What makes sex so scandalous? Why is the American culture so ‘hush, hush’ about the friction in the sheets while the rest of the world exploits it? Regardless of what the world does, in general, this country desires to protect the youth from sex in television and radio. Some Americans feel furious when seeing or hearing sexual material and send complaints to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). While others either support the questionable material or feel indifferent towards it. The FCC has created guidelines of indecency and obscenity for broadcasters to use and to judge what content is aired. What qualifies as indecency or obscene differs from person to person due to their personal life experiences, their morals, and upbringing. On the other hand, parents judge indecency or obscenity based on their children and the age of each child. So, what is okay for mommy and daddy to watch or hear may bother them if their child is exposed to it as well. However, is it the government’s job protect everyone’s child from obscene or indecent material? No, that is a parenting issue. But, the FCC still has to balance itself with the First Amendment and the Communications Act. “The First Amendment, as well as Section 326 of the Communications Act, prohibits the Commission from censoring broadcast material and from interfering with freedom of expression in broadcasting. The Constitution’s protection of free speech includes that of programming that may be objectionable to many viewers or listeners.” (FCC, 2008) Set aside the morals for a moment and look at the issue with openness. Are the Federal Communications Commission rules regarding pornographic programming effective? Yes they are, however, it took until the 2004 contr... ... middle of paper ... ...ublic_and_broadcasting.html#_Toc202587539 Howard Stern. (2011). Biography.com. Retrieved from http://www.biography.com/articles/Howard-Stern-9494041 In text – (“Howard Stern,” 2011) Leis, C.L. (2001). United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group, Inc. – Sexually Explicit Signal Bleed and §505 of the CDA: Unable to Overcome Strict Scrutiny but Will Strict Scrutiny be Able to Overcome the Future?. Unpublished manuscript, Capital University Law School, Columbus, OH. Retrieved from https://culsnet.law.capital.edu/LawReview/BackIssues/30-4/Leis.pdf Pornography. (1996). Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law. Retrieved from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pornography Supreme Court of the United States, (2000). United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group, Inc Washington, DC: Retrieved from http://www.fcc.gov/ogc/documents/opinions/2000/98-1682.html
In 1973, Marvin Miller, operator of one of the West Coast's largest mail-order businesses dealing in sexually explicit material, had conducted a mass mailing campaign to advertise the sale of illustrated books, which was known as “adult material”. He was found guilty based on the fact that he violated California’s pena...
A decision from the Supreme Court is expected sometime in the spring of 2002. This case does not directly address the issue of how the community standards requirement applies to determining whether online material is obscene (speech that does not receive First Amendment protection) rather than merely indecent (harmful for minors but protected for adults). The court's ruling will nonetheless be significant in terms of the future of the "community standards" test for obscenity online.
AT&T is the biggest American company that has accommodated itself to the pornography boom. Its cable division, AT&T Broadband, distributes to subscribers the explicit porn channel, The Hot Network; and this has unfortunate repercussions in the world of Internet pornography. In the spring of 2001, an interfaith coalition of relig...
...from the other side of this argument is the fact that profanity and sexually explicit material shouldn’t be exposed to young children without their parental permission. But telling teenagers and young adults who are mature enough to choose what they want to listen to is completely wrong and unjust. The key word here is choice. As stated earlier, the thing that makes this country truly great is the idea that we have the right to listen to whatever we choose we want to listen to, not what a censor thinks you should be exposed to, it’s ridiculous.
The Constitutional issue that was addressed was whether the CDA violated the First Amendment’s protection of free speech (Reno, 1997). The court found that the CDA did infringe upon the freedom of speech protection afforded in the First Amendment. The CDA was an effort to restrict inappropriate material from reaching children under the age of eighteen through the internet. However, the court found that the CDA’s language was too vague and because of that, it ...
After reading “Let’s Put Pornography Back in the Closet” by Susan Brownmiller, my opinion regarding the censorship of pornography has not changed. Although her essay was very forthright and descriptive, it seemed very biased.
Recently our government through its administrative agency for communications, the FCC, has decided to send a message to the corporate media to clean up their broadcasts. The FCC defines indecency as:
The pressure from parents’ rights groups such as the ACT, was finally exposed in the Action for Children's Television v. FCC (ACT I) in 1988 where the concern was limited to the indecent exposure and obscenity on television at hours when children were likely to be watching. The Court looked at the regulations imposed on commercial broadcasting networks in 1987 as a response to parental outrage and the government’s responsibility to care for children’s well-being and protect them from obscenity and indecency on television.
Head, Tom . "Radio Censorship." About.com Civil Liberties. About.com, n.d. Web. 10 Dec. 2013. .
American culture is very sexually oriented. Sex can be seen all over the media. Charles Krauthammer stated, "Sex oozes from every pore of the culture and there's not a kid in the world who can avoid it"(Bender).
On one hand, many parents praised the new invention, because it allowed them to control what their children were able to view on television. Even if the parents weren’t in the room when the television was on, they could rest easy knowing that their kids would not be subjected to inappropriate material, because it was all blocked automatically. However, “critics saw…[v-chips and television ratings] as a step towards censorship” (Stephens). Critics of v-chip technology asserted that it violated the First Amendment’s right to freedom of the press, by allowing the government to establish restrictions on television programming. This right protects the ability to create and dispense information to the public without fear of the government controlling or blocking its distribution; some in the television industry felt as though the v-chip was the first stride towards stripping away this right. Critics also asserted that v-chip technology was not effective, because children could learn to circumvent parental controls. Children in the modern age grow up immersed in new technology, and as a result, adapt very quickly to it. Therefore, “new forms of technology increasingly upset established patterns of parental control. Children can operate [technology] better than their parents” (Balkin). Children can sometimes learn to break into and change the television settings chosen by their parents, thereby rendering V-chip technology useless. This fault will most likely force the government to consider new, more efficient ways of controlling obscene material on
If there is a single most important event that happened in television that caused major ramifications, it would be the Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction” during the halftime show at Super Bowl 38. In this incident Janet Jackson exposed her right breast. Worst of all the Super Bowl was broadcast on CBS, a non-cable free channel, where censorship is pushed to the extreme. An estimated 140 million people were watching the halftime show when the incident occurred (Davidson 2004). In response the FCC fined CBS $550,000, which is the largest fine ever handed out by the FCC to a T.V. broadcasting station (Davidson 2004). The 227 CBS independent affiliates were left un-fined (Davidson 2004). This one event probably had the most severe consequences ever, and caused an onslaught of censorship to follow, and spread into every aspect of American’s lives.
To sum up, to set a single standard in the censorship of all programs is inappropriate and irrational. It is better to use different criterions to censor broadcast media according to different groups of audience. Government should rigorously censor programs provided for children while do l...
In recent years, pornography has established itself as perhaps the most controversial topic arising out of the use of the Internet. The easy availability of this type of sexually explicit material has caused a panic among government officials, family groups, religious groups and law enforcement bodies and this panic has been perpetuated in the media.
The Court held Section 288.2(b) did not violate the Commerce Clause because "no legitimate commerce would be burdened by penalizing the transmission of harmful sexual material to known minors in order to seduce them."