What the fuck...
Topics: Civil Liberties
17 Mar 2006
From: Ervan Darnell
> In all, six other programs across a broad spectrum were fined for
> indecency, from Spanish-language music videos, to the WB reality
> series "The Surreal Life 2," to a PBS broadcast of "The Blues:
> Godfathers and Sons," a documentary by filmmaker Martin Scorsese that
> contained profanity.
>
> The FCC fined an educational station in San Mateo, California,
> $15,000. [1]
>
The FCC is fining PBS for an apparently accurate historical
documentary? This is so wrong that the merits are not even worth
debating, but rather one wonders how we got so far off the track.
The debate on the Newshour was about whether or not the new line being
drawn was a sufficiently clear one. What a ridiculous debate that is.
What shade of blue are the emperor's new clothes? Here's the line: no
censorship. I'm reminded of Penn Jillette's quote (which I've probably
used before):
> "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion,
> or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of
> speech, or of the press." Do we need to see it [before we decide]? No:
> Congress shall make no law. It's not, "Congress shall make no law,
> unless it's African-American people in Florida saying things about
> fucking women in the ass." No, it's Congress shall make no law. [2]
Here we are debating whether or not Bush can order wiretaps without a
warrant, and we cannot even get the court to stop Congress from
authorizing censorship in flat contradiction to the most obvious
statement in the Constitution.
[1] http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/jan-june06/fcc_3-16.html
[2] In a Reason interview talking about 2 Live Crew.
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