AJC.com > Opinion > Woman to Woman > Archives > 2007 > September > 29
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Do we need stronger protections against ‘fleeting expletives’ on television?
Shaunti Feldhahn, a right-leaning columnist, writes the commentary this week and Andrea Cornell Sarvady, a left-leaning columnist, responds.
Rebuttal
Fleeting expletives are on the mind when battling traffic. So on a recent drive I was musing about the FCC’s crackdown when my young teen asked, “Isn’t that, like, the government trying to be our parents?”
Right, honey. Now could you explain that to the grownups?
In the past few years it’s as though we’ve all been adopted by the FCC, that self-appointed arbiter of good taste and good art. Thus, Saving Private Ryan was aired with fleeting expletives outnumbering the flying bullets, while Martin Scorcese’s documentary The Blues didn’t pass muster. Soldiers can swear, blues musicians can’t. Cheney and Bush can, Nicole Richie and Bono can’t. Get the pattern? Of course, the FCC won’t give you warnings in case you don’t. Why, that would be censorship.
I think even “NYC-based” judges share my aversion to the junk on broadcast television. Yet I think they also share my confusion: if fleeting expletives are truly “harmful to minors,” shouldn’t hearing one from the president be more damaging than hearing one from a disgraced reality TV starlet? The courts didn’t order up a blitzkrieg of f-bombs; they simply called the FCC’s rulings “arbitrary and capricious”, even “unconstitutionally vague.” For now, paranoia prevails; some stations wouldn’t air documentaries on 9/11 and Marie Antoinette at all, fearing their content might land them in the “indecency” bulls eye.
Next up on the docket: giving the FCC more power over TV violence. It sounds helpful, until The Parents Television Council moves into overdrive. Then, the same watchdogs who took their kids to “The Passion of the Christ” will make sure we don’t see so much as a brandished gun during the sacred family hours.
Another approach to fighting dreck? Talk to kids about the issues they confront everyday. By advocating Media Literacy and critical thinking , we arm young people with both information and the same skills we prize as parents.
Yet if you’re still wondering how to keep your kids away from “fleeting expletives”, this simple plan might help: Turn off the TV. Monitor the computer. And, for friggin’ sakes, don’t let them drive with me during rush hour.
Commentary
By Shaunti Feldhahn
One year ago, CBS aired a 9/11 special laced with expletives during the family hour. As many readers recall, I argued against the timing, not the special: It is still illegal to air explicit sex, violence or profanity over public airwaves (as opposed to paid cable) before 10:00 p.m., since kids could be watching. Despite that instance, I was still encouraged that the Federal Communications Commission was finally - by fining even “fleeting” network profanity - beginning to enforce the indecency laws.
Only months later, however, the crafty broadcasting industry successfully appealed their case to a NYC-based court, where two judges unbelievably overturned that FCC enforcement - basically ruling that the F-word and S-word can be aired on television at any time.
Why would broadcasters even want to air these so-called fleeting expletives? And why would it be so difficult to bleep them out? One might assume that the surge in live and taped reality shows would account for it - but one would be wrong. A recent study by the Parents’ Television Council (PTC) found 2245 instances of “objectionable violent, profane and sexual content” in just 180 hours of original television programming - and the scripted indecent content was three times higher than for unscripted and reality shows. In other words, real people have a far better sense for how to conduct themselves on-air; it is the broadcasters who are trying to ensure that any child in the room can hear and see sex, violence and profanity.
It is crazy that we have to even go to these lengths, but following the NYC court ruling Congress began considering legislation that would explicitly give the FCC the authority to fine “fleeting” instances of indecency. As the PTC’s Dan Isett recently exclaimed in an interview, “What profanity isn’t fleeting? The content by very nature is fleeting! But the F-bomb is an F-bomb no matter when you say it.”
Broadcasters disingenuously claim they respect decency laws, while legally pushing to gut them - and while purposely scripting most indecent content. Since broadcasters apparently actively want our kids to hear and see this stuff, both the courts and the congress need to take a firm hand to stop them.