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Supreme Court Barely Prevents Censorship
iritant writes "CNN reports here that The Supremes have once again rejected congressional attempts to protect us from ourselves. Ruling in favor of Playboy, they agreed with the lower court who said that since there were less draconian ways to protect children, Congress could not limit hours or specify blocking methods of cable channels. This is clearly relevant to the Internet, as this decision may keep Congress from causing content providers much grief. The scary part is that it was only 5-4, with a peculiar split of Thomas in the majority and Scalia and Breyer in the minority. Scalia's opinion was particularly appalling, since he claimed that protection was allowed, not just for children, but for adults. The thought police are coming.
Here is the decision. " It's actually quite an interesting decision. Congress was attempting to ban sexually-explicit cable channels during daytime hours, using the excuse that even though they were scrambled for non-subscribers, the scrambling wasn't 100% perfect and kiddies could still turn on the scrambled channels. It's not directly applicable to the internet, but it's related to many other free speech cases in its use of the least restrictive means test - although Congress might have an interest in coming between kids and porn, so too does Playboy have a right to speak, and since individual subscribers could, if they wished, contact the cable company and have the Playboy channel entirely blocked, that that would be a way of accomplishing the goal of keeping kids from porn without entirely banning the Playboy channel.
Thought police? There will be no thought police in the future. There won't need to be any; we'll be too busy killing each other in the streets over perceived differences, bamboozled and hoodwinked from birth into believing that this is the only way to survive.
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If you are 18+ you are in the "legal majority" and are entititled to all the rights and freedoms allowed under the constitution. If you are yet in the "minority" than I'm not so sure you are entitled to exposure to what would be illegal material.
There is a responsibility to "protect" access to material that is "socially inappropriate." There are things better left not to the eyes of children.
I do not agree that the appropriate remedy is to ban providers from broadcasting when they see fit because they are taking appropriate steps by trying to filter content. I believe they have a responsibility to make a good faith effort to control access to this content, but cannot be responsible for the resourcefulness of kids.
After all, I still remember finding where my dad hid his magazines....
meh.
It is good to see that the current court continues to favor free speech, though it is disturbing that the descion was so close. All it takes is for one fo these guys (or gals)to die or retire and the balence could shift. I don't know if I want to live here when that happens. Congress has gotten entirely to interested in "protecting" me and my (currently notional) children. If the court slides any farther to the "moral majority" (Whose morals... why are their morals more important than everyone elses?) we could be looking at a situation where cenorship becomes the norm.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
that sex isn't bad? That seeing movies with "mainstream" sexuality, or even "softcore porn" which is tame and not fetishistic, doesn't even harm kids? In most other civilized, non-Islamic nations, parents don't try so hard to shield their youngsters from the realities of sexuality, and the kids in those countries grow up healthier with fewer hang-ups and dysfunctions. I'm not one of those Jocelyn Elders liberals who thinks masturbation should be taught to kindergarteners, but by the time kids are 8 they've already heard about sex from all their friends, and are usually filled up with misconceptions and errors about sex. Kids should hear the facts about sex from their parents before they hear misconceptions and tall-tales from classmates. And as for stuff like the Playboy channel--hell, in France they show hardcore pornography on basic cable and softcore porn on late-night broadcast TV, and yet the French seem healthier and happier than we poor Puritanical Americans. When will Americans grow up and join the rest of the world in acknowledging that sex is not "dirty" or too private to be discussed in public, or have softcore porn on cable? It makes me ill to see how much violence we allow in PG-rated movies, or kids' cartoons, compared to the backwards restrictions placed on the sexuality that can be depicted in an R-rated movie. When they butchered Kubrick's *Eyes Wide Shut* for having softcore scenes nowhere near as vivid as shown on Cinemax at 11 PM any night of the week, I realized how alarmingly backwards our country really is. I'm glad the Supreme Court ruled correctly on this one, but I fear for thye future. Don't think that a Democrat in the White House to fill future Supreme Court vacancies is the option, either; Democrats want censorship, too, just for different reasons. Remember that Tipper Gore is almost single-handedly responsible for the ratings system for music which prevents teenagers from buying CDs with even mildly explicit lyrics about sex. I'm increasingly believing that Noam Chomsky was right, and that the two=party system we have is really just two sides to one party with no real, different, truly libertarian options at all...
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, *The Annals*
>After all, I still remember finding where my dad hid his magazines....
and ofcourse that scarred you for life, causing endless mental anguish and cerebral trauma, showing to everyone that censorship is good.
And my dad was a penguin and my mom a chameleon.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
The mayor of my town, Oak Lawn, Illinois, our mayor for many, many years, had helped to prevent the local company from carrying the Playboy channel many years ago, even if subscribed to.
In other news, just the other day, residents in an unincorporated part of Cook County complained about a billboard advertising the Mancow radio show on the Chicago Q101 (WKXQ) channel. Many neighboring, and incorporated, cities have such policies regarding billboard content. In fact, many people had complained to the surrounding cities, who have no jurisdiction in their areas. The billboard features three naked men (from the waist up) as well as one naked woman covering her breasts.
I don't think congress should be enforcing any such censorship upon the whole of the United States. Such should be left up to the individual cities, where the moral values of those in that particular city is more understood by themselves. Our country is too diverse to enforce upon everyone in the US such a morality ban on certain propaganda.
Honestly, it's not. A skeleton of the system I live under can be seen here
Okay, if you don't know how a censorship system could work, here is what we do. Basically all publications can be submitted to the censorship office. As a matter of practise, only films are submitted en-masse. Only when a publisher has qualms does a book or computer game be submitted. Someone can object however, and then the censors should review it (Ie. a porno mag). So once a publication has been reviewed, it is assigned a rating, in our case:
(G) General exhibition, so no restrictions.
(PG(number)) Means parental consent should be attained to view the film, until the person is of the age in (number)
(R(number)) The film is restricted to those of that age in (number)
As long as those that administer it are not crazy, which I suspect could be the case if it became a reality in the USA, because of the (apparent to me) influence of pressure/lobby groups. I can see Americans, who appear rather paranoid of their government (And rightly so, ie. Jonestown) thinking a film about evolution could be banned because it's morally repugnant to the conservative community. Don't fear, if the law is well-written. For example, section 8(d) of the statute linked to about exempts science films from the law. Or section 3,2 uses quite a lot of common sense in decideding what is objectionable and what isn't. (Except some would argue, including the previous chief censor that 3,2(d) was a bit pointless (He said that bit of pee never hurt anyone!))
Personally, I have nothing to fear from the censorship, and few complain about it. The last time I can remember a film been asked to have it's rating changed was "Saving Private Ryan" which had a rating of R16, but after a objection it got dropped down to R15.
It's there to protect children, nothing has more that R18 rating. Nothing is banned (Except sex with dead bodies and stuff like that) and no-one really complains about it. The chief censors are usually moderate, progressive people (The previous one was a rather well humoured.. er.. Homo) and we arn't scared by it, we don't feel repressed in any way. For example, billboards with naked people on them arn't taken down (Actaully, there was a billboard in one city with real-live singing and dancing naked people on it a few years ago, it was part of a radio station promotion)
However! After saying that censorship isn't that bad, no censorship is probably still more desirable, but don't get too scared by some well-meaning parents.