Penguin Random House CEO Markus Dohle on 'unprecedented' number of book bans and how to fight back
Reliable Sources
CNN
3.4 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 25 February 2022
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Markus Dohle talks with Brian Stelter about making a personal donation of $500,000 to PEN America to combat the censorship of books. Dohle says there is a "theme" behind the current wave of book bans in the United States and observes that "bad things follow after the written word is suppressed." Dohle also discusses the state of the publishing business and makes a bullish case for the future of print.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Book bands are both unpopular, but also becoming more common. |
| 0:07.7 | This is a narrative throughout the media world. |
| 0:10.2 | So what can individual consumers do to try to push back against these bands? |
| 0:16.3 | What can publishing houses and owners and CEOs do? |
| 0:20.3 | Well, those are a couple of the questions for this week's Reliable Sources podcast. |
| 0:25.9 | Let's go ahead and hit the music. |
| 0:28.7 | I'm Brian Stelter and this weekly podcast is our chance to go more in-depth, |
| 0:33.1 | talking with media leaders and newsmakers about how the media world really works. |
| 0:39.1 | Not a day, not a week goes by without stories about actual cancel culture. |
| 0:45.1 | Books, in some cases, beloved works of literature, |
| 0:49.3 | being banned from certain schools or being challenged by certain parents groups |
| 0:55.0 | in certain school districts. |
| 0:56.9 | This is a challenge in America right now that is coming up again and again and again. |
| 1:03.3 | And we are seeing leaders take action and step up about it. |
| 1:07.4 | One of those leaders is Marcus Dola. |
| 1:09.5 | He's the CEO of Penguin Random House. |
| 1:12.1 | He recently announced a $500,000 personal donation to Penn America. |
| 1:18.4 | Actually, he said it's going to be at least $500,000. |
| 1:21.2 | All going to the group Penn America to stand up against these book bands. |
| 1:26.3 | So I thought he'd be a really interesting figure to talk to about what's going on. |
| 1:29.6 | Where is this strain of intolerance or censorship coming from? |
| 1:33.1 | And what can all of us do about it? |
... |
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