Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Major Networks

The major broadcast TV networks had a major victory today in the US 2^nd Circuit Court of appeals against the Federal Communications Commission's rule banning expletives and indecency from both radio and television networks. The Court ruled in favor of TV networks, citing the policy as "unconstitutionally vague."

In 2006, the networks jointly sued the FCC in response to tighter reins on indecency on the airwaves, in response to a March ruling by the FCC that "unscripted expletives uttered impromptu on live broadcasts, such as award shows, violated indecency rules and were subject to fines". (http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fcc-indecency-20100714,0,5995911.story)

After the much-publicized and often-criticized "wardrobe malfunction" of Janet Jackson during the 2006 Super Bowl Halftime show, the FCC decided to crack down on what Americans can and cannot see and hear over the airwaves. Was it enough, or was it too much?

The First Amendment to the Constitution states: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

If you notice, nothing is said about profanity.

In the beginning, the government did not have any real regulation against profanities. However, with the increasing popularity of radio and then television, rules had to be made. In 1957, the Supreme Court applied the Roth test (based on Roth vs. the United States) stating that "...'the average person, applying contemporary community standards' would find the work, as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest....the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law, and ...the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value."

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution)

I will be the first to agree that, in most cases, the adding of nudity or profanity to movies and television does not increase its worth. It seems as though violence, nudity and profanity have replaced talent. Maybe I yearn for a simpler time, when suggestion was far more sexy than outright nudity. Maybe having television couples sleeping in separate beds was a bit much, but whatever happened to imagination?

Children today are the most susceptible to television and radio. Today is a technological world, and, unless you are in the far reaches of the world, children are going to see and hear way more than we ever did as children. When you have Teen Nick, owned by MTV networks - a subsidiary of Viacom - showing teenagers engaging in sexually explicit situations and getting pregnant or a cartoon like Family Guy and its sexual and profane references, you have to wonder if America has gone too far. I recently put parental locks on my cable channels so that my 11 year old would not be subjected to profanity and sexually explicit situations. She can only watch about five channels.

The ruling by the Court is going to have serious consequences on the FCC's ability to censor what your children see and hear. The control is quickly slipping from their grasps. While I agree that the government should not have its hand in everything we do, the FCC has a job to protect our families. And, now, the FCC is seriously limited from doing it's intended job.

As a result of this ruling, TV networks and radio stations have free reign on what they air. Hollywood is already having problems coming up with original ideas, given the vast amount of remakes, so what comes next? I predict that we will all see a severe drop in the quality of productions, and all this loss of FCC control does is open the flood gates for more trash.