on December 7th, Vossen said, "I can absolutely assure you that ITVS does not want your film to be buried." She said of the title, "I think you understand why it’s problematic. . . . We live in a world where we have to be aware that people with power have power."

2. Mayer, Jane (May 23, 2013). "Stephen Colbert on David Koch and PBS". The New Yorker (blog).
3. Rehm, Diane (May 21, 2013). "The Intersection Of Political Influence And Journalism". The Diane Rehm Show / WAMU.
4. Robbins, Christopher (May 20, 2013). "How Billionaire David Koch Gets PBS To Dance, Monkey, Dance". Gothamist (blog).
5. Thomas, Rob (May 21, 2013). "Citizen Koch filmmakers Claim PBS Killed Their Doc to Please Koch Brothers". The Capital Times.
6. Stelter, Brian (August 12, 2013). "The Documentary 'Citizen Koch' Regains Money". New York Times.

— Arthur Rubin (talk) 16:01, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up and observing the dictum of WP:PRESERVE that material which is removed from an article should be copied to the talk page. I have as such, restored the references for now as external links as they are plainly encyclopedic and relevant to the article at hand, in the hope that they might be better incorporated into the article itself eventually. -- Kendrick7^talk 04:06, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

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