[redbird]

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

The only problem is that that's not exactly true. Fleetwood Mac's videos got lots of play on MTV. "Little Lies" even topped the MTV video charts. It was an MTV special that brought the classic Fleetwood Mac back. Solo Stevie, Don Henley, Glen Frey, Tom Petty, the Traveling Wilburys, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Genesis, etc, all were in heavy rotation.

As for black artists on MTV, I think "Thriller" is still considered the most successful video of all time. I watched a lot of MTV, and I never really thought they had a racial diversity deficit. Look at the mainstream success of hip hop. You don't think Yo! MTV Raps! had anything to do with that?

MTV can be partially blamed for the downfall of popular music to some extent, but I think MTV actually did more to narrow the racial divide in the culture of music than not.

Because the author implied that Lindsey's and Stevie's solo careers followed, I assume she is talking specifically about the early 80's. In the early 80's it was definitely a recognized criticism of MTV that they did not play many black artists:

MTV was called to task on the air in 1983 for its lack of black artists by none other than David Bowie. At about the same time, MTV famously refused to air Rick James' "Superfreak" video. It defended itself by claiming it wasn't a rock song.

- source

SuperStation WTBS launched Night Tracks on June 3, 1983, with up to 14 hours of music video airplay each late night weekend by 1985. Its most noticeable difference was that black artists received airplay that MTV initially ignored.

- source

MTV's original head of talent and artist relations, Carolyn Baker, who was black, had questioned why the definition of music had to be so narrow, as had a few others. What's more, as MTV received more and more press attention, a growing number of journalists and music critics and black artists really began to slam the network for its segregated view of music. True, the critics said, album rock stations didn't play many black acts, either. But other radio formats did, and black music was still widely available on the radio. MTV, on the other hand, was still the only music video channel on television, and therefore, according to the critics, it had an obligation to expose black acts and to educate its viewers to what else was out there.

Perhaps the most vocal critic of MTV was black musician Rick James. Despite the fact that his most recent album, Street Songs, had sold more than three million copies in 1982, MTV had passed on clips for his songs "Super Freak" and "Give It To Me Baby."The funk star clearly wasn't pleased by what he considered a snub, so in early 1983 he took every opportunity to publicly call MTV a racist network.

- source

When Michael Jackson came along, he was already an established star. That was good for all. He put a lot of money into the 'Billie Jean' video. It looked great and better than everything else that had ever come out. MTV executives to this day contended they added the video right out of the box, there was never any doubt. Everyone else, including all the record company executives and Jackson's manager said that's not true. Walter Yetnikoff, who was the very powerful head of CBS Record, said to [MTV head] Bob Pittman, "If you don't play Michael Jackson's video, we're gonna pull all our videos from rotation," which would have been a significant loss for MTV.

- source

So it seems to me like it was definitely a struggle to get MTV to respect black artists initially. And even once Michael Jackson changed that, it could still have been in the memories of audiences and artists alike. MTV helped once black artists stood up for themselves and demanded better treatment.