FCC Looks Into Regulating Violence on TV

The Importance of writes "The FCC's regulation of indecent and profane speech has gotten a lot of attention recently. Now, the FCC is considering getting into the business of regulating violence on television (broadcast and cable/satellite). This isn't unexpected, because the House Commerce Committee ordered the FCC to conduct the study. Notice of Inquiry [PDF] [TXT]. Somehow, I don't think the FCC is going to tell Congress there is nothing they can do about violence on TV."

Comments

Equalising...

[cujo_1111]

Finally they are trying to equalise their violence vs nudity vs language levels, going the wrong way though.

How is it that in the US you can see as many shootings as you want on TV bvut as soon as someone says fuck or bares a breast, the loonies go nuts... I thought seeing people getting killed would harm a kid more than seeing a breast or two.

Its an election year

[gad_zuki!]

Expect more of this to fire up the GOP base and conservative democrats.

I mean, how many people are going to be upset at a politician who claims "I fought to clean up violent media."

Its a shame most people don't see that as meaning, "I'm big on censorship."

Re:Its an election year

[Abcd1234]

First of all, it ain't up to the state to protect the children from idiot parenting. Otherwise, most of the children in middle class homes would probably taken away from their parents due to neglect.

Second, censorship is never the right solution. The parents should have the right to control what their children can and can't watch, while still being able to watch things *they're* interested in. Hell, technology can all but do this for them, anyway! It's called locking out channels. It's existed for years (or don't you watch the Simpsons?).

Thirdly, even if kids are watching a ton of violence, please, prove to me that it actually matters. I've seen plenty of studies which disprove any link between watching violent materials and commiting violent acts.

Fourthly, even if you want to try and censor violence, how do you define it? What about animated violence? What about live action "violence" where there is no blood? Or where there's only the "suggestion" of violence?

Fifthly, censorship is a dangerous, slippery slope, with questionable benefit. If we start censoring TV and video games, what next? When will they start censoring "inappropriate" books? Or music? After all, we need to "protect the children", lest we somehow damage society.

Personally, I'm a little tired of people trotting out the ol' "think of the children!" line every time they want to curb *my* rights.

Re:Max?

[Commander Trollco]

That doesn't matter, the point is to clamp down on what the plebs can see and hear. The consolidation of federal power has been going on since Hamilton, and this is just one small step for mankind's enslavement. Considered in the light of other news, anyone can see what direction we are headed in. "Slippery Slope" is not a fallacy, it is usually correct.

The FCC should do its job instead of that

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

They should regulate the media industry. Prevent, instead of encourage, media consolidation. Regulate if/how media businesses should be owned by corporations, and ensure said corps don't dictate the media outlet's line. And most of all, they should prevent its CEO (the chief regulator) to have such close tie with a member of a government that demonstrably wants a total secrecy and government-approved only press releases.

Instead of that, they pretend to be working on censoring nudity and violence on TV, which is a comparatively mundane and non-important, and pretend to be working on stuff that way. In reality, they just divert the public's attention from the real issues they're not working on, a method not unlike what Joseph Goebbels was advocating.

Re:I'd trade violence for sex on TV anyday ...

[LiquidMind]

having moved to the states from germany, i was amazed at how the violence to sex content ratio is so backwards. i remember watching a commercial during germany's prime-time tv shows, and they'd advertise some shampoo where you'd see the lady bare-chested and everything....and it wasn't a big deal.
i think people are very hard-up about anything regarding sex in this country. remember that nipple slip during the supperbowl? wow, mothers of America were yelling bloody murder! i read some email that was sent to CNN from a concerned mother who stated that her child's life will now forever be changed because of that scene.
I'm not surprised that we see so many sex-related crimes in this country, it seems that people have been so shunned from sex while they were growing up, that when they're old enough to do whatever they want, they go all psycho....
I honestly think that teaching your kids about sex and showing them that it's a very natural part of human life is not a bad thing (TM).

Re:I'd trade violence for sex on TV anyday ...

[Triumph The Insult C]

Better yet, don't censor the airwaves at all, just require a very thorough, detailed, and precise rating system, and enforce it.

NO! This is the wrong approach. The gov't should not do any of this. The FCC should be there to make sure Company A's radio freqs don't mess with Company B's radio freqs, and end there.

The gov't saying what's wrong and what's right, what's too sexually explicit and what's not, is completely wrong.

If soccer mom's are afraid that their kid might see something bad on TV, they can: A) don't let the kid watch TV or B) let the kid watch and explain it was wrong. having the gov't rate what is right and wrong is just flat-out wrong. what's next? the FCC says a Christian radio show isn't indecent, but a Jewish one is?

Keeping children safe is the responsibility of the parent, not the gov't.

Re:Max?

[Lord Kano]

You seem to be missing the point my friend. This is all about money. It's a shakedown. Hollywood isn't passing around enough campaign funds. Congress will threaten regulation, a flood of campaign funds will flow in and the call for regulation will be forgotten.

This is just like every other argument, it isn't to protect the "average" person. It's to protect the morons who are too stupid to learn how to change the channel. And especially those people who are too stupid to use "The V Chip" that congress mandated be included in all new TV sets. Remember when they told us that they were mandating that so "parents" would be empowered to control the television viewing habits of their children? All of a sudden, that's not enough. MORE HAS TO BE DONE! I call bullshit. It's a smokescreen and a sham. This is about legal extortion, nothing more and nothing less.

LK

Re:Why won't they... ?

[raistphrk]

Maybe instead of flipping out about the content of programs on TV, we should teach our children to respect one another? Jesus didn't waste his type chastizing the prostitutes; he taught people the importance of mutual respect and understanding.

If we teach our kids that getting a tax break is more important than sacrificing a little to help those who are not as lucky as ourselves, our kids are going to turn out to be MUCH worse than kids who watch "trash" on television - our kids are going to be selfish, callous, and uncompassionate. And I worry quite a bit more about the callous and greedy than I do about the kids who like watching action films.

Teach your children the value of other people. The greed and selfishness I see in the world today is far more indecent than anything I see on television.

Re:Max?

[what the dumple is]

Funny* you should choose the phrase, "enslavement."

My fortune when I logged on today was:

A warning from Scots Historian Professor Alexander Tyler circa 1787 re the fall of the Athenian Republic:

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money (generous gifts) from the public treasury. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world's greatest civilization has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence.

From bondage to spiritual faith;
from spiritual faith to great courage;
from courage to liberty;
from liberty to abundance,
from abundance to selfishness;
from selfishness to complacency,
from complacency to apathy,
from apathy to dependency,
from dependence back into bondage."


If the 90s were all about apathy it's dead clear where we're headed. My take, if they're going to do somewhat about violence, at least give us our sex back. :p

* not so much funny as interesting, really.

Re:Max?

[fermion]

Turning off the TV is what everyone wants to prevent.

TV is the perfect medium. It passively places the rabble in a harmless state without the negative effects of other methods such as alcohol. Such pacification is a critical part of social control.

TV allows the elite to clearly define the norms and customs of said rabble and set the appropriate expectations. This means that every person in America knows that he or she must consume. It means that every person in America has a common cultural basis.

TV clearly presents people in similar economic and social situations as the rabble, but with better stuff. This implies that the lack of stuff is caused by some personal defect, and not the fact that your job pays nothing. Friends was brilliant in this regard, convincing gullible young adults that life is good and good things could be had even if the means to pay for them was non existent

Remember that the one mistake Bradbury made in Fahrenheit 451 was the notion that we would need walls of TVs for social control. We now know that a single set will do the job. We now have confirmation that people will go into debt to acquire this means of social control.