The Curse of the Female Body

Why are mammary glands obscene?



Over a half-million dollar fine for the second of breast exposure is absurd.

This week's Arkansas Times has a column on this.

Earlier this month, President Bush signed the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act, increasing the maximum penalty for broadcasting indecent material on radio or television between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. from $32,500 to $325,000.

The National Association of Broadcasters, not surprisingly, has said that any indecency rules applied to broadcasters should apply to cable and satellite TV also. They are losing viewers to cable & satellite and I would expect this to escalate in the months and years to come. Terrestrial television (and probably radio as well) will become more like white bread to a large audience who prefer whole grain.

I've blogged on this earlier, calling it the Death of Broadcasting. Of course the broadcast networks will continue to find ways to push the envelope with innuendo rather than blatant "obscenity" (whatever that is). I believe the greatest impact is going to be on public broadcasting which is truly sad. They have a number of artistic documentaries where the language isn't used for shock value, rather it's a intrinsic part of the dialogue and setting.

Two years ago, AETN (Arkansas Educational Television Network) showed a documentary on the blues, made by the movie director Martin Scorsese, that contained some strong language. AETN got by with it. But last March, a San Mateo, Calif., station was fined for showing the same program — probably because some national organization complained. National watchdog groups generate most of the complaints, Weatherly said. (read: a half dozen or so extreme fundamentalists.*)

The Public Broadcasting System has advised all its member stations, including AETN, to edit out coarse language and to obscure the lips of the person using the language, so that viewers can’t tell what was said just by looking. PBS said it was trying to protect the stations “from the now-catastrophic financial sanctions and expensive litigation associated with FCC indecency enforcement activity.”

From
Mediaweek:

*Virtually none of those who complained to the Federal Communications Commission about the teen drama Without A Trace actually saw the episode in question, CBS affiliates said as they asked the agency to rescind its proposed record indecency fine of $3.3 million. All of the 4,211 e-mailed complaints came from Web sites operated by the Parents Television Council and the American Family Association, the stations said in a filing on Monday.

Feeling hijacked yet?

Had the same wardrobe malfunction happened to Justin Timerblake instead of Janet Jackson -- even if he had been completely topless, there would not have been a word said.


Previous posts:

The death of broadcasting.

Hijacking PBS from the right.