FCC- Federal Censorship commission?

Is there a more insane idea than considering Saving Private Ryan to be indecent? Sure it's a long, bloody, gory, war story smattered with a few curse words; but as you and I know, World War II wasn't a church social. Yet somehow, a full third of ABC stations elected not to show the movie in fear of FCC sanctions, and I'm ashamed that my local ABC station in Baltimore is among them. For those that did not know, Steven Spielberg has an agreement that his movies shall not be edited or modified when shown on television by ABC. (and bully for him) And because of the agreement an edited version of the film could not be shown; so the stations decided to show more of the bland, insipid programming that they've used to kill their market share in the past.

Apparently the new "moral" agenda of America forbids naughty words from any type of television programming for fear of "the children." (note the very obvious use of quotes) Everyone with a broadcast license is now fearful of the FCC and their "broadcast decency" witch hunt. Now let's not forget that the chairman of the FCC is Michael Powell who was appointed to the position by GWB and is the son of the recently resigned Colin Powell. While I like his father, Michael Powell seems a little enigmatic. While he's a champion of using broadband and the internet to go beyond POTS networks, he's pretty lax about media consolidation, and is leading the FCC charge against "indecency" on television. He seems to me as being part of the same big business pandering sycophant GOP mob while pushing the "compassionate conservative" agenda down the throats of the rest of America.

Now let's debate the actual definition of indecency. Dictionary.com gives a general definition of indeceny as being "The state or quality of being unseemly or immodest." (links added) While our friends at the FCC seem to define indecency as "language or material that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium, sexual or excretory activities or organs[.]" The FCC has had the same definition of indecency since 1978(FCC v. PACIFICA FOUNDATION, 438 U.S. 726 (1978)), when it brought the Pacifica Foundation to court because of an afternoon radio broadcast of "words you couldn't say on the public airwaves."

Now where do these two definitions collide? Well, indeceny as defined by the dictionary reflects actions that conflict with the standards of polite society and good taste. Indecency as enforced by the FCC is specifically geared towards material that only pertains to sexual subjects, excretory functions, or organs. Presumably by organs they are referring to biological organs, and most likely only human organs. So the FCC really only cares about one subset of indecent things, notably boobs, wieners, fart jokes, and things you can do with boobs and wieners. But where is the "moral" outrage against indecent and inflammatory political or social views? As a politically stacked government organization, what the FCC would consider as indecent politically or socially would probably change depending who was in office that term.

However I think where we really run into problems is where community standards come in to play. Something considered indecent in rural Texas might not be considered anything special at all in Chicago and vice versa. The United States is a country that prides itself on it's diversity, however, it doesn't seem that the FCC takes that into account. Take for instance the recent fine that Clear Channel Communications received for an episode of the Infinity Broadcast Howard Stern show. They fined a company for it's broadcast across the country for complaints received from a handful of locales. The transcript of the show isn't any more tasteless than the hundreds of shows that Stern has broadcast for years. However, they found it appropriate to slap Clear Channel with a $495,000 fine, and Infinity Broadcasting received a $27,500 fine for a separate broadcast from 2001. Perhaps some motivation for the fine was because of Stern's outspoken opinion against the current administration and the FCC's practices, but that's a different conversation.

Now if someone doesn't think that it's a big problem, it gets better. This week the FCC claimed that it had domain over all instrumentalities, facilities, and apparatus "associated with the overall circuit of messages send and received." (as stated on page 17 of the brief Mrs. Crawford has kindly made available on her website) Is that so? Under such a definition, anything that involves a circuit is under the domain of the FCC. This includes the computer you're using right now. Put that together with the "indecency" issues we've been running into, and the United States of America starts to look like the People's Republic of America. How could one part of the government have so much weight in determining what people can and cannot say? Especially an organization who really should just stick to governing out RF bandwidth to Amateur Radio Operators, Television stations, and technology companies so I can do my QRZ, 802.11, and Monday Night Football all at once without them stepping on each other. That's what the FCC should stick to instead of being the morals police.

Once you get stuck on the slippery slope of telling people what you can and can't do, then everyone is liable for what they say, just in case some soccer mom activist takes offense when little Timmy hears about Sphincterine. It's been said a hundred times, but people still don't seem to catch on. IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, YOU DON'T HAVE TO ACKNOWLEDGE IT. How difficult is that? There are enough resources available from the V-chip, television and movie ratings, to Net Nanny and god forbid parental supervision. If you yourself don't like what's on, change the station or maybe even read a book. However it is not the United States government's job to foist morals and spirituality on it's citizens. I don't care what book written by dead misogynists you subscribe to, keep it to yourself like the rest of your fetishes.

[insert spiritual belief here] bless America.