Blogcritics The critical lens on today's culture & entertainment
Congressional hearing today on broadcast “indecency“:
- House lawmakers on Wednesday called on television and radio broadcasters to clean up their act by instituting stricter standards after renewed complaints about the coarseness of some programming.
They expressed disappointment that big broadcasters were not represented at a Congressional hearing delving into the issue of indecency and faulted the Federal Communications Commission for not sufficiently enforcing its rules.
“I believe American families should be able to rely on the fact that — at times when their children are likely to be tuning in — broadcast television and radio programming will be free of indecency, obscenity and profanity,” said Rep. Fred Upton, chairman of the House subcommittee on communications.
He said networks should review their codes of conduct and, in the case of live broadcasts, their time-delay procedures and redouble efforts to make them work.
Federal law bars the airing of obscene speech and limits the broadcasting of indecent material, containing sexual or excretory references in a patently offensive manner, to late night programming.
Upton and two dozen other House lawmakers are pushing legislation that would boost tenfold the $27,500 maximum per incident fine that can be imposed on broadcasters who violate indecency rules.
….The FCC on Tuesday proposed fining radio broadcaster Clear Channel Communications $755,000 for airing, among other things, purported cartoon characters describing explicit sexual activities at a time when children were likely to be listening.
Parents groups are pushing the FCC and Congress to increase fines and hold hearings to determine whether broadcasters who violate indecency laws should have their licenses revoked or not renewed.
“The $27,000 maximum fine is a joke and everyone knows it,” Brent Bozell, president and founder of the Parents Television Council, said in prepared testimony. “The FCC must get serious about revoking station licenses for those who refuse to abide by standards of indecency.” [Reuters]
If you are going to have the rules, then they should be enforced and the penalties should have some meaning, which they clearly do not as of now.
I despise morning “shock jock” stupid crude shit and would very much like to see that cesspool drained, maybe then I could turn the radio away from NPR in the morning every now and then.
