Discovery Communications has joined forces with President Obama to produce programming related to The White House's initiative known as "My Brother's Keeper". The initiative seeks to combat stereotypes about men of color and improve their life outcomes through public-private partnerships. Discovery will be investing $1 million to produce programming which promotes the initiative and CEO David Zaslav will be named to the National Convening Council which will help facilitate those public-private partnerships.
This new endeavor will culminate with a one-hour TV special which will broadcast on Father's Day 2015 and will be simulcast on OWN, Discovery Channel as well as Discovery's online websites. Discovery Education, which provides educational television shows to schools nationwide, will also produce townhalls about various issues affecting minority men.
MY TAKE: It's honorable that Discovery is taking a stand in helping minority men succeed and I have no doubts that the programming they produce will successfully portray a positive message which will make a difference. I just wonder why Discovery was chosen as the media partner for this initiative when none of their networks have a target audience of minority males.
Why not a network like ESPN or TNT, both of whom have many different personalities under their stable who can relate to viewers when discussing issues affecting minority men? Both networks have also had forums dealing with these issues in the past and they're partners with the NBA, who'll be playing a role in advancing this initative as well.
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