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Lone Activist Group Submits 99.8% of FCC Complaints
andywebz writes "Mediaweek is reporting that complaints to the FCC are rising. Powell spoke before congress, detailing that the complaints are up from 14,000 in 2002, to nearly 240,000 in 2003. There were only 350 complaints during 2000 and 2001. Powell failed to mention however that 99.8% of those complaints came from PTC (Parents Television Council). The article does mention he may have been unaware of this fact. Jonathan Rintels (president of the Center for Creative Voices in Media) commented, 'It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.'"
PTC lost a LOT of their political clout after WWE kicked their ass in court a couple years ago. Other targets should repond the same way.
Alright, I'm going to write a letter to the FCC demanding that they keep doing things just the way they have been, smut-filled and all. Who's with me?!
The pain was excruciating and the scarring is likely permanent, but that just means it's working.
This small group of complainers can then easily be taken out by a small group of assassins... There must be a reason this has not been done yet, but I cannot think of any.
- Your stupidity got you into this mess, why can't it get you out? -Will Rogers
I, for one, welcome our new PTC overlords.
What the PTC has figured out is that indecent TV and radio was being allowed simply because the FCC only takes action when it gets a complaint from somebody in the public. No complaint, nobody was harmed so no foul.
The FCC is still in control over what is indecent, so the PTC's power is merely that of spotter. If they complain about something that isn't over the line nothing will happen. Of course, a big problem with the current system is that the FCC doesn't have a written down definition of what they consider to be indecent so broadcasters are flying blind when it comes to deciding what to air before they actually do it. What they've gotten away with in the past is no help because they've been allow to get away with far too much.
The megacompanies need to realize that they should use their cable outlets for the borderline content they have, because the over-the-air channels are regulated.
They better not be the people that meant I couldn't watch Sabrin the Teenage with a few years back :(
It would be nice for the FCC to define what is indecent..
It really blows that 100 people can RUIN what millions watch...
"It's not like your minds are as open as the source you love..." - Me to the majority of Slashdot.
I know that Stern pushed for his listeners to complain about Oprah Winfrey (?). Oprah got away with saying things about vaginas and sexual practices that Stern was fined for
"brxref
You mean all I have to do is write 240,000 complaints to the FCC and I can control what goes on television and radio? I can write a script to do that in about an hour.
Producers of the biased, left-wing Today show - fear me.
M
a link to the eponymous Parents Television Council. (Click several times! It's fun!)
I love their motto - "because our children are watching". Paternalism at its finest - television viewers must be treated as children!
(Luckily we can't air, for instance, photographs of caskets of US troops - but that's because voters, not children, are watching.)
I certainly hope these nice fellows will submit an FCC complaint if any television network tries to air "The Passion of the Christ". So much sadomasochism! So little time!
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
I don't see the problem with censoring your own TV for your family, but censoring everyone else's just because you don't like what is on it? Is that acceptable?
Chris
aterr - an open source threaded discussion board.
to manage your complaints and you may soon miss out on things you enjoyed and didn't complain about.
Special interests kill.
Why do you think interest groups are engaging in these kinds of actions?
Because other "interest groups" have recently proven that politicians will usually bow to your wishes if you bitch loud enough.
Small minority took this country to war. No surprise here. If I want to sensor my TV there is always a remote control. In the worst case there is a power plug.
Ha - they are busted now, and its good for the world to see that it *is* a small group of crackpots [my opinon].
But I think this would be typical to other areas in life (letters to the editor, complaining about service) - most people (me included) whinge and complain about things but never do anything about it.
It really is true that the squeaky wheel gets the grease, and actually doing something can get things changed [for better or worse]
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
Why not just grow a spine and keep your brat kids from watching inappropriate material?
How many other people here get the feeling that powell is not qualified for his position. Of all the times I have heard this man talk he has never been able to give a sufficient answer to the true nature of the problem with cencorship. I dont know about you but before I address congress I woudl make it my busines to know everything about the statistics I am about to present. Think about it. you have a exponential growth in complaints aren't you even curious about what group be it age range geographic area, etc that this is coming from. Especially with the US culture being as diverse as it is. I just can't help but think he is totally inept every time I see him.
If there is something that you are offended by on TV, no one is making you watch it. If your concerned about your kids watching something you dont want them to, just rememeber who is the parent. I sure hope your not expecting the FCC to take care of your kids.
Market forces will dictate what programming exists on television. If people want to watch content with sex, then yes you will have that on TV. If you dont like that, start your own station.
In America we are imprisoned by our fear of them.
What you meant was, "I can't count!"
Watch sesame street, unless that gets censored too.
Cry wolf enough and you end up with Janet Jackson's tit. Way it goes.
If we complained about every crap show on television perhaps we could get the whole lot switched off?
Beep beep.
especially when you consider in Canada they broadcast (i.e. no cable needed) the sopranos (at 11pm). Heck even CityTv broadcasts softcore porn after 12.
As the title says. Loud minority groups are the most vocal, face it, they have to be.
It is a shame though that the FCC chairman did not realize 99.8% complaints were from one group.
Spread the virus
They ought to charge them the administrative costs for investigating and processing each of these claims if they are found to be baseless. That should slow them down a bit.
At what point does the FCC become a government-funded mouthpiece for the PTC? If one of the major reasons that the FCC takes action is because someone filed a complaint, and PTC is filing most of the complaints, then doesn't that basically make the FCC a somewhat filtered out PTC?
Also, whatever happened to those Howard Stern complaints again Oprah Winfrey's "Tossed Salad" comments?
I'm just curious, what is the definition of a political agenda? That is, what makes an agenda political as opposed to ... um, well, perhaps there are no agendas other than political?
Just like RAY BRADBURY's Fahrenheit 451.
[ The contents of this post have been censored by the FCC ]
...said Lara Mahaney, spokeswoman for the Los Angeles-based group.
And I promise to fight so that you never will.
Why can't kids go outside and play anymore? We wouldn't have to worry about censorship of television if these damn kids would get out from in front of the TV and stay active.
Beat the computer, program your life.
Goto http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/publications/reports/ top10bestandworst/main.asp and look at their list of 10 worst shows and 10 best shows. For an org that hates mention of sex on tv, they still rate Every One loves Raymond a top 10 pick.
When emailed on this they refuse to respond.
They also hate Las Vegas because it has sexy women in it and Will and Grace because it has gay people in it.
They are about as far from main stream america as one can be.
Too late, I saw Janet Jacksons tit before I could reach for the plug! Ohh make that mental image go away!!!
Most sets or set-top boxes, Tivos, etc. have parental control built right in, often using a V-Chip. If you only want children's programming to work when you aren't there, just set it to limit that type of programming for them, then when they're in bed you unlock it for yourself. Still means things need to be rated properly (and news of all things, one of the worst things you can show children is often rated G) but it is better than sticking all of us with TreehouseTV.
There is one other problem, commercials aren't V-Chip rated yet and while you'd think they'd make the commercials match the show, often there are innappropriate commercials around educational shows. Surprisingly, Discovery channel is one of the worst culprits, at least Discovery Canada does. With simulcasting I'm not sure about the original signal.
$#!^ happens, but why does it always have to happen to me???
I read that in one of the more famous recent indicidents where the FCC issued a big fine. I can't remember if it was the guy who said "fuck" at that award show or not. There were only 3 unique complaint letters out of tens of thousands. All but 2 were form letters from this group.
I think someone should start a form letter accusing Fox News of saying a bad word like "liberal" and we will just flood them with complaints till they get run out of business.
"The document listed tools developed by the PTC, including continual monitoring and archiving of broadcast network programs and "cutting-edge technology to make it easier for members to contact program sponsors, the FCC, or the networks directly with a simple click of the button."
It's no wonder if they have made it that easy for people to complain that the number of complaints has risen dramatically. And in the article it states that with such a drastic rise in the number of complaints, now over 99.9% of them are from the PTC.
It sounds like they are submitting the exact same complaint at the click of a button. FOX pointed out that on one show all but one complaint (or something like that) was exactly the same. And only one of the complaints actually mentioned that the person had seen the offensive show on the tv!
So basically these people have found a loophole to push their agenda. Either the rules to complain will change or tv is about to get a lot more boring.
You know, just hit refresh on a voting poll that doesn't check for IP or needs a username ;) Though seriously, if there are going to be bulk complains the information regarding what organization is behind such things should be made publically available. The same thing with huge financial "donations" to politician election campaigns.
In the long run this tactic will not work, no matter how focused or well organized. Broadcasters will slowly migrate to pay mediums (cable, satellite radio) and which will eventually become free to those who opt-in to advertiser sponsored programming. Which brings us back to the current system.
Hollywood is churning out sex and violence because that is what the people want to see, not because they have some liberal agenda that these do-gooders are trying to save us from. Eventually the free market will sort this out.
Remember, this is about boobies and cussin', and in a capitalist society any man with a little bit of money in his pocket will always be able to get him some boobies and cussin'.
God bless America!
No battles to the death are recalled. Mumpsman can hit to attack and cause brainsmashing.
This is America. We are supposed to be an example of victimization to the world. We should have a varied landscape of whiners, a multicultural panoply of complainers petitioning the FCC. But we have just this one group. Shame on you America.
If you don't want some vocal group imposing its religious values on you, I suppose you'll have to be just as vocal. Of course, prohibition was quite profitable for a lot of Americans...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This letter is in regard to your recent complaint to the FCC regarding whatever show you think your child should not be watching.
We would like to inform you, in response to your concern, a device will be installed in all television sets that will allow you to control the content. It is called the OFF button.
We would like to mention that this device has been shipping standard with all television sets since the beginning of TV. We apologize if this was not obvious enough for you.
If you should have any other concerns or complaints then, seriously, fuck you. Use the button.
Sincerely,
The FCC
UTF-8: There and Back Again
The anything-goes gang is suggesting we live in a pretty hypocritical country if we can profess our desire for moral leadership and make our number-one smash on television the ABC smut soap "Desperate Housewives." When the red states profess a great concern for moral values and then embrace sleazy shows, that's hypocrisy, is it not?
No. It isn't. That's not hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is when you profess belief in the fact that an a group can make an intelligent decision, mention said group has decided for itself a second time, and then go on a rampage to try to change that second decision because you feel it conflicts with the group's best interests.
What, they're right the one time they vote and wrong every single time they choose to turn on the Television and watch a programme for an hour?
Where is the V-Chip in all this? I thought the V-Chip was supposed to handle a rating (TV-MA, etc), and block the show if the parents had the TV configured to do that. Are people not using it? How are kids watching these shows?
Credit for this story ultimately should go to blogger Jeff Jarvis. Jarvis is a longtime journalist, former TV critic, and currently head of the internet division of a major U.S. media company. He filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the FCC's data and followed it up with a searing analysis.
Jarvis is a professional, but anyone can do this. Dig in and report. Many hands make for light work, and all that.
For the children.
Go on, say it.
For the children.
Anything you want changed, just claim that its for the children. There's a big percentage of adults in this country that have kids. Most of these people are die-hard parents.
Their own children can do no wrong, are perfect angels, etc. Its easy to see where you could get something changed if you said for the children, because if you didn't approve, you're automatically against the children.
We all know that anyone against children is a terrorist. Are you a terrorist?
That's the same kind of shit these people pull.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
Rather than allowing you to retain responsibility for your own viewing habits, these people are slowly making the decisions for you.
To the PTC I say:
"If something offends, change the channel.
"If it is unsuitable for your children, change the channel.
"If you think that it might offend me, it is not your right to infringe upon mine."
The decision to watch or not watch should be left up to the audience, not determined by a 'morally questionable' group, and filtered for the safety of an unintended audience.
By morally questionable, I am not suggesting that there is anything wrong with the PTC or it's members. However, having never met them, I cannot vouch for their ability to judge what should or should not be censored. Anyone who stands before me to tell me what my choices are allowed to be is questionable in this fashion.
oh, he knows it perfectly well all right.
I think what the FCC is doing to "censor" TV/radio is completely un-American.
(I put "censor" in quotes because they don't actually stop broadcasts from going out, they simply fine you if they later deem it was offensive -- a subtle difference, but a difference.)
But read this quote from the person at PTC:
She has a great point. The problem is not that PTC has sent in a billion complaints, but that the FCC exists and is actually in charge of fining companies who dare to broadcast things people tune in to.
Personally, I think the FCC should be inundated with bogus complaints. When they aired Saving Private Ryan recently, unedited, I was real tempted to send in a complaint about the movie just because I think the whole thing is ridiculous.
It is one thing if ABC says, we're going to show you Monday Night Football, and opens with an intro that might not be suitable for children, or CBS airs a half-time show that features an "accidental" nudie show to a wide audience, but other than that, as long as the networks are correctly classifying their broadcasts, I think they should air whatever people want to watch.
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
" I'd hate to see what would happen if /. would "organize" and write mass letters to congress. I can see the OSS zealots now..."
Well, we can send the highest moderated "letters" over to them. Wait a couple weeks, and then post the results.
kinda funny that the FCC was spamed by the PTC to get changes. I say we make a group called the PWA (pr0n watchers anonymous) and send in thousands of requests for more hardcore nudity on our televisions. Maybe thats how Europes so open...
I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes. - Catcher in the Rye
It will be interesting to see how Fox flip-flops on this issue. They try to appeal to both groups - the Right-leaning "Think of the Children" groups with their news, all while serving up the standard "When Dogs Attack" style schlock during prime time.
I think in this case, they'll probably fight any possibility of fines, all while publically reporting on the "terrible decline in television standards from evil Liberal Hollywood".
I was just discussing the whole "censorship of mass media" issue with a co-worker yesterday.
I feel like we're witnessing a rebellion of sorts, where TV show hosts and producers, musicians, artists, and the like are all making concerted efforts to push the boundaries of what's "decent" in broadcasting.
Whether or not this prompts niche groups with agendas to file thousands of complaints, it sends out a signal that producers of media are tired of trying to comply with FCC regulations that haven't changed with the times.
For starters, I think the current generation, as a whole, is simply not as offended by or adverse to swearing/curse words. Many of us in the "20-something and 30-something" age groups and below have decided that "words are just words" and curse words are only as "bad" as the attention we choose to artifically draw to them.
Last time I listened to a modern rock music station, for example, I was surprised to hear words edited out of at least 5 songs within an hour or two's time. In at least 3 or 4 of these cases, I had never even noticed the singer was singing a "curse word" before, except they made it obvious by chopping it out of the middle of the music.
When your listening audience is perfectly fine with a singer saying the "F word" in the middle of a song, then why should the FCC prohibit it on the radio? As always, those who don't care for it can change the station or simply listen to their own music, instead of what's served up on the radio.
I'm of the opinion that federal regulation of the media is basically unnecessary and "un-American" when you get right down to it. The people who want "clean TV" for their kids or for themselves are a large demographic, so the free market will cater to them either way. (Why do you think we have 2 Disney Channels on cable/satellite, Nickelodeon and "Nick for Kids", etc. etc.?) If the local stations keep airing things that offend big segments of their viewers, they're the ones who will lose advertising revenue eventually....
But since my rather Libertarian views are in the vast minority, I'm sure we're going to be stuck with the FCC dictating what we can/can't see on TV or hear on the radio during certain hours... That's why I'd still say, ok - fine them for obvious stunts like the Janet Jackson/Superbowl fiasco. (That sort of thing is done knowing full-well there will be punishment for it later... But sometimes people just want the "negative publicity" enough to do it anyway.) But at the very least, reconsider the "1950-esque" standards for "decency" on the radio.
It's their f*ing fault I can't hear the word f*ck on my f*cking radio...
for a while people kept telling me to go to http://stopfcc.com/... I am curious what the slashdot opinion of this is. I mean are these guys legit? can online petitions really change anything? for whatever it's worth I signed... but it seems like a hopeless effort.
Obama is a twitter sock puppet
I PAID for access to offensive, abusive, deragatory humor, sexual content, and Free Speech TV.
If I loose my mindless entertainment and indy reporting, I am much more likely to leave the house and become a criminal. PTC, please help keep lil johnny safe by staying out of my life.
There was a nice article by Frank Rich in the NYTimes on this, but unfortunately, you would have to pay to read it now.
Just in case you have a subscription or don't mind the price: The Great Indecency Hoax
Oh, wait! There's a free copy here.
You are misinterpreting how the FCC polices indecency. It doesn't watch channels. It responds to complaints that provide transcripts of the alledgedly offensive broadcasts. The PTC and other American Moralists have been streaming complaints against Howard Stern for over a decade. That's why he's been getting fined.
The Oprah Winfrey example clearly illustrates the hypocrisy in how the FCC arbitrarily chooses to levy fines. If you're a friend to the mainstream, you're safe. If you're outside the status quo, watch out.
Here's a link to the transcripts. Judge for yourself if the FCC is being fair.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
"It really blows that 100 illegal downloaders can RUIN [it for] millions [of innocent citizens]"
The fact that Bush was reelected would indicate that it wasn't such a small minority.
We've suffered decades of their new-deal socialism, imposition of values, and ignorance of federalism. Now that the red states, religious right and their neocon proxies are firmly in the drivers seat, we're going to get the same ass reaming but from the right this time.
Not sure if anyone saw this or not on Friday. Powell wrote an interesting Op-Ed (yada yada -- free reg required --yada yada) piece for the NYT on Friday the 3rd.
The quote I found interesting was, "Even so, there are important limits placed on the F.C.C. Our rules do not ban indecent content entirely; they merely restrict its broadcast during times in which children are likely to be in the audience, namely from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Courts have consistently held these rules constitutional, accepting that the government has a compelling interest in protecting children from inappropriate material."
If you think about it, all these fines and issues have basically been for "daytime" and "primetime" programming and not for "late night" shows.
Don't get me wrong -- this PTC group is ruining my bad television! Parents need to control what happens to their kids. JUST TURN OFF THE DAMN TV.
The PTC would like to officially file a protest over the obscene way in which yuo failed it.
Television sucks. And its not like Stern was Lenny Bruce. Basically, cable television (and then the web) made this issue irrelevant. Who knows? Maybe writers will get more creative if their challenged more often by the FCC.
The scariest part about the Janet Jackson incident is how many people actually watch the Superbowl halftime show rather than using that time to, say, go buy more snacks, or take a leak, or go outside and stretch before the second half. Those halftime shows are always incredibly lame.
..One person (Or group) ruins things for the rest of us. It's only idle speculation on my part, but in such places as Europe, is there a similar sort of thing happening?
Tell me Euro slashdotters, do over-protective and often times fundie/church affiliated groups in your countries have so much clout and control over 'moral' values being shown on your media? Or is this a uniquely US travesty?
I love my country.. I just don't like how everyone else seems to think they need to crap it up with their perceived 'morals.'
http://thepoliticalgeek.com/blog/ Politics for Geeks.
These people just got the president re-elected. They have more power today then they have ever had. Not only does the president agree with them pretty much 100% he is indebted to them for his election.
Expect the PTC and the rest of the Christian fundemantilist movement to push and get through most of their agenda in the next four years.
evil is as evil does
These same SOCIALIST CONSERVATIVES (i.e. bigots, Fascists, Nazi's etc.) are the ones who made us pay about $25 more per television for a V-chip (and its requisite "public service" ad campaign) that NO ONE USES. At most parents who don't want their kids watching porn on cable block it through the cable box and everything else on TV is not nearly sexually graphic or coarse enough to produce much more than an awkward moment and a funny question if a young kid were to see it. Only total nutjob parents worry about their kids television viewing, since kids don't like shows they won't understand anyways (although this may explain the dumbing down of grown-up television shows).
Parents should be far more worried about Car accidents, molestors, and hockey dad's than TV.
https://www.parentstv.org/ptc/fcc/fcccomplaint2.as p
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
Hmmm..
Mod me up... for the children.
(Is it working yet? Is this thing on?)
I am all for showing sex and violence on TV but not when it is deviously smuggled inside shows billed "family entertainment".
And.. to those who say "change the channel", I have tried that as well. The sad fact is that there are hardly any alternatives because almost EVERY show is doing it. There are not many intellectually stimulating shows to watch - unless you want to watch PBS all the time.
I, for one, am glad that there is atleast someone holding the purveyors of dreck accountable - even if they go overboard sometimes.
After reading http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/publications/release/ 2004/1129.asp it appears they have some valid points. Five major news papers rejected two adds the FCC accepted. Absurd!
Take that, Jesus.
PS What Would Jesus Watch?
Political minority groups on the right and left have massive amounts of influence and stage things like this ALL the time. This is the equivalent of PETA for TV... a small group of people focused on a cause so they create a lot of ruckus. (Difference between these guys and PETA... these guys are abusing a system that is set up for legitimate complaints while PETA merely tells everyone they're going to hell.) Really, while this is a non-story, its a non-story because disturbing practices happen like this ALL the time. A small minority inflicting their will upon the majority. Though I tend to agree with this small minority (I think parents should parent their children first and foremost, but I do agree that public television ought to be regulated) I disagree with this kind of "Shock and Awe" attacking.
'It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.'
What's not clear is exactally what effect these complaints are having, and what are they complaining about. First of all, have these complaints actually affected what gets aired in any significant way?
Do I care if...
Perhaps before we start bitching about censorship we start thinking a bit about what censorship is. People seem to think that eliminating Swearing and Sex on the radio is some sort of terrible crime but it is really meaningless. When you look at the bigger issues.
-- DennisYou know you can always let them know what you think: Mailing Address: 707 Wilshire Boulevard #2075 Los Angeles, CA 90017 Phone: 213.629.9255 800.882.6868 (Toll-Free) Fax: 213.629.9254 Media inquiries: Contact Kelly Walmsley at 703.683.5004 Editor@parentstv.org Webmaster@parentstv.org
In a country where people that vote are heard, the people that complain are heard, too.
What's the mystery? Is everyone oblivious to the way the country works? The difference is *they* complained to the FCC, which can do something.
Most of you grumblers just posted to slashdot.
One Question Quiz: Which approach is more effective?
http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/grassroots/forum/ I signed up, but I cant login. hrrummpphh
Mod parent up! It's good to hear both sides of the issue.
It may be only a tiny minority, but the key point is that it is a minority that has the ear of the powers that be. Without that, they'd be just another ignored group.
Four fifths of all our troubles in this life would disappear if we would just sit down and keep still. -C. Coolidge
Escape Pod Films: Sketch Comedy and Web Series
Here's a 'novel' idea: give your awful little urchins a book. Then give them some instruction as to the meaining of the squiggly symbols contained therein. Then grow jealous as they grow up with grossly superior intellects.
Has anyone else delved very deep into the website for this psychotic group? They're even bitching about shows on premium networks like HBO. Granted, I think "Sex and the City" sucks, but you know what I do about it? I don't watch it! These guys rant about how American families are "forced" to pay for what they consider smut, because the cable companies put it in programming packages whether they like it or not (as justification for the FCC forcing a la carte on the companies). Again, a suggestion: if you really find cable to be that offensive, don't subscribe. If you find broadcast TV to be offensive (other than the obvious fact that it belittles the intelligence of even the family dog to watch most of it. Fox, I'm looking at you), then you have a bright future in your local convent/monastery (unless you find the habit a bit too sexy)...
(Censored)Film @ 11!
Allow the flaming to commence, but I disagree with this article. The FCC did not receive 99.8% of all its complaints from the PTC. They received their complaints from parents that are members of the PTC and whom have strong opinions about the nature of television. This article and the actions of the FCC deny the right of representation by assembly as guaranteed by the bill of rights. To say that the PTC only represents a single interest is like saying the democrat party represents one political view. It also is sensible that parents with strong opinions on the issue would join the most aggressive and well known organization representing their views, because that is the only way that they will be heard! If single parent writes a letter to the FCC, the FCC can ignore the letter. If 25000 parents, affiliated with the PTC, write letters to the FCC, that concern cannot be ignored.
Furthermore, the PTC is justified in its complaints. There are times when children are not supervised while watching television, and you would never want a child to say, flip on 'nip tuck', which is run by a cable network that also shows family entertainment. When you change the channel, you have no real knowledge of what may be on that channel - it could be physical nudity or cartoons.
The real special interest group that is really driving the FCC is not the PTC, since they are a very small minority, it is the Hollywood establishment, which has the big bucks and can ignore everyone.
www.cleanup.tv is hosted on the same server.
If the FCC is getting hundreds of thousands of complaints, then there's no way for them to actually investigate these complains. So probably all they can do is count them.
What this means is that any organization that can muster large numbers of complaints about random programs they don't like can cause the system to collapse completely. There'd be no effective way for the FCC to use the complaint system as an alert mechanism.
The only problem with this is that the slashdot crowd aren't nearly as good at organizing as the PTC. So the question is whether we can write python scripts with output that is not detectably different than the PTC's form letters?
I can only point to Stern and other popular radio talk shows as being HEAVY FCC targets. The media conglomerates have no alternative to broadcast radio, so they lose their shows to startups in XM and Sirius. Also since this one organization is responsible for most of this stuff, couldn't the FCC give Stern some negotiation with this one organization to allow him to get off the hook for the offenses he's been fined for?
The PTC is not the problem. The PTC is just striving to have the current "decency" rules enforced. The FCC rules (as written) have been largely ignored for years.
An analogy might be the RIAA and MPAA popping up after years of unchecked P2P filesharing and saying to the FBI, "Ahem, excuse us, there are some copyright laws that need to be enforced and here is a list of the infringements and infringers, please go get them."
So either change the rules to allow profanity, Janet Jackson's Boobs, and full uncensored graphic sex scenes or quit whining. The rules are the rules and the law is the law. Like it or not we are a nation of laws not a nation of whiners.
Also worth noting, even though the PTC is one organization, it is composed of 28 national chapters. It's not a single person, but an organization representing thousands and thousands of people. According to their website, the PTC isn't about censorship, but is about making the FCC enforce the existing rules. Again, if you don't like the existing rules, start another organization to get the rules changed. As long as these rules exist the potential to stop LCD (lowest common denominator) entertainment exists.
Personally, I think the latest crop of reality TV shows and new sitcoms is as low as we need to go on the taste scale but hey, I'm not the majority and your tastes may differ. Maybe the majority wants even dumber shows with more potty humor and a compulsory laugh track (in case you forget to laugh). Personally, I am down to three shows these days (2 Network, 1 Cable). TV has retarded to the point where I believe the mere act of watching it lowers your IQ by the hour.
I just sent a bullshit one and apparently it has already been sent to the FCC.
Ignorance kills, complacency kills, hatred kills, but usually not the ones guilty of them.
I guess what's really happening is that Lycos has sold them the idea of a screensaver named "makebeepnotlove" that is responsible for most of those 240,000 comments.
Now we have UHF, VHF, cable and satellite, so why this FCC still around?
Goes to show you that once you create a government agency it only grows bigger, it never goes away.
Get rid of the FCC and free the airwaves. Read http://www.harrybrowne.org/Harry Browne's articles for more details
All your favorite sites in one place!
In "The Handmaid's Tale" Atwood depicts a world where the religious right takes over. All non fundamentalist Christian relgions are outlawed. Homosexuality is a capital offence as are a whole host of other heresies like being a liberal and speaking against the government. Women are prohibited from all learning including learning to read. Polygamy is the law. Familes are assigned childbearing quotas.
You people elected this White Taliban, you live with it.
Just how "tiny" is the PTC. They have enough people to witness 240,000 individual broadcast events in one year, and enough of them motivated to file a complaint for every one of them. To me, that sounds like a substantial political voice.
No political lobby is made up of a large portion of the population. Tobacco and alcohol are the largest lobbies (I think the NRA is number 3) and they represent just a hand full of corporations. Their impact is due to the dollars they spend, not the people they represent.
I dont see that much money being made by lodging FCC complaints. Just a bunch of people saying what they think needs to be said. Regardless of what you think of their opinions, the PTC is the closest thing to a legitimate political voice a democracy can hope for. Unfortunatly for them, Americans now communicate with Washington more by putting their asses on a couch than by writing letters.
Here are the emails you need: Chairman Michael K. Powell: Michael.Powell@fcc.gov Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy: Kathleen.Abernathy@fcc.gov Commissioner Michael J. Copps: Michael.Copps@fcc.gov Commissioner Kevin J. Martin: KJMWEB@fcc.gov Commissioner Jonathan S. Adelstein: Jonathan.Adelstein@fcc.gov
Wanna get nasty? - DaNasty
>FCC is still in control over what is indecent,
They are not censsoring things. They are enforcing existing legislation and existing regulations from way before Bush became president.
Careful now. WWE didn't kick their ass in court, the PTC and WWE settled out of court. There's a difference.
but:
IMail NT-ESMTP 8.13 2186-2 (Not the patched version) seems to be very much open for your business, script kiddies.
Make Mommy proud.
Dear Parents Television Council,
I'd like to welcome you to the country you live in. We call it the United States of America. Here, we have a Constitution with Amendments which is the laws that govern us.
Specifially, the First Amendment reads "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." This means that everyone has the right to speak freely without fear of retribution. This teaches tolerance, the one thing we ask you to learn and reflect.
However, if you do not follow the rules and attempt to remove the freedoms of other citizens, perhaps based upon one of many archaic, hateful, elitist religions, then you become guilty of depriving others of their rights. This is called a Civil Rights violation. This is a crime. For this, you may be fined, jailed, or flamed to death on websites.
We ask you to kindly follow the rules set in this great country of ours.
Thank you for your time.
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
Setting up bureaucracies to "grant licenses" to some applicants while denying licenses to other applicants is directly violating the first amendment to the constitution. They could have amended the constitution but they chose to simply give over the most powerful means of indoctrinating populations ever conceived by any ruler in history, to groups with political acumen and connections while effectively silencing the vast majority of the US.
Seastead this.
Powell spoke before congress, detailing that the complaints are up from 14,000 in 2002, to nearly 240,000 in 2003. There were only 350 complaints during 2000 and 2001. Powell failed to mention however that 99.8% of those complaints came from PTC (Parents Television Council). The article does mention he [Powell] may have been unaware of this fact.
Powell was unaware that a single politically-minded group was driving a campaign leading to the huge increase in complaints?
If the story is true, Powell is irresponsible, or he's being dishonest with congress. There are no other options.
How about if "liberal" bloggers flood the FCC with complaints about televangelists?
If 10,000 people each file a complaint every time one of them mentions "Sodom" or "prostitute" or "fornication" or another "adult" topic, that'll be 250,000 complaints by this time next year.
Maybe then this group will realize the value of free speech.
The shows on their bottom 10 list aren't much worse when it comes to child-safe fare.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Here are the emails you need:
Chairman Michael K. Powell: Michael.Powell@fcc.gov
Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy: Kathleen.Abernathy@fcc.gov
Commissioner Michael J. Copps: Michael.Copps@fcc.gov
Commissioner Kevin J. Martin: KJMWEB@fcc.gov
Commissioner Jonathan S. Adelstein: Jonathan.Adelstein@fcc.gov
Phone numbers:
1-888-225-5322 (1-888-CALL FCC) Voice: toll-free
1-888-835-5322 (1-888-TELL FCC) TTY: toll-free
Address:
Federal Communications Commission
445 12th Street, SW
Washington, DC 20554
Wanna get nasty? - DaNasty
I'm pretty offended every time I hear George W. Bush speak on the radio or TV. There's free speach and free speach, you know?
"there ought to be limits to freedom" -- W.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
my letter to the ptc:
to: editor@parentstv.org
subject: wow congratulations
99.8% of all FCC complaints come from you.
with this knowledge the FCC has just ignored you. no one that complains that much has any real intelligence. you've marginalized yourselves.
i believe in free speech, and the right to not use a shift key when everyone else does. i'm a liberal, and a card carrying liberal at that.
the ptc (not capitalized because you don't deserve it) can eat my ass.
signed, with pride,
Jeremiah Joseph Johnson
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
...and the way it has always been. Groups with a sufficiently strong interest in the subject speak up loud enough to be heard. The average person isn't usually affected enough to make a fuss. This same thing happened in the writing of the 1976 reform of the copyright act. From a paper by Harvard Law Professor William W. Fisher III, "...the negotiations privileged groups with interests sufficiently strong and concentrated to have formal representatives. Very rarely was the public -- the consumers of intellectual products -- represented in any way. And Congress itself -- whose job, one might think, is precisely to protect the public's interest -- failed to do so."
Dear FCC,
:)
Last night's episode of (Insert show here) was fantastic! I am very happy to see that our nation is still one where free speech exists, and entertainment like (Insert show here) is available. God bless America! Keep up the good work, FCC!
Love,
Taxpayer
---
I think that a few million happy letters to the FCC will counteract these "concerned parent" morons, eh?
mod parent up
I am a conservative, however I hate these groups that give me and the conservative cause a bad name by trying to force censorship on people. I still beleive the best sensor is an involved parent. I also don't nessisarly like what Howard Stern says, or even listen to him, but I will still fight for his right to be on the air. Just as I would hope the people on the libral side of the same argument would fight for Rush Limbaugh and his right to be on the air.
If you don't like something turn it off, and beleive that there is enough people out there that think like you. If personalities like Rush and Stern, loose audiance they loose advertisers, and when they loose advertisers they are forced to do one of two things, change or keep on down the same loosing path.
Hurt people though the use of free enterprise not an omnious-government-agenency.
Okay your saying that complaints are up, but they are from one source, that source has an email list, when they want to launch a complaint, they send an email to the people that signed up on the list. the people then follow a link and sign they're name, and press send. So, that does not take away from the fact that complaints are still up that much over the past couple of years. Its still that many people complaining, I know i get emails from them all the time, some stuff is worth complaining about, but to me most of it is not. They complain everytime some one on some sitcom even hints around about something crude. But like I said, its still 240,000 people sending them email through PTC's website. Its not 240,000 complaints from one person. Cant we all just get a life?!?! I know what my kids watch and when they watch it, half the humor on these sitcoms are above they're heads, they dont get it. If a show offends me I turn it off, I wish that the PTC would practice that more often, thats one sure way to cancel a show.
ROFLMAO! Man I never have Mod points when I really need them...
My days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle...
So a small minority controls what is censored...
And a small minority (ClearChannel, AOLTW, etc) controls what goes on the air....
That leaves us (the majority) with how much choice?
Insert Sig Here
Does this seem like a spam approach to activism? The fact that Powell didn't mention that over 99% of the complaints came from a single group makes me think that he will use those misleading statistics to further his or his administration's agenda. If mass complaining is all that is required to get political agendas pushed forward then Slashdot could very well become one of the most important or at least most vocal lobbying group in the country.
A while ago a radio talk show host was complaining about the new FCC regulations. He mentioned something that I completely forgot. Remember the V chip? It was supposed to protect our children from foul content on TV. Every TV made in the last several years has one. His opinion was that almost nobody even knows their TV or VCR can do this, much less how to use it.
When I got home that evening I started playing & found the V chip setting. I censor what my kids watch myself (they are too young to know that I censor them) so the V chip isn't a big deal to me, but I was amazed that this was in my cheap $130 TV.
Anybody here use it? Seems to be a simpler solution than complaining to the federal government if it works.
I bet the council is made up of people who in life complian all the time. They founded this council so they could do it as a job. Lazy bastards. Get a real job and shut your mouth. Not everyone has the same viewpoint as you people, and you need to get a fucking hobby.
This reminds me of something that happened here in Australia. The Australian government ordered ARIA to instigate a rating system for all music CDs sold in Australia. Similar to the movie rating system, any R rated CD would have to be sold behind the counter to 18+ only. The government said they recieved hundreds of complaint letters, Triple J (a very cool, independant, government funded radio station (I'm not linking their website, it'd waste the ABC's measly budget)) did some investigating and found that almost every complaint was sent by a group of about 5 women in Queensland (I think you know the kind of group, religious, mothers, thinking of the children etc.) Nonetheless, ARIA still had to rate their CDs.
So they did. They went through the hundreds of thousands of CDs and gave an R rating to... two CDs. Triple J interviewed the leader of the complaint group, man was she pissed.
I truly hope that some of the responses posted here to this story were being sarcastic or joking. Not all of us that read Slashdot are liberally biased like most of the news media. I guess Slashdot never claimed to be an objective reporter of the facts, but perhaps some of those 240,000 complaints came from people who clicked on the link to complain to the FCC from the PTC website?
Also, I think the issue is not that the PTC or other conservative groups want to censor television for everyone, the biggest issue is when some types of objectionable material air. The reason that CBS was cracked down on so hard during the SuperBowl is because the incident occurred around 9 pm which is still considered "prime-time" TV and is not "late-night" (10pm or later). If that incident would have occurred after 10pm, they might not have been fined at all.
I know this will probably get me flamed, but if the majority of people in the nation voted for a conservative Senate, House, and President, does it not perhaps signify A) That the majority of the nation actually *wants* conservative policies or B) That a large number of people are too lazy to vote and then like to complain when they see the results of their inaction.
Just my two cents. And yes, I am a conservative, and yes I DO think that there is far too much foul language and sex on TV during hours when children are watching. If people want to air uncensored nudity or sex on TV - do it on a pay channel that is an optional addition to your Cable so that parents can choose not to purchase it for their household. Otherwise, there is no excuse for this kind of stuff during times when children are watching.
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." - Tennyson
Their argument to this is that:
-They can't use the V-chip
- - It's too complex to use
- - Many homes have older model TVs without it
-They can't just turn the channel because
- - Once they turn it on & happen across an offensive image/word/sound the damage has been done. (Obviously they can't use TV guide either)
- They might see a TV out in public (If you go to a bar it's your own damn fault, & Yeah, like Circuit city is going to play p0rn instead of football)
- Little Johnny might go over to a friends house & watch inappropriate TV (Hey, don't let little Johnny go over there first, get to know their parents... it's not like if little Johnny was smoking crack over there you would be just as helpless to let him go)
Do you see Al Franken being fined?
it's only a matter of time.
Not surprising, but...
1 &as_qdr=all&q=christian+site%3Awww.parentstv.o rg 1 &as_qdr=all&q=jesus+site%3Awww.parentstv.o rg 1 &as_qdr=all&q=god+site%3Awww.parentstv.org
http://www.google.com/search?lr=&safe=off&c2coff=
http://www.google.com/search?lr=&safe=off&c2coff=
http://www.google.com/search?lr=&safe=off&c2coff=
This is no different than the vast but vocal minority in favor of gay marriage. From the way the media portrays it, you'd think like 75% of people are for it, but every time its voted on, it is crushed.
For the record, I am a moral conservative, and a strongly religious man. However, I RESENT that other groups are trying to do my job. I don't need somone to censor the internet and filter my TV for me. How can I teach my children the importance of making choices if the choices are already made? If all that's available is G-rated pablum, where is the victory of a choice well made? Life is about choices, and I would like to able to use the low-risk, limited consequence items like TV, internet and music to teach good decision-making skills.
I'm also trying to teach my children something about personal responsibility, moral courage, and tolerance for others. Religious nuts throughout history have tried to enforce their particular morals on the remainder of humanity, usually with tragic consequences. I would like my children to realize that, while we don't want sexually-explicit shows, we don't have any moral imperitive to force others to conform to our standards.
So, for the children, please quit doing my job. Fill the airwaves with every variety of material, leave the internet alone. I will teach my children, and if I will teach them to choose the good, and ignore that which does not enlighten. I am, after all, a parent.
Hmm, maybe we should start a campaign to inform this group of our feelings on the matter. (Gee, I hope it doesn't overload their email servers *wink* *wink*). Here is the email that I will be sending, feel free to use it and/or use any variation of it.
to: Editor@parentstv.org subject: Anti-American Messages on TV I am writing to you out of a deep sense of concern for the current state of affairs of television in the US. As you are no doubt aware, TV is one of the most influential mediums in the modern world, exerting it's influence on all people, young and old, and shaping the future of this great nation. No doubt it is because you recognize this influence of TV on our natioon that your group has been active in the past in alterting the FCC to material which is broadcast which you find is inappropriate for public airwaves. We are faced now with a more immediate and terrible threat however than mere dirty language or violence, we are faced with a threat to the very core of american freedom. A number of groups which are highly influential in television has recently been using it's influence to stelthily subdjugate the great freedom of american, and place a most un-patriotic influence on the youth of america. By seeking to eliminate the freedom of press and of speech, the freedom of expression and the freedom of the the public to use the public airways for entertainment that they deem appropriate for themselves. This group, by attempting to censor the expression of americans is sending the message to american viewers that we are a country that is not focused on freedom, but rather is focused on the control of the majority by a small minority which is dictating morality to the country at large. You needn't look far to find this group, in fact just look at the office around you, and consider the message you are sending next time you deem that some bit of television is so awful that you need it to be removed from the public airwaves, rather than you simply chosing to turn the television off.
Famous Last Words: "hmm...wikipedia says it's edible"
"Buffy": redlight
"Angel": redlight
"Arrested Development": redlight
"Desperate Housewives": redlight
"Tru Calling": redlight
"Lost": redlight
"Alias": redlight
"Joan of Arcadia" is listed as their #1 best show for families.
About the only shows I watch that even got a yellow light were "The Simpsons" ("Marge is a role-model") and "King of the Hill".
I'd try to check out some of the other red-lighted shows but since it seems to be most of them I'm afraid I won't have time.
~~~~~~~
"You are not remembered for doing what is expected of you." - Atul Chitnis
It's very interesting how pressure groups can control so many things in the US (heck, EVERYWHERE!)
:)
Because americans are, or at least tend to be, a "the heck, who cares" or "the heck, i care, but I can't change it so who cares" kind of people. Like it's becoming this giant amorphous mass of goo that gets shaped by... guess what? THE MEDIA!!!
Put millions of people in front of a TV showing
stupid soap operas and they end up purchasing their favorite actors' clothes, or following their examples. Put them in front of a TV showing
all kind of violent crimes, and you end up with lots of people purchasing guns for "self-defense". Put them in front of a TV showing "The terrorists! The terrorists! Run away!" and they end up voting for Bush.
IMHO this parental group at least should be praised for trying to do something - heck, they're doing it! Which is much more than the average american does.
Now there's a little "problem" with America... it's COMPLETELY HETEROGENEOUS. 50 years ago, there was a christian majority, so people could manage to get organized and decide by themselves what's good and what's not. But now, people can't protest against something they consider bad, because others consider it good, or "normal".
In other words, it's the jungle law. This parent group will have control of your TV unless _YOU_ do something about it.
Ah, the joys of being in a completely chaotic democracy, ruled by pressure groups and a bipartisan system... Don't you LOVE America?
... are belong... Someone get Lycos to make a pr0n-filled screensaver already.
I am not
As an outsider who has only visited the US a couple of times, it always seemed to me that the attitude, opinion, rules, what you can and can't do on tv, did not reflect the people I talked to.
I mean, if someone said or did something on TV, the reaction would be "they can do that on TV?", rather than being truly offended. It seemed to me that the rules and culture on TV and what was acceptable or normal, were very different from the real world.
When will the American public wake up and realize that they have a choice? You have a choice in everything you do: wake up, go to work, eat, listen to whatever music you want to, and in regard to this article, you can watch whatever you want to.
Along the same lines, you have the choice of controlling the TV. But please understand this: There are Family channels, religious channels, porn channels, movie channels, music channels, news channels, food channels, etc, etc, etc. for all the people out there in the whole wide world. But, *you* have the choice of watching these channels. If you dont like what is on, then please change it, because someone somewhere might like it. I myself would rather have my children watch smut than violence.
Along with this, this means that you will have to actually pay attention to what your family and/or children are watching. If you dont agree with something or dont like a show, then please change the channel.
I am not pro- or anti-smut/violence/profanity/religion; i am pro-choice. take that away, and you take away Freedom.
I am done. :) Please flame away.
Can't have children without sex, and can't have an over-50% divorce rate without SOME violence!
hear, hear!
Blar.
some would say it's better to be mindful of what your kids watch, but nuts to them! the whole point of a democracy is to allow the citizens to legislate a theocracy on themselves. everyone knows this.
...sell me some of what you are smoking. Just out today, stats about Christmas: Peeps who believe the Xmas tale from top to bottom: 67% Peeps who believe Jesus actually lived: 93% Peeps who believe Jesus is the Son of God, etc... 82% Peeps who believe religion shapes life in America: 86% Find these numbers here So is it really a vocal minority who is raising objections, or a group representing a vast majority? Don't get me wrong, I don't get all hissy about seeing Janet Jackson's nipple, but alot of people do. If you believe America is some secular nation that doesen't act at all on religion, you yourself are in a fanatical minority.
I don't watch programs with commercials unless it's a live sporting event, or first-run new episode of a select few shows.
TV is essentially dead to me.
Let them turn it into Disneyland, I don't care...
I can still rent my German Sheisse videos.
Still pisses me off that these idiots feel the need to control what I can watch on broadcast TV...but that's OK. I'll be busy voting down every single school budget they can muster.
Blar.
I pay taxes in the US and that money of mine funds the Federal Government.
These people are wasting my money, because every complaint they file needs to be at least read by a government employee. They get paid to read them.
Wasting my money.
Lets pass a law to restrict a person to a certain number of complaints to the FCC per month. Then at least they would need to have 20,000 members to generate 240,000 complaints in a year.
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
"It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.'""
Do we really need MORE people to try to censor the TV?
ood Morning, I guess I'm concerned about even the quoted script of sex and the city on your website. I can't even read it because I don't want the images in my head. That's why I also don't watch the show. I know that it is the responsibility of PTC to monitor this but I don't think it's necessary to give us the graphic visual. Please be careful not to cross the line on what we're fighting.
Thank You,
Brenda Emmett
I cannot even process that.
itadakimasu
Get a babysitter, not a TV.
Jerks.
Direct away from face when opening.
The stupid thing is that the entire issue of TV censorship could be solved with bloody technology: you either have a V-chip device that looks for a signal to block content or you scramble the censored bits and have a cheap device to unscramble them. The worst thing is that the transition to digital would have been the _perfect_ time to fix this stupid thing once and for all, people are falling over themselves to get a 'broadcast' flag but no-one wants a 'censor' flag? why? it would be so insanely easy to build into the specs and you could even censor a tv image on a dct block scale! it would be a perfect system: if you want censorship you select it and set a password, if not you dont, problem solved, half the FCCs time saved. WTF isnt this happening?? unlike internet filters this would be pretty much perfect, you could even have different flags for say 18 vs PG etc!
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. -Mark Twain
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
yes.
all the way.
...sometimes living in the netherlands isn't so bad really :)
Machine9dotNet
Children don't need protection from something they don't want to see anyways... and keeping stuff from teenagers is impossible anyways.
"" How about taking the safety labels off everything, and let the stupidity-problem solve itself? """
So, without digressing into a completely fucking useless discussion about using the DMCA to stop this, what technological tools can Slashdot readers come up with that will help users keep tabs on and respond to PTC complaints? For example, if the PTC complains about a show, is there an automated way for the appropriately interested torrent fan group to get a notice, so they can contextualize the complaint, or make public comments in support of the show? Is there a way for slashdot fans to respond, tit-for-tat (hehe. I said tit) when the PTC harps on a piece of dialog taken out of context?
Again, no points will be awarded for silly, DMCA-style suggestions. Let's think of smart ways to organize groups of fans for a show, so they can show up or impact a hearing/investigation.
I just sent the following email to PTC, from the link on their website:
i cle_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000731656] brought your group to my attention. I would like to take this opportunity to do something you seem to have taken on for yourself: Speak for Americans everywhere. It disgusts me that you would attempt to skew the number of complaints filed with the FCC to further your own views, and to attempt to regulate television as you see fit.
"To the Parents Television Council,
Please go away. Disband, disperse, diffuse, disappear, dissolve, disengage, break up, cease all activities, halt all programs, and leave.
The recent article in Mediaweek [http://www.mediaweek.com/mediaweek/headlines/art
Your spokeswoman Lara Mahaney asked, "Why does it matter how the complaints come?" I sincerely hope she was not the best you could do for your public image, because that would indicate your group is not only misguided, but headed by fools. It matters because the complaints filed with the FCC are supposed to represent all Americans, and what they consider indecent. It is not your responsibility to speak for those of us who are satisfied with television the way it is. Even were we not satisfied, we did not ask you to speak for us, and would prefer you stayed silent.
I find the entire premise of your group offensive. No child is required to watch television. On the contrary, children only watch television with the permission of their parents. Indeed, no parent is even required to own a television. The argument that parents cannot monitor their children, and so America "needs" you to do so for them, is ridiculous. When I was a child my parents regulated the shows I watched, the movies I went to, the amount of computer use I was allowed, the videogames I played, and helped me to foster a sense of *self* regulation. I am a fine, upstanding citizen today because instead of relying on groups like yours my parents did their job: They parented me.
Go away. You are not wanted here.
-Jared Kling"
And.. to those who say "change the channel", I have tried that as well. The sad fact is that there are hardly any alternatives because almost EVERY show is doing it.
I have a much better alternative for you: turn the damn thing off.
I've for the most part stopped watching television simply because there are much more enjoyable things to do. If you find what's on television so objectionable that you actually become offended by it, why on earth are you still watching it?
I didn't go lobby the FCC (CRTC up here in Canada, same diff) because I find a million "reality" shows to be more boring than a trip to the dentist's chair. If people really want to watch garbage, more power to em. Who am I, or you, to tell them what they can and cannot watch?
Besides, if you're so hell-bent on watching television, most everything from the first 40 years of broadcasting is showing up on DVD these days. I'm sure there's something in there you'd find less offensive than what's on TV these days. If not, why did you start watching in the first place?
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
To give a more reasoned opposition view, the airwaves are public. I'm not obligated to watch, no - but since they're serving the public, they should have to present things the majority of the public actually wants and won't be mortally offended by seeing while they flip by. Your argument is more appropriate to an unlimited medium resource like cable, and in fact cable is lightly regulated.
Of course, the people acually bitching are really annoying paternalistic bastards who think they know what's good for the rest of us. Unfortunately, they don't have a monopoly on that attitude.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Before you say it remember who said it first: Ol'DirtyBastard Wu Tang is for the Children!
Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
shouldn't be able to vote or register complaints. They have tax exempt status. Isn't that enough? Save a life, tear a church down!
Score -2: boneheaded. What does "believing in Jesus" have to do with being offended by a nipple?
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
I wish there was a small card (like a Vegas blackjack odds pocket card) that listed things like this and handed out to all people when getting thier drivers licence.
Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
You went to far on that one... you had me at "pr0n".
Could this be a new slashdot classic, for the children?
Soon we will be imagining a bewolf clusters of children (ala matrix)... & in Soviet Russian the children are for you (which might be true)...
god I hope that when the machines take over they aren't programmed by members of the PTC. Can you imagine the Matrix they would create. No one would ever have any sex... wait a minute... has anyone here on slashdot ever had any sex?
What really chaps my ass are the things which ARE NOT being broadcast into my home. You don't hear about the media conglomerate bills going through congress, limiting national viewership to under 44%, because it would hinder Time-Warner's profit margin. You don't hear about all the Mexicans crossing the border, because it would offend the "Latino" population. You don't hear about anything "good" that's being done in Iraq, because it's not as popular as the more sensational news.
Instead of all the women being raped in Darfur, I'm supposed to be concerned about explaining breasts and mammary glands to my 4 year old. Instead of hearing about the Columbian FARC and the cartels, using "mules" (sometimes, tragically unsucessfully) to move cocaine across the border, I'm supposed to be worried about a naked woman jumping into the arms of a football player. I'm supposed to be offended that Howard Stern coaxes New York women into the studio, to willingly strip bare and be oogled and groped.
I've had more trouble explaining the brainwashed Muslims and the entire hierarchy of aggression and blood-letting over the past 1300 years, than I have sexuality in ANY form. Sexuality, in my house, is a topic discussed over dinner. Shooting women in the back of the head, in a soccer arena at "halftime", is something that DOES NOT make the dinner table.
Wow. Talk about misplaced priorities. The problem with the mainstream media is they do not report anything which isn't popular. Years ago, when people struggled to put print-blocks together and used inked hand-rollers to make 1000 copies, it had a specific purpose. To bring about change. To make people aware of all kinds of issues, however popular or un-popular they might be. It wasn't about the bottom line of the company, it was about the social benefit of decent laws and regulations governing daily life.
This entire country needs an enema.
If the PTC can submit 99.8% of complaints and totally own television, how come there's no OGG support on the iPod yet?
Kind of shows their true colors:R EECH.gif N D.gif
http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/cartoons/2004/FREESC
http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/cartoons/2003/1STAME
Of course, prohibition was quite profitable for a lot of Americans...
Prohibition was and still is.
As it says on the PTC's web site, it's the parents' responsibility to decide what children are able to watch. It then goes on to say that all of the sex, violence, etc is having a negative effect on children. So, it sounds like what they are really saying is that parents aren't effective in their responsiblity.
Why should TV stations change their programming because parents aren't effective? Stupid! What's next? "My skin got burned from being out in the sun too long. Let's eliminate the sun..."
...just another bunch of fascist religious bigots
Start watching Canadian TV. We got Kink, a serial documentary about S&M, Friday night soft core on BCTV, and a half hour swear fest called Trailer Park Boys.
Very insightful, Mr. AC.
Standards of conduct are strangely unmentionable these days. I was raised to be polite, although I am not always so. I was raised to respect other people, at least until they do something to lose that respect. I was also raised on the Golden Rule.
Now, I don't believe in the Golden Rule; I would rather poeple would Do Unto Me what I would like done, and not treat me how they would like to be treated. Subtle difference, but important. And evengelical Christian might think they would want to be converted, if they were a hedonistic atheist like me. I'd prefer they didn't try to convert me.
But I digress.
Politeness and "profanity" are orthogonal ideas. You can be polite to people, but still be fuckin' profane. There's nothing impolite about Everclear claiming, "Yes I guess I fucked up again," but I can't play it on the radio, even though Strawberry Burn is a fuckin' excellent song.
If we want people to be more polite, we should be censoring impoliteness on the Big Blue Eye, and not profanity.
And chronically rude people should just get the fuck off my streets, capiche?
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Bob: "Yep, WWE sure did."
I'm sure the same idiots who send out ridiculous PTC complaints chow down on freedom fries while spouting freedom out of their bloated republican asses (that's right I said asses you losers) but check out this quote from their site about the video game Fable
You can really do close to anything you want, to be as evil or good-natured as you wish, but man it is disturbing to realize the implications of such freedom.
you know I grew up watching way too much tv and I loved violent and explicit stuff from a young age today I really enjoy the Sopranos and I can't wait till Family Guy is back on. Edgy is cool. Strangely enough whenever I've played a game like Fable despite "the implications of such freedom" I always opt for the incredible good guy thing cause deep down even pretend doing sick things seems wrong to me. Why? perhaps it's because I had parents who weren't wastes of skin and taught me right from wrong and fantasy from reality? perhaps children aren't all stupid zombies ready for audio visual programming?
Perhaps all the concerned, unintelligent parents who are so busy writing complaints to the FCC should be watching TV with their kids? or better yet doing something active.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
not just a sperm-donor or an unlucky paternal unit paying for a youthful fling.
Who will do the parenting for them? I mean, I'm not worried about getting robbed by your kids. But you don't have all the kids. I thought it takes a village and all that.Ugh, Hillary Clinton said that. Yuckers. Kinda like the whole gun thing. Im sure I'm not going to shoot someone with my gun, so I'd like it handy for use in case of revolution, but Democrats in big cities are afraid the unlucky paternal unit's kid might shoot them for crack money, so they want them banned. Wow. Shit's complex yo. But seeing both sides isn't as fun as judging and name calling I guess.
Jesus didn't have nipples.
I haven't read the article, and I don't know anything about this parents' group. However, as a new parent I really do not appreciate the flippant attitude Hollywood and broadcasters have towards standards of decency. I do not want US television to degrade to the trash level of European TV where bare breasted women are displayed to sell products. Broadcast TV needs to take a step back and become more age appropriate for the various time slots, and Hollywood needs to take a step back with its rating system. A PG-13 movie of today would have been rated R when I was growing up. Standards of decency have not changed, but Hollywood would like to have society believe that they have -- that they changed to their standards. I don't think so.
i don't care what they say, they cant take my howard stern away! ;D
viva satallite radio in 2006! (until of course, it will start to get regulated soon too..
damn greedy government and their "standards")
Who put you in charge of telling me what I can let my child watch? Who put you in charge of telling the rest of America what their children, or what they, can watch?
You are absolutely right. There is a little thing called responsibility. As in each and every one of us is responsible for ourselves and our own families. Your responsibility ends with your family, plain and simple. If you do not want your children (do you even have any?) watching CSI, they don't let them watch CSI. I, on the other hand, feel that it is entirely appropriate for my 11 year old neice, who has an IQ well in the genius range, to watch CSI, since it has gotten her interested in forensic science, and that's where she is going with her life.
Open airwaves are just that; open. If you want to decree what can be shown on the airwaves, buy yourself a broadcast network and fill it with reruns of 7th Heaven, and then all of us who don't want to watch it, can change the channel.
I'm a proud member of this 'small activist group' And I'm convinced that there are millions of like-minded people out there.
Great. Let them write their own complaints to the FCC if they agree with you, and don't like what they are seeing. Until then, stop trying to parent the nation, get down off your soapbox, put down the bible, and go take care of your own family. Something on TV that you don't personally like? Change the channel. Go outside, read a book, etc etc etc.
Granted, I know that the AC will never respond to this, and will go back to their one-person crusade to clean up the airwaves, since God has given them the responsibility to parent the nation, but at least someone said it.
"If Common Sense was so common, it wouldn't be such a valued trait."
I'm censored from talking about breasts, so breast cancer and cooking chicken can no longer be talked about on TV?
Public radio is censored for talking about homosexuality?
People can't talk about sex education on TV?
Your last two points about censoring Pres. Bush and politicians are valid, but sex is where it starts. And where do you draw the line between pornography, art, and science? Once you try drawing a line, the people start trying to redefine the line in their favor in order to control you.
People try to control your behavior with language. They want control of you. If censorship starts there with sex, it will progress to politics and current events. To coin a cliche, its doubleplusungood.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
It never ceases to amaze me, how liberals are the biggest hypocrites on the planet.
,yes MAJORITY, will then have SUPER MAJORITY's, in the House,the Senate,another 8 years in the White House and another 800 judges appointed to various positions of power.
The PTC is exercising THEIR right to free speech. They are finding THEIR voice.
But since it disagrees with yours, they are now trying to 'censor'.
I hope you guys continue this crap for another 4 years...because then we in the Republican majority
Keep it coming. You are digging your own grave. Maybe you could get Michael Moore to make another movie? The first one was soooooo helpful.
I'm still working on a clever footer.
I mean just look at the crap that's put out on telly:
Promiscuous idiot island.
Sitcom with token gay person making wise-cracks about straight people.
Show about 4 sluts who parade their stuff around some city looking for instant gratification.
Four shows, back-to-back, trying to figure out how and why this person or that dog was gruesomly killed.
And the kiddies programs? Bordering on mindless drivel, but what's worse is the adult programs are advertised right in the middle of them.
But I'm not convinced their agenda of censorship is the way to go.
I'd be more in favour of just not watching telly altogether, taking my kids outside or, if it's raining, reading a book while listening to music, making stuff out of old egg-cartons and raisin packets, you get the idea.
Perhaps making my next TV upgrade a plasma-screen without a tuner wouldn't be such a bad idea after all.
Television should never be a substitute baby-sitter. Unfortunately it's no longer politically correct to suggest that people actually spend time with their kids. I mean come on, I've got a career, isn't that more important?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
SATAN COMMANDS YOU TO BUY THE FAMILY GUY DVDS!!!
"And a voice was screaming: 'Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?'" - HST
My definition of decency is probably different from yours. For instance, I believe "decency" means respect for your fellow person; saying "fuck" is not indecent unless it is used disrespectfully. So, "Oh, my fucking Christ with a pogostick!" is not indecent, but "Fuck off, tard!" is, unless the person being talked to *is* a tard, and has been doing something for which he/she should fuck off.
And there is *nothing* indecent about the naked human body. Even gross lookin' folks are not indecent when naked; they are merely gross lookin'.
There seems to be a movement within the US towards some strange version of "decency" that does *not* include the way we treat our fellow person, but has *everything* to do with enforcing a certain religious viewpoint. This is not decency. In fact, the act itself is indecent, as it disrespects other people deserving of respect.
So you might imagine I don't want people deciding for me what is decent or indecent. Our viewpoints are different. I don't believe all viewpoints are equal: I believe I am right. So do the folks who want to censor everything. They believe *they* are right, I mean.
Where was I going with this?
Oh, yeah. Decency is in how we treat our fellow man, not whether Janet's breast was bared. In this, my reading of the Bible tells me even Christ agrees with me. Not that I believe in God, let alone the sacredness of Christ.
After all, I'm just an atheist, and so have no sense of morality.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Hillary's right, it does "take a village", but not "to raise a kid". It takes a village to pay for a kid. Parents, think about that the next time you're lobbying for new additions to the local school, or for speed bumps every 10 feet because you're afraid your kid will get run over, etc. We child-free folks pay just as much as you do for those items (ie, in most states property taxes are used to pay for public schooling, and the amount of property tax you pay relies only on the value of your property and not the number of children you have attending a public school), and we don't use the provided services nearly as much as the childed. Consider the catch-22 of moving to a new community because it has a "better" school. Chances are, in many cases that's because the community and school are small, with a low number of students per teacher so that teachers can spend more time per student. You see that and drag in your three progeny. Others do the same and before you know it the school with an average class size of 16 has now skyrocketed to an average size of 35-40, hemmoraging teachers left and right because of the added stress, increasing property taxes to pay for school additions and increased community infrastructure (more/wider roads so all of your huge SUVs can drive junior to school in the morning), etc. Of course, then you start complaining about how bad the school is, or how the community is no longer the quaint place you thought you were moving into, or that you're getting reamed by property taxes. Here's a little video worth watching. (warning: this will likely offend parents, and it's definitely an example of an extreme belief, but the concept is still sound and the video is funny, IMHO)
As for "family values", can anyone define "family values" for me? I'm not considered a family (single, no kids), so why should I embrace "family values"? Who says what a family is, anyway? Is a childless married couple a family? What about a single father with custody of his kid(s)? What about a same-sex domestic partnership (with or without children)? Are those families? If not, why should they "act in ways that value families?" There's nothing in it for them.
(Note: I read your post to be in jest, making fun of Hillary, anti-gun nuts, etc. I just decided to rant.)
http://www.lib.siu.edu/cni/b411.html
The Naked Lunch trial is a famous case of something that many people felt was filthy, disgusting, and without value being defended by both the artistic community and the courts. It was the last time (that I'm aware of) that a novel was prosecuted as obscene in the United States.
A more detailed discussion of literary obscenity can be found here. Site MAY not be safe for work. It's an adult theme website and the article has pictures of naked naughty bits, albeit artist ones. Click at your own risk.
Ill see your soft porn (We've had it here since I was a tyke) and raise you TQS (the french FOX/NY Post-like network in Quebec) which showed on their sex show at 13h00 a gynecological exam.
No, not waist up.
Almost a 3/4 spread view (that's what pubic hair is for) but you definitely saw waaaay more than you thought would go on 30mins after the Flinstones/Simpsons reruns.
I was so disgusted that I had to tape it when it ran again at 23h30.
The following day's reaction....nothing.
No one commented in the french media and the english are too busy watching Toronto or US channels to even notice.
zeke
PS: I still remember seeing a test for the clap on the learning channel here as a young teen. Seeing that long Qtip going through the tip of the penis really drove home the point of wearing a condom.
Christian fundamentalists are actively destroying the world in the name of their very own Apocalypse.
--
make install -not war
I work in a television... Sure, I live in America Junior, (canada), but it is much the same here.... although to a lesser degree. I find that canadian stations sensor much less.... or atleast much differently. I remember catching an american broadcast of the Matrix.... and they edited out every little offensive word, (including changing "Jesus Christ" into "Judas Priest" LOL.... i really get a kick outta that!) Yet they left every little bit of violence! I find that amusing.... it's a great message! You can go out and shoot anyone you want.... just don't swear! anyways.... between all of these groups, PTC etc.... and the inteference of large corporations.... (people that advertise on the networks....) there really is nothing that isn't censored anymore.... (especially the news)
Then you get into the problem of what books children find in the library, or school library.
Heaven forbid, they could find books on magic (i.e. Harry Potter), or other unsavoury topics.
In NZ, "Fungus the Bogyman" got removed from school libraries becuase a Member of Parliament's child brought it home from the school library...
NZ Parliament - equivalent to the USA House of Representatives. Or maybe Congress. We've only got the one House.
Jesus didn't have nipples? What??? Did he have them surgically removed? Was he a space alien? A mutant? An invertebrate?
It hasn't been about Jesus since Corporate America figured out that you sell things to people so they can give them to other people on December 25th. Now it's all about the $$$
"If Common Sense was so common, it wouldn't be such a valued trait."
Talk about missing the point.
It's nothing like the gun argument.
Its EXACTLY like the gun argument. You should prove it isn't using words. Merely stating such only works in the echo chamber in which you live your life. Both deal with the moderation and/or revocation of constitutionally guaranteed rights based on the situations of others. In both cases one side thinks because they personally are ok, the other side should leave them alone. One side wants Janet Jackson's titty on TV and the other doesn't want a neighborhood kid turning into a rapist. One side wants their right to arms and the other is afraid of the gang members just a few blocks away. ITS THE EXACT SAME THING.
Since they don't have a role model at home, someone would rather legislate it.
That much is evident. I am merely pointing this fact out and mocked those who think they are holier than someone else. I didn't propose a solution. And I see you don't have one beyond praying for me. No, no judgement there. Who is to say I need to be prayed for? You? I don't have any kids so I don't know how that will help.
I agree that if I don't think it's right, I'll make the call.
That's neat. But you have still failed to address who will make it for those incapable of making that decision and without a parent to guide them. Should they just be thrown to the media wolves? And the current gatekeepers think its a good idea to put an aging titty on during halftime of the superbowl. I don't know if they are the best choice. Maybe you should reconsider the benefactor of your prayers.
The problem is that most TV networks and stations have pretty much ignored what was a common standard not that many years ago, and that was presenting certain material at certain times of the day because some of it is not appropriate for kids.
As much as some of you don't want to hear it, every show is not appropriate for children. Yes I agree that parents need to be parents, but there really was a time you could let your kids watch tv and not worry much about what was on. Those days are gone, and society is not better for it. TV is kind of like a public park (airwaves owned by public, not the stations), and we don't allow anything to go on all hours of the day (this includes freedom of speech). We have restrictions of both legal and cultural. Just because its an "irwave park", we don't eliminate all restrictions.
So as a parent my self, I have heavily restricted my kids (including my 13 from watching TV). No cable, or satellite. I wish it wasn't the case but it is.
Speaking of this, anyone out there heard anything more about the Family Guy coming back? Dates/Times/Episodes?
ive read through this thread (ugh, yeah - i shouldnt read the comments, just the articles) and i'm so bummed by how biased the moderating is.
the slashdot crowd is so religiously godless and radically liberal and most of 'em dont even have kids so they are talking out of their arse when they speak of parenting (and most of the ones that do have kids frighten me.)
this is not going to get modded at all, or -1 troll if anyone bothers to read it, but on principle i will submit it anyway.
it'd be neat if slashdot was more balanced, but most techno-geeks are hardcore bigots in their own special way anyway. i guess we're all lucky they are techno-bigots instead of lynch-mob bigots, but the thought process is still the same. freaky, huh? in another time/place these whacko's would be running progroms against windows users or something. sad.
One click hits to networks from a minority of a few complainers? Sound pretty much like responders to here. Oh wait they actually get something done instead of sitting on their asses talking up how linux is better and it's only ___insert problem and or company and or microsoft here___ thats keeping it down.
Actually, tradition is that he had three: two regular ones and a nubbin.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
Like you need a satelite and a DSL line. Hope DSL is available in you area; otherwise I guess you're just screwed. Condolances if that's the case.
Ignorance kills, complacency kills, hatred kills, but usually not the ones guilty of them.
Top 20 Worst Shows
I don't know what some of you are complaining about. If they can get rid of even half the shows on this list then we're all in better shape.
Besides, these people have every right to complain -- just like you. If you don't like it get organized and do something about it.
A modicum of snuff can be quite efficacious.
Dear PTC activists, We are of the bread of human being that through history promoted science, technology and new ways of communication. Things like The Internet, television, radio and many others exist because of the hard work of many free spirits before us that we admire and from whom we are always trying to take the flame.
In another hand you are of the kind who claimed that the earth was flat and that continue to claim that evolution is non-existent. Your puritan and conservative way of thinking comes from those who have done everything to slow down the research and accomplishment of the first group. If humanity has listened you from the beginning, we will probably still be chasing animals with rocks and sticks and living in caves.
Please stop censuring those technologies that you did not contribute to create, in fact why don't you simply stop using them at all and go communicate though bushes on fire or something else you believe in?
Sincerely yours.
Yahh, hiii haaaaa! -Major Kong, from Dr. Strangelove
they claim they have over 800,000 people in it.
Since Jesus was actually born in early Spring, Christmas has even less to do with Jesus than you'd think. They (the Catholic church) picked Dec. 25 because it coincides with the Festivus traditions of the ancient Costanzas. Or the pagan traditions of ancient europeans, if you don't like smartasses.
Quoting http://www.christmas-time.com/cp-hist.html:
In the Western world, the birthday of Jesus Christ has been celebrated on December 25th since AD 354, replacing an earlier date of January 6th. The Christians had by then appropriated many pagan festivals and traditions of the season, that were practiced in many parts of the Middle East and Europe, as a means of stamping them out.
There were mid-winter festivals in ancient Babylon and Egypt, and Germanic fertility festivals also took place at this time. The birth of the ancient sun-god Attis in Phrygia was celebrated on December 25th, as was the birth of the Persian sun-god, Mithras. The Romans celebrated Saturnalia, a festival dedicated to Saturn, the god of peace and plenty, that ran from the 17th to 24th of December. Public gathering places were decorated with flowers, gifts and candles were exchanged and the population, slaves and masters alike, celebrated the occasion with great enthusiasm.
In Scandinavia, a period of festivities known as Yule contributed another impetus to celebration, as opposed to spirituality. As Winter ended the growing season, the opportunity of enjoying the Summer's bounty encouraged much feasting and merriment.
The Celtic culture of the British Isles revered all green plants, but particularly mistletoe and holly. These were important symbols of fertility and were used for decorating their homes and altars.
New Christmas customs appeared in the Middle Ages. The most prominent contribution was the carol, which by the 14th century had become associated with the religious observance of the birth of Christ.
In Italy, a tradition developed for re-enacting the birth of Christ and the construction of scenes of the nativity. This is said to have been introduced by Saint Francis as part of his efforts to bring spiritual knowledge to the laity.
Saints Days have also contributed to our Christmas celebrations. A prominent figure in today's Christmas is Saint Nicholas who for centuries has been honoured on December 6th. He was one of the forerunners of Santa Claus.
Another popular ritual was the burning of the Yule Log, which is strongly embedded in the pagan worship of vegetation and fire, as well as being associated with magical and spiritual powers.
Celebrating Christmas has been controversial since its inception. Since numerous festivities found their roots in pagan practices, they were greatly frowned upon by conservatives within the Church. The feasting, gift-giving and frequent excesses presented a drastic contrast with the simplicity of the Nativity, and many people throughout the centuries and into the present, condemn such practices as being contrary to the true spirit of Christmas.
The earliest English reference to December 25th as Christmas Day did not come until 1043.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
If "balanced" means "pays a lot of attention to one particular skewed viewpoint from one particular religion" then I guess we're guilty.
Not giving much creedence to a set of beliefs that were invented by some ancient Hebrews five or six thousand years ago isn't bias; it's rationality. Not enjoying the frightened people who demand that everyone conform to their own self-hating concept of "morality" -- priceless.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
That's still smaller than some cities in this country. Now there's an idea....
Put them all in one city, only show them the shows they want to see, and leave the rest of us the heck alone.
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
Search their website for "Sex and the City". Here's the link: http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/campaigns/sexintheci
I truly and deeply appreciate their sincere efforts to collect the juiciest dialogue from each episode and present it all in one place.
I sent this letter to the parentstv.org email address. Maybe send them similar letters?
Hello,
I'm not sure who I might be addressing at editor@parentstv.org, so I apologize for the lack of personalization.
I am somewhat curious about your organization and why it exists. I realize you probably get all sorts of crank emails, spam, etc... So I expect this email to most likely get ignored.
I don't like most of what's shown on TV today... I rarely watch TV as a matter of fact. However, I find that trying to prevent other people from doing so is a) futile and b) wrong. I am wondering why your organization thinks it's ok to dictate what other people do in the privacy of thier own homes?
I understand you are working under a "save the children" banner, and that's fine. But is it not more logical for a parent to parent, as opposed to expecting the government or TV and radio stations to do it for them? Why does your organization feel that it's acceptable to deny programming to people who may find it funny/interesting/worth watching? Why do you feel that your "rights" override other's "rights" to watch what they please?
As I said, I have no real agenda; I don't watch the TV shows you label as "Bad" nor do I watch the ones you label as "Good." If either or both of them are cancled or taken off the air, I don't really care one whit. What I do care about is your organizations internal justification for censoring programming because parents can't be bothered to actually monitor what their children watch. I have a very real problem with organizations like yours dictating to others what's "right" and what isn't.
It's time to stop blaming TV, Radio, Newspaper and other media for the poor condition some children find themselves in, and it's time to start looking at the parents. I know it's hard to accept responsibilty for the majority of parents that are part of your organization, but the very real facts of the matter are that any parent that joins your organization is a poor parent and is obviously incapable of taking care of a child in an appropriate manner. They rely on the TV to babysite or educate then children, when that is a job for the parents themselves, not to be shunned off on the anonymous TV screen.
As I said, of course I do not expect this letter to be given any serious thought by the people of your organization. It's often hard, if not impossible to convince a zealot that they are misguided and doing harm rather than good. It's a very sad state of affairs and a very sad day for the nation when people with misguided political agendas are able to influence freedom of speech and democracy. Shame on your ogranization for further erroding our right to free speech and freedom of expression. Your ogranization is part of the problem, not a part of the solution.
Thank you for your time,
XXXXXX
The problem is the FCC fines are ineffective. People are routinely thrown in jail for talking to a child in person for things that are now intentionally said on the air to children.
For the same reason that dirty magazines are kept from minors, and people are thrown in jail for solicitating, corrupting the morals, and raping children, people should be thrown in jail for doing the same thing on the air that people are arrested for for doing on the phone, or in person.
You're being lied too. I've heard people solicitate under age children for sex on some of the talk shows on the air. The issue is not about free speech, but whether there are two different sets of laws in this country, one for peon joe and the other for media elite.
Lord, after the third or fourth time I heard a 15 year old female solitated for lesbian sex on the air by a porn star, a 16 year old given instructions on how to take shrooms on the air, and on and on, I became disgusted at the evil of posters on the boards here. These are crimes, and they will always be crimes.
Powell failed to mention however that 99.8% of those complaints came from PTC (Parents Television Council).
MOD PARENTS DOWN!
Our children are watching
I cut and pasted that line directly from the PTC's website; it's apparently their motto. Our children are watching? Why the hell are you letting them? Stop whining to the government and try actually being a parent, you self-obsessed, self-rightous pig-dogs.
Who the hell ever said TV was for children? Why should there be a "family hour?" Why are they watching TV without you, and is it really so bad if they get interested in sex? They will anyway, you self-deluding freaks. Will anything they see on TV really ruin their lives? I grew up watching TV, saw all sorts of sex and violence, and my only problem with it is that I wish I'd spent more of the time reading. (And no, not the bible, you dolt. Grow an imagination.)
And why do you presume to impose your morality on everyone? If you don't like what's on TV, don't watch it.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
i was thinking the same thing i was just thinking the size of NYC and well what is that over 8 million so i was thinking it would only need to be a city on the smaller side
but the difference between PTC and slashdotters is that THEY take their grievances where they will accomplish something, and slashdotters post here.
I agree with the context and intent of your post in regards to media censorship. But I think way too many people are denegrating rap with the same ill-thought and preconceived notions:
"You can remove every "motherfucker" you want from Rap music and it's still talking about fucking hos and doing drugs."
You really need to listen to the lyrics of most rap music. The vast majority of hip hop that I listen to is about racism in america, anti-capitalism, the culture of minorities, god, family, friends, love, relationships, and other related themes. These artists utilize lyrically complex poetry in rythm with unique beats to form an entire genre of music.
Hip hop music today is very deep, and if all you are getting from modern rap is fucking hos and doing drugs, you aren't really listening to the lyrics. Or perhaps you aren't listening to the right artists.
You may find some of the artists mentioned below rapping about fucking a ho or doing drugs, but A) A lot of people have sex with women and have done drugs B) The entire content and context of each of these artists' most recent albums suggests much more complex ideas and themes than you may be aware of.
Suggested artists: Kanye West, Outkast, Eminem, Tupac Shakur, Nappy Roots, Talib Kweli, Jay-Z, Bubba Sparxx, and Rage Against the Machine.
Listen to an honestly wide breadth of music from each of the above artists and maybe you will agree rap isn't so bad.
Give rap a chance man.
It is well within this group's right, however misguided, to flood the FCC with complaints about shows.
Perhaps the best way to fight back, is to slashdot the FCC:
Complain about EVERYTHING. EVERY LITTLE THING!
I'm sure 240,000 complaints is a drop in the bucket. A few grassroots organizations who complain about the most inane things will cause the PTC's percent of the volume to drop to, oh... 0.2%?
Hunt your preferred prey at Aliens vs Predator MUD. Join the war at avpmud.com port 4000
I think television has been going into the crapper for years. I rented 'Blues Brothers'. I had seen it as a kid, and remember the R rating... watched it, and decided it might have gotten a PG rating today.
Gradually, TV and movies have devolved into very little content, but a lot of sex and violence.
I got rid of TV altogether about four years ago. It was one of the best decisions I have ever made. Now, when I see TV at a friend's house, I think to myself: "Who in the world would watch this trash?"
But of course, we must pander to the mindless majority. If someone speaks up, he/she is just an old prude who wants to stop everyone else's fun. I am not a member of the PTC, but I support their right to do this.
And you are free, of course, to use your first ammendment right to support the dumbing down of America... but if you complain that the US elected George Bush (twice), I will laugh in your face. You reap what you sow.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I'm seeing a surprising number of people crying out how fundamentally flawed the PTC is for not representing the will of the common American... well guess what? They don't pretend to, nor should they have to. Activist groups by definition will have a focus way beyond what the common man or woman has. Do you honestly think the ACLU or EFF represent the will of the man on the street? Do you think most people even know what DRM or IP is? The point here is that the PTC isn't bad because the population at large doesn't endorse them, they are bad because they're fruit-cakes with a normative moral agenda based on nothing but their personal beliefs and too much Dr. Phil.
Christ... Mentioning "rap" and "artist" in the same sentence should be just cause to poke your eardrums out.
But 100% of the complaints about the PTC come from Cowboy Neal.
Nice, how you're imposing your moral values on your children. When I was a teenage boy with raging hormones, I very much wanted sexually-explicit shows. Very much like drugs, if I couldn't get them from TV, I would get them from somewhere else. And I saw some pretty explicit stuff at a fairly young age (around 15, 16). Can't say it's caused me any physchological damage. Though I guess I can't prove it as AC.
The problem with the Puritan rooted US society is that sex and violence are lumped in one category. Why? They're not the same thing at all. So what Janet Jackson's boobs were on TV? Guess what, a lot of you were sucking on one right after you were born!
There's nothing wrong with seeing sex on TV as long as it's not mixed with violence.
The NY Times just recently published an article about red America's viewing habits. Surprisingly, the States that voted conservative in the last election are the same States where the highest viewing population for "CSI" and "Desperate Housewives" arise. You should read the article before NY Times starts charging for it. What does that say about America's viewing habits? "Do what I say, not what I do?"
Lastly, all this attention on the PTC should not divert attention away from the thoughtless actions of the American Family Association, who according to an NPR report the night of Veteran's Day, were poised with thousands of people ready to lodge complaints to the FCC about stations that were going to air "Saving Private Ryan" in commemoration of Veteran's Day.
Linux at home
It looses a lot of your intended impact due to using phrases such as "by effectively spamming the crap out of the FCC."
..." The 'until you discover...' bit sound very amaturish and would be better worded in terms like : "However, if the statistics are investigated further it comes to light that 99.8% of all complaints..."
That will get the letter put in the 'loony left' bucket quicker than anything.
Also, using the phrasing of "Until you discover that 99.8% of all complaints
Quickly rushing out a poorly worded email does nothing for the cause I'm afraid.
Damn right. We need more people willing to stand up and say "it's my responsibility." More power to you!
I looked at a couple of this years and previous years shows. This is strictly a group of shows approved by your local church.
I see little to do with "morality" and lots to to with propagating the faith. News flash people don't have to go to church to have morals.
The "best" show are littered with the "godly shows":
Seventh Heaven, touched by an angel. And shows so mind numbingly bland that your intestines would throttle your brain as a defence mechanism if you actually watched them and actually had a brain. Shows like Sue Thomos FBI.
The "Worst" list has many shows I actually enjoyed. Like Buffy, Angel, That 70's Show, Spin City, CSI, Cold Case, and NYPD Blue.
I din't actually see anything on the "Best" list that I could actually tolerate watching.
We need more breasts during the Super Bowl, and
:^)
;^)
F bombs during awards shows (by foreign music
acts no less) and bologna thrown at girl's asses
so they can get breast implants (so they can go
on the Super Bowl show the following year and
show them to us).
Seriously, if you think things are fine now, then
you are kidding yourself, and I'm no PTC fan!
What the article also doesn't mention is that
most annoyance lawsuits (of all kinds) are
brought by left-wing groups, so the shit on both
sides stinks.
I'm sure Powell DIDN'T know. I keep up with
things political and I didn't know! I do now.
So what though. It gives them ALL something to
do (left and right), and keeps them from going
after the real "threat". What we all enjoy...
INTERNET PORN VIA P2P (and BitTorrent)!
You can't read the First Amendment literally like that, as the poster above me noted you can't yell fire in a theater. You can't disclose state secrets (like troop movements in war time), even if it is news. Congress can regulate contracts (even though this could be seen as a form of speech). It is not an absolute prohibition since there are other clauses that also have to be taken into consideration. But you're right, more than political speech is protected.
I apologize for following up my own post, but I always though spin city was a pretty clean fun comedy. So I had to see what the beef was Quoting:
"Crass and vulgar language abound, while casual sex and the homosexual lifestyle (one character is an openly homosexual male) "
Do you suppose that if there were no gay characters, they wouldn't have had enough to make the list?
Yeah its common for small organizations such as the PTC to start letter writing campaigns. Its been known that they also commit fraud by going door to door in neighborhoods, asking people to write in letters complaining about the content of specific shows without having seen them.
o cr acy.html
There is a religious movement to control all of America. If they cant get you to beleive in their christian fundementalism... they will impose it on you by law.
This is only one of the many inside attacks on our country by those among us who insist their idea of god is your way to heaven.
They wont stop until you conform, or atleast until they're able to impose their "holy" beleifs on you by law.
http://www.buildingequality.us/ifas/fw/9109/the
"It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio."
Apparently, they're not doing a very good job.
I changed the title of the post to point to the hypocricy. Since it is obvious no one wants a slur leveled against them instead of just speech, I thought I'd point to the level that slashdot has degenerated into - ad hominum attacks.
Perhaps these are important, because the examples that many people are complaining about are crimes, at least if done in public places, such as nudism, soliciting kids and prostitutes for sex, and so on.
In a democracy, debate is tolerated, and conter-examples allowed. In a society moving towards a dictatorship, contrary viewpoints are shouted down, slandered, and eventually forcefully removed.
Slashdot has followed the rest of our declining society and gone to stage two, ad hominem attacks and slurs instead of peaceful, reasoned and reasonable debate. The next stage is to forcefully prevent people from talking.
Democracy requires debate.
According to the article there were 240,000 complaints in 2003, and the population of the U.S. is about 294,920,046, http://www.census.gov/cgi-bin/popclock , so if my calcutations are right 240,000 / 294,920,046 * 100 = 0.081377%. That seems to be a very small percentage of the population determining what we see or hear for everybody.
Personally i like this page http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/familyguide/main.asp. Where they list all the curse words they try to block. Who knew Jesus was a swear? And since when is Queer Eye a bad show becuse it has gay guys in it?
I mean geeze, what a suprise, look what's number 1:
Joan of Arcadia - A whole series about talking to God... who'd a thunk it?
OK, let's proceed with an Australian's uneducated look at the lists!
2. Doc - Ok, don't have it in Australia... but by the description "In addition to being completely devoid of offensive language, sexual content, or violence, episodes of Doc consistently reinforce family-friendly themes such as honesty, compassion, hope, and reconciliation. " I'm happy it isn't
3. Sue Thomas F. B. Eye - Don't have this either, but is made by the same people as 2, so pretty happy there too.
4. Reba - Nope, don't have this either (Gee, wonder why we don't have all these piss boring shows?)
5. 7th Heaven - Uh Huh, we do have this, it plays during the day I think, when no-one is watching... urgh... more religious crap.
6. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition - Don't have this, but plenty of our own homespun versions... I like these things, so it's ok by me... harmless fun. (Extreme Makeover of the person variety though... urrrrgh)
7. Everybody Loves Raymond - Not my cup of tea, but very popular... eh.
8. American Idol - Ahh, the Christians do love a singalong. (Yes, that's one word!)
9. American Dreams - Don't have it... no idea!
10. Bernie Mac - Came and went very quickly over here...
So, I watch maybe 2 shows from that list (Renovation style shows and Australian Idol)
Onto the BAD list:
1. Everwood - Ok, we're off to a bad start here, never heard of it.
2. That '70s Show - On now in our off ratings period... watched a couple of episodes, a bit eh... I love that they have such issue with storylines such as "Donna walking in on Eric while he is masturbating in her bathroom. " Oh come on!
3. Fear Factor - Yeah, ok, this is a pretty shite show.
4. Two and a Half Men - Came here very briefly and I think has left now... It belongs in a 10 worst shows, but just because of how very, very unfunny it was.
5. C.S.I. (Crime Scene Investigation) - OH COME ON! This show is fantastic. It's not for kids, granted, but it is a supurb show for entertainment's sake.
6. The Surreal Life - Dear god... that does look like crap! (No, we don't have that)
7. Girlfriends - Don't have it, but really, sounds harmless.
8. Las Vegas - Airing reruns at present... looks pretty terrible, haven't watched it.
9. Will & Grace -" bawdy banter " Who the hell uses terms like that? I find it funny... it's pretty harmless really.
10. Cold Case - They've tried teaming this up with CSI here, and I don't think it's doing too well.
Ok, I've lost the plot on what I was doing... still, I'm always amused by these right wing groups choice of targets for anger.
Note: If you agree with the site in question, you will be offended. Fire off your emails blindly.
Maddox Banned?!
Posted AC to avoid kharmoring.
Knowing Stern, any mention of this topic is most likely done in a degrading, derogatory manner, with absolutely no intrinsic value other than to titilate/stimulate his brain-dead listeners
I see quite a difference between this aproach, and approaching the subject with a sense of intellectual or educational value. Perhaps it's not so much the "what" that matters here, so much as the "how".
This happened in the 70s and the 80s in the UK. Mary Whitehouse, a housewife with very old fashioned and reactionary views, set up the "Viewers and Listeners Association", which was a very very tiny group who nevertheless managed to be extremely vocal - and this was before the net. The did have a fair bit of influence for a while, but eventually became so out of touch and out of date that they were openly ridiculed and often the target of jokes. In the end, while the VLA still exists (despite the death of Whitehouse), humour did for them what no amount of handwringing and argument could. I suggest the US follow this example - point and laugh at them, repeat until they go away.
It would be nice for the FCC to define what is indecent..
No it wouldn't!
How would that be any differnet than PTC deciding what is indecent? Just a differnt group of the few saying what is and is not proper to broadcast on the public airwaves. And a federal agency too? Yeah, there won't be any partisan meddling in a group like that.
If anything the FCC should protect the right of the broadcasters to air what they decide to. Let the public decide what they hate and the FCC be their tool, not the scapel AND the hand.
In a perfect world the tasteless and vulgur shows wouldn't air because people wouldn't want to watch them. Market economics would say to play more consumer-friendly shows as shows nobody is watching aren't going to generate many ad sales. But we live nowhere near perfect. And like the few in a thousand who buy products advertised in spam, we have no one to blame for the profitability of these shows but the populace who's willing to watch them.
I would mod this down but I wanted to post a reply instead and I can't do both.
If you look up the actual case where the quote about yelling fire in a crowded theatre came up, you'll find that the case was about suppressing speech that protested US involvement in World War I. It's a good illustration of how dangerous arguments for censorship actually are.
I don't know if anyone knows this or if it has been posted, but before his passing, entertainment renaissance man, Steve Allen, was involved with this group. It was the one thing on which I fault him. PTC used to rail against the World Wrestling Federation a few years ago, when I watched their programming, until they were found civilly liable for spreading untrue information about the company. I do not trust that group or its leader, L. Brent Bozell.
My other computer is a Jacquard loom.
It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.
These people have decided that they have the right to tell everyone else what they should be watching. Is that the American way?
No. This is the way of the Middle Ages: when the Catholic church ruled and everyone who wasn't a true believer just wasn't taught OR anyone who taught anything that disagreed with church doctrine was burned at the stake! This led to 1000 years of ignorance and superstition. Shall we repeat that? I say no! What say you?
The radio show On the Media recently covered a similar thing:
Army of Three
Last month, the FCC hit Fox stations with the largest ever aggregate fine for indecency on TV. The offending material was a scene on the short-lived reality show "Married by America," involving strippers and whipped cream. Regulators said the move was triggered by 159 citizen complaints. But Buzzmachine.com blogger Jeff Jarvis tells Bob that the actual number of angry missives was much, much smaller.
Link to audio and transcript (midway down the page)
Makes ya think, eh?
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Free speech is a bitch when people who disagree with you are speaking, huh?
Get organized. Fight them. They are winning right now because they play the game better.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
I am personally the owner of four different versions of the bible, including a German translation from 1918, translated by dr. Menge.
(Yes, I thought that was the other guy first... and I'm only writing this as a funny aside, especially since I am deeply agnostic)
"I got rid of TV altogether about four years ago. It was one of the best decisions I have ever made. Now, when I see TV at a friend's house, I think to myself: 'Who in the world would watch this trash?'"
I did about the same thing at about the same time. I remember commercials for the first Survivor series just before I unhooked the antenna. I only hooked it back up again on September 11th, and had it unhooked by the time television started to somewhat return to normal. I also see what's on and think, "What the hell?! This crap sucks!"
"But of course, we must pander to the mindless majority. If someone speaks up, he/she is just an old prude who wants to stop everyone else's fun. I am not a member of the PTC, but I support their right to do this."
I don't, and here's why: The TV has an off button. It also has channel up, channel down, mute, and some even have an image surpression mode. The city that I live in has the major four networks, the lightweight other three or so, a few independent stations of mainstream rerun programming, and at least three religious Christian channels, with shows like The 700 Club. Additionally there are at least four Christian radio networks in addition to the large number of conservative talk radio stations and music stations that have a more conservative bend. All of this conservative programming gives the PTC people plenty of airwave to look at where they don't have to see Janet Jackson's boob, Dennis Franz's ass, Tara Reid's surgical scar, or anything else that would "oh so damage" their children.
These people need to grow the fuck up, or else we need to start complaining about their television programs, especially ones that take strong stances against ideas or actions like premarital sex, science, liberal politics, or homosexuality. Call out the programs that criticize these and label them as obscene. Get them slapped with fines, or get their 501(c)3 tax exempt status revoked for endorsing political candidates.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Their site has a ridiculously obvious list of their top 10 best and worst shows for families (i.e., children). Well gee golly, who would've thought that shows designed for ADULTS shouldn't necessarily be seen by children, and shows DESIGNED FOR FAMILIES are appropriate for them?! No duh that my 8-year-old shouldn't be watching CSI and Bachelorette, but a home improvement show might be okay! Sigh. Aren't there real problems these people could be fighting?
Looking at their list of best and worst programmes, the group seems to be very selective on which consequences they like shown and which they don't. They like to see the consequences of sex and drug use being shown, but not the consequences of assault and murder.
If they think that showing the consequences of sex will put people off of having sex, why wouldn't showing the consequences of murder put people off of killing?
I despise group-think whether conservative or liberal. So let me play devil's advocate.
Much ado has been made about the importance of parenting, instruction, and "being there". It is said that all these special-interest groups (demeaningly called right-wing nutjobs) are somehow trying to foist he responsibility of the parent to society.
The question is why not?
It is purely a Western concept that families are solely responsible for the raising of good citizens, that somehow these nuclear environments are they only things that form a child. In other cultures, there is a deep realization that children are only as good as the environment around them.
In other words it takes a village to raise a child. Being a parent is hard, and I think a reason so few people do it well is they lack support; they can't turn their backs. If I can't trust my society to keep my telivision shows reasonably clean in the mid-afternoon if I need a quick break, what is it good for?
Yes, yes "reasonably clean" is difficult term to gauge...it's a slippery slope. But the truth that I see is that it is a lot easier to inform your child on something that he/she needs to know than it is to remove erroneous information they have learned. It is much easier to teach a new behavior than to eradicate an old one.
If the "public airwaves" are really such a public resource, then why is it practically impossible to purchase a legal license to broadcast radio (nevermind TV) on any of them in anything resembling a major metropolitan area?
... the broadcast side. The broadcast airwaves would only be truly subject to "public opinion" if government let go of their controls on them, and let the free market decide which broadcasters were doing a good job and which weren't!
I know we're debating control of content on the receiving side of the spectrum, but that really means you have to consider the other half of the story
Because it's so prohibitively expensive to start one's own TV or radio station, we've gotten into the current situation - where folks feel like they're stuck hearing/watching only what the big conglomerates want to broadcast, unless they pay extra to get the alternatives (like XM radio or cable TV).
Especially with today's technology, it's really not that costly a proposition for someone to set up their own little radio station that covers as much as a 5 to 25 mile radius. The only reason the cost is through the stratosphere is govt's insistence on outlawing most of this as "pirate radio", and guaranteeing frequencies (at a huge price) to one business per city.
I never said it was somehow "un-libertarian" to let people "pay for their smut". Your Howard Stern example would be absolutely fine by me, except for the fact that he was cited, specifically, for things other air personalities have done on TV or radio too - and gotten away with. If you're going to let govt. force someone off the air, then it should at least be determined by clearly spelled-out details, and apply to *all* parties. Not just selective enforcement.
it would destroy every small cable station. Only the giant "safe" cable stations + commercial channels would be able to survive. Smaller ones (like the one you think your subscription fee would pay for) would be gone in about 10 seconds because there wouldn't be enough subscribers to sustain it for long enough to find an audience and be able to attract advertisers.
I'm sure religiou-- I mean "faith-based"-- channels, supported by charitable donations, would continue on the air.
They rate "Trading Spouses" as "Family-friendly show promoting responsible themes and traditional values."
"It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists." -Ludwig Wittgenstein
Seems to me you used to hear things like 'For every one complaint heard, there are a thousand others unheard'. So it seems almost like the FCC is still living in the backwards days before email where it actually took time to complain and therefore deterred all but 0.1% of the people outraged.
I hope eventually they get the idea (well I hope they are disbanded outright, but that's just me dreaming) that the new equation is more like 'for every thousand complaints heard, theres one wacko fundamentalist christian with a computer'.
Since the FCC only hears from the handful of people who are irritated enough to throw a tantrum, perhaps it would help give them perspective if they started getting "I say (name of show) and they had something on the show that I thought might be controversial. I want to report that I was NOT offended by it in the least..." messages as well...
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
I lost all faith when Bush got re-elected? i have come to expect shit like this.... We now have our most self righteous, hypocritical nosy neighbors running our country.
And how many people complain and sue about (a) In God We Trust, (b) The Pledge, and (c) the bible in front of the courthouse?
Decency? How dare you tell us what decentcy is?
Decency is respecting the views of others. Decency is allowing others to live their lives. Decency isn't forcing your views, religion, and perverse method of raising children (let TV teach them) onto others.
Sheesh, no wonder I switched to Buddhism.
As I scanned the posts here, I began to wonder why no one even checked the "About Us" page of the PTC. "Now nearly a million members strong and growing every day..." Then I remembered that most of you had already made up your minds that anyone complaining to the FCC must be evil.
These guys are submitting complaints because their members want them to, and have given them money to do exactly that, so they wouldn't have to do it themselves. This is what lobbying is about. Farming out your activism because you don't have the time and energy to do it yourself. It's not a "small minority." It's a really big organization.
Regardless of what you think about the substantive issues here, this looks like a group with broad support. And there is a vast group of people in this country that agree with their campaign... They re-elected Bush.
Is thinking that members of religions are so terribly offended at the idea of there being other religions. Its pretty much just nut jobs that are offended by other religions.
Expect the PTC and the rest of the Christian fundemantilist movement to push and get through most of their agenda in the next four years.
If you truly want free speech, let's put porn, abortions, and the electric chair on primetime. Then we'd have free speech.
NO? Don't like that? Then why do you attack the Christians?
If Muslims complained, you'd bend over backwards to please them.
This country was founded on free speech AND freedom of religion. There are plenty of people offended with the rubbish put on the airwaves. The source of the complaints come through one website, what does that tell you? That a lot of complainers are finding a way to complain at one location? Maybe.
I suggest you get off your high horse. A good chunk of the people don't care for the game that the media plays. An escalating vulgarity problem create a cylcle of advertising and ratings' wars. Who wins? Not the public. Look at the trash that's out there.
Wait til some rich anti-abortionist puts up the "abortion channel" airing abortions on TV just to show what happens. If we hear you or anyone here complain, you're ALL HYPOCRITES. You want freedom of speech, but only when it's good for you, and not for others.
Go read their reviews of these shows http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/shows/all.asp. Hilarious. Here's my favorite, a review of the Drew Carey Show:
In one episode Lewis tells Oswald, "Well, at least I don't live in my parents' house and abuse myself on the mattress I was conceived on." Such content makes this series a poor choice for family audiences.
Cowboy Neal's remarks are typical of the powers that be at SlashDot. Despite the quoted claims, this isn't a censorship issue. Broadcast television gets free use of a valuable and scarce resource, the RF spectrum, that's publicly owned and worth many billions. It does that because it has agreed from day one that what it broadcasts must serve the public interest not the interests of the networks or a select group of artists.
For a parallel that fits what Rintels wants, imagine a society where only a few giant corporations are allowed to use our Interstate highways, while the rest of us can only travel on their buses where, when, and how they want. That's what TV networks want to do. It's "free speech" for a vanishingly small and extraordinarly wealthy few.
Imagine further that those networks have decided that more money is to be made by using the land alongside "their" highways to dump trash that gets blown into our neighborhoods. That's the network's current glorification of violence and sex. It blows into every neighborhood in the land.
The result of the programming is the same as with the advertising--our sons are more likely to get mugged and our daughters to be rapped. Never forget that if programming doesn't influence behavior, then neither does advertising and the networks are guility of fraud on a massive scale.
That's why "we the people" have every right to decide what is in the public interest and can or cannot be broadcast. If the TV networks don't like that, they have every right get out of broadcasting and publish their programming like the rest of us do--on DVD and video tapes where there is no issues involving a scarce public resource and thus no role for the FCC.
All this is so obvious, it makes you wonder why there's a fuss.
--Mike Perry, Inkling blog , Seattle
No matter how liberal people are, the vast majority of them want some level of broadcast TV content regulation.
Consider that most all of the population thinks it is wrong to show hardcore porn to children 5 years old and younger.
It's a free country and when ppl like you want to shoot down somebody for telling it 'like it is' you are propagatingaganding. Your critisism is appreciated by the PTC - I'm sure. :)
Fuckhead.
Well, if we're also going to take the first amendment literally, then you also have to consider the part that says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". We seem to have forgotten that second part in this modern age.
So there, plain as day, the government shall pass no law preventing me from praying to whatever I want, wherever I want. That means I should be able to pray in schools, pray in libraries, have my religious floats in Christmas parades, etc etc. Instead, in 200 years we've managed to turn the amendment around to "freedom from religion", where noone is allowed to practice their religions on public property because someone might be offended... not in the pledge, not on our money, not in our courts, despite the fact that the founding fathers were quite religious (not by-the-book Catholics, but definitely not secular nor atheist), and wove that into the framework of our governmental bodies.
.. that would stop people from complaining too much!
It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio
This is news how? I thought this was the norm...
all credibility was lost on this one.
Suggested artists: Eminem
This guy is just some dude that complains too much and talks to much shit, then is too dumb to know elton john is gay.
It has been statistically shown that helmets increase the risk of head injury.
you misspelled "everyone." Hope this helps.
You make a good point and in a perfect world you are probably correct. THe problem lies in who is defining the framework for what is indecent and what is clean. For example, to me nudity is not an issue of morality. Somehow American culture has decided that a nude body in any context is indecent or at the very least the domain of adulthood. On US television they even blur out the breasts on most if not all educational medical shows. Does that not strike you as odd? The direction this is going is not a good one I predict.
I realize that everyone on slashdot loves to give out parenting advice, even when they have no kids of their own, but it's important to realize that most of the crap that passes as "insightful" when it comes to parenting assumes that parents control everything with which their children come in contact, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. In other words, it's worthless BS.
I've read some of the PTC columns and show summaries. They want a family TV evening free of violence, language and sex. They imply programming watched between 7 and 10 pm by the complete family.
I strongly disagree that stations should provide only the PTC's preferred kind of programming because I personally want my sex, language and violence. (If only 7th Heaven type-of programming would be shown I'd throw my TV set out of the window.)
But PTC is not about being able to park children in front of the TV. They want a different kind of TV at the time of the day when most people are watching.
Why not start filing complaints about how you hate the way the Wonderful World of Disney portrays animals? Or how the relationships on 7th heaven portray an unrealistic vision of modern interpersonal relationships and are contributing to depression in local schoolchildren who can't possibly hope to live up to such standards?
Indecency is in the eye of the beholder apparently.. so see what you can do to get these IMHO indecent programs off the air or at least heavily fined.
It's subjective and totally subject to "Squeaky Wheel" syndrome.. be a squeaky wheel.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
I haven't exactly followed on the trend of V-chips, but are those regularly installed in new televisions these days? Do these let parents force filtering of content they don't want their children to see?
If they do, then is the problem that they're not sophisticated enough to work well, or that people are just too lazy/stupid to figure out their operation? I seem to recall there are a hue and a cry about the V-chip at one point, but I think it'd be a reasonable way to deal with issues like this, basically once and for all.
Find the addresses of the top members and sign them up for every smut list known to man - email and postal (when financially possible). Points for creativity... like nuns being shagged by demons or women pleasuring themselves with crucifix vibrators....
There's no pretense in Washington to appointing competent people to top jobs. The idea is that it's the backroom wonks that are supposed to do the thinking - the guys on the front line are just there to be a pretty face to appear on TV and elsewhere. How do you think George Bush got to be President?
Feel free to define decency as you see fit, but the fact of the matter is, if my kids run around in elementary school saying either "oh my fucking Christ" or "fuck off tard" to a teacher in school, this is contrary to societal norms, and blatantly offensive to some. You may not feel such language is inappropriate, but I can pretty much guarantee that the teachers are gonna find this pretty disrespectful. Perhaps you feel decency really is how you treat others; sometimes that does mean sacrificing some of your freedom of expression in "playing nice" with others.
You see, we live in a society in which most people:
1. avoid personal responsibility like the plague,
2. don't want to even talk to their children.
Daddy is too busy doing overtime to impress the boss. Then daddy wants to spend the whole fucking eveing with a beer and the TV, or with a beer and the Linux kernel. Mommy is too busy between impressing her own boss, all those soap operas, and all those female friends she just has to spend hours a day talking to.
And the poor kid is just some pest that just gets in the way. Telling little Billy _why_ this and that is wrong, is a tiresome talk and you just know it'll go right over his little head anyway. Naah... better just avoid him and go watch that football/baseball/soccer/whatever game instead. Watching the idiot box is a tough job, but someone's got to do it. Can't let a kid get in the way of that.
So little Billy grows up basically without any guidance. But here's the fun part: just because Mommy and Daddy are too busy to explain things to Billy, it doesn't mean someone else won't either. So Billy picks up all sorts of wrong ideas off the street or, yes, off TV.
And when Billy finally does something wrong, we get to point 1 again: nobody wants to be personally responsible for it. Noo. It's not our fault that Billy grew up wrong. It's the TV's fault! The government should censor it!
Sad.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
CBS, NBC refuse to air gay-friendly church ad
The main media ouotlets seemed to have failed to pick up on this, and yet - if true - to me this seems like major news: Banning an advert that says 'anyone is welcome to our church' because the president was *thinking* about changing the Constitution to ban gay marrige.
You will forget this sig before you next see it
These nutters think Will and Grace is depraved (number 8 on their list).
It may not be funny, but it's extremely tame in its references to sex.
right-wing christians made up a significant percentage of bush's vote. they want something for that vote. they're getting it - they're getting an administration that is responsive to their point of view in the "culture wars."
and they're not getting it by resting on their laurels. every day tens of thousands of them are writing letters, calling elected officials from dog catcher on up, writing letters to the editor and generally making sure that their view of america is the one that wins.
people can yammer on about how they don't have a mandate, about why people voted for bush, about liberals and conservatives and libertarians, and on and on. but at the end of the day the christian right has a lot of power in america, and they are making progress on their agenda. so the question is this:
if you disagree with the christian right, what are YOU doing to oppose them?
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
In fact, I feel so strongly, I decided to do something about it.
I setup a macro to hit "submit" 240,000 times in a row.
That'll teach them.
http://www.fsckin.com/
of everything on the air, that's TV & radio, is total, degenerate CRAP.
100% of the people watching and listening to this garbage should also be complaining and not passively sitting there.
The truth is beyond belief.
I never thought I would see the day when Rednecks>>>>>Slashdot posters.
What a sad day this is.
Just shows how desperate people really are.
..if you want to be taken seriously. Fast and loose spelling and grammar is ok on slashdot, txt msgs to peers, but if you're writing a formal letter to a conservative organisation (a pressure group, the government, big businesses, etc) then check your grammar and spelling. If you don't, then they will just throw your letter in the bin before getting to the end of it. It will be a waste of your time rather than of benefit to anybody else.
FUCKT
shit
Cock
BallS
Whore
Bastard
Tit
C**
self censorship at work
Similar to other comment but more effective is to be more serious. Form a secret group of FCC complainers who complain about random controversies.
That is, add noise to the laser focus of the miniscule minority, PTC.
If you need text styles to communicate then you don't have a message.
http://www.epic.org/free_speech/fcc_v_pacifica.h tml
Supreme court ruling regarding indecent speech in broadcast media.
"First, the broadcast media have established a uniquely pervasive presence in the lives of all Americans. Patently offensive, indecent material presented over the airwaves confronts the citizen, not only in public, but also in the privacy of the home, where the individual's right to be left alone plainly outweighs the First Amendment rights of an intruder."
Dissenting opinion - "Without question, the privacy interests of an individual in his home are substantial and deserving of significant protection. In finding these interests sufficient to justify the content regulation of protected speech, however, the Court commits two errors. First, it misconceives the nature of the privacy interests involved where an individual voluntarily chooses to admit radio communications into his home. Second, it ignores the constitutionally protected interests of both those who wish to transmit and those who desire to receive broadcasts that many including the FCC and this Court might find offensive"
If marijuana were legal, the shows they approve of could be entertaining.
Retired from software... maybe. Sort of.
Peeps who use the term "peeps", 33.5%
'Nuff said.
If it wasn't for Bush needing his daddy as a scapegoat for Iraq, this unqualified idiot wouldn't have a job!
Isn't that the underlying principle of the democratic and political processes? The first amendment protects the right to protest and use political means to get what they want. The problem is, IMHO, that those dissatisfied with this "censorship" are not organized and do not sound off.
Also, there's no doubt that they are censoring stuff on TV based on subjective assessments, but they're not "fringe" from the FCC point of view, since they make up for more than 90% of the complaints. Is there a mechanism to file a complaint on another complaint??
Same goes with Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter was Probably the most moral president this country's ever seen, but he got totally destroyed by Reagan.
Just goes to show, the religious right isn't about morality as much as it is dominance. They are more interested in controlling behavior than in changing minds.
That's why Carter was no good to them. He was the worst kind of 'bleeding heart'. He actually cared about people, and was willing to cooperate with others.
Seriously, to generate this volume of bull, they must be using a common document template for all their complaints: 'Ms Crudgeworthy, would you fill in the blanks on the Leno complaint? No, the one for the 23rd - we've already done the 16th'. These people need to get some lives.
Or maybe they'd be better off campaigning against people watching 'objectionable material'. The reborn masses are likely to be a more receptive audience - and broadcasters listen to ratings.
Wait, are you one of those right-wing nutjobs who thinks that things can actually be solved through market activism rather than crying to the government to hold our hands? You people make me sick.
Another one bites the dust
TV does suck - but it is also great. I will admit, I do watch some crap. But I try to learn from it. There is a show out now called "Nanny 911". An English nanny (not hot) comes and stays with a family for a week. The family has horribly behaved kids, and it is usually the parents fault. She lays down some guidelines, they eventually learn, and la la la happy ending. Pure trash, right? Well, yes. But I am about to be a dad for the first time. I enjoy watching this show to see just how bad it could possibly get. :-) My wife and I watch this, and we talk about parenting stuff. Could we do this without TV? Of course, and we do. But I try to learn stuff from everything in life, including TV. I watch a lot of the Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, The Learning Channel, and The Food Network. I have learned sooooo much from FoodTV. Even those channels run crap shows, but just because I watch TV doesn't mean I watch all TV. I turn it off - a lot.
But to the point of this article, let them run whatever they want, within some guidelines if need be. Censorship is NOT solving anything.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Since there have been groups with diametrically opposing viewpoints to really clash wrt the FCC. We need a group that opposes these censor-mad idiots of the PTC (or whatever their acronym is) otherwise all we'll have on tv are re-runs of Barney and Teletubbies.
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." Proverbs 16:25 (NKJV)
I think I might bring my wife and my daughter up to live there. Canada shall recieve a programmer with a +1 compiler of smiting.
click me
Have you ever tried simply turning off the tv, sitting down with your children, and hitting them?
The difference between hot lesbian teenage oral sex on Oprah vs. Stern is simple: Oprah is discouraging that type of behavior and Stern is encouraging it. It is very different thing to bring teenagers on your show and tell them not to do such things (Oprah style) as opposed to bringing teenage girls on your show and having them perform various sex acts in the studio while on the air and actively encouraging it (Stern style).
Don't get me wrong, I'm with Stern on this one. I think Oprah can take her attitude and shove it. But realize that in the eyes of a 'moral' zealot, the difference is very much in the content and not in the messenger/audience.
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
It's because the bulk of the red states are in the midwest, and the midwest is BORING AS DIRT.
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
Playing another card here. Is there something wrong with being one of these Christian Fundamentalists?
You can bitch all you want but if you're not exercising your rights and writing to the FCC in protest of PTU, then you don't really care. They are a special interest group, *gasp* acting in their own interests! Those selfish idiots! How dare they!
Next week, we can begin talking about how corporations are really just out to make money! Who would have thought?!
Slashdot, home of countless failed idealists.
What about the children??? Won't somebody pleeeeaaaase think of the children???
This is one of their descriptions of why an MTV show is inappropriate.
1. Shavonda: "Even though I'm free to do [bleeped "shit"]. [Bleeped "fuck"] you. You got caught, and I'm happy you got caught. Cause your ass is out and I hope you have a [bleeped "fucking"] great time. And you lean on Jenny's shoulder while you're [bleeped "fucking"] crying. Don't come out and see my ass. You are stupid if you think I'm going to sit here and let that [bleeped "shit"] happen. [bleeped "fuck"] you and kiss my ass."
At least MTV has the decency to bleep out their curses. Fuck you, PTC. hypocrites.
not just implied oral permission.
my password really is 'stinkypants'
I do see some of their concern... but disagree with both premises and conclusions. I don't support the values they want to instill, and I don't think censorship is the way to do it. When raising kids, you need to instill both values and judgement. Part of judgement is making sure little Suzy learns that not everyone around them shares the same values, and that just because little Johnny next door does something, doesn't mean it's right or smart. Explain to little Suzy that no, she may not watch South Park, she can watch Nova (or the 700 Club, or whatever). Lay down the rules early, relax them gradually as they grow up, and make sure they remember: My House, My Roof, My Rules. Adult supervision would solve so many of these problems... assuming the head of the household is an Adult of God as well as a Child of God.
Of course, if your values cannot withstand scrutiny, you will have a problem once little Suzy leaves the isolation of the home and church. An incident with ex-Jehova's witness who had dyed her hair purple (above and below) streaking my second year college dorm room colorfully made sure I'd remember that for a long time....
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
I like a lot of rap. Much of the stuff I like is old school like Public Enemy or The Ghetto Boys. I listen to some new rap too.
In my experience with the hip-hop culture, if they remove the word "motherfucker," the content of the song is very likely to be hos and/or drugs. Most of the rest of the songs, including very many that are socially and politically meaningful, don't have "motherfuckers" that need to be removed.
TW
Are you pro-death penalty as it's implemented in this country, or just in theory?
More or less both. While I'm not entirely happy with how it's been implemented in some states, it's more or less what I want. Use it in the most heinious cases(multiple murders, child murder, torture&murder), where guilt is clear. No implementation will ever be perfect, so if we hold to that standard, we might as well go with life sentences, but then, even true life sentences don't prevent the murderer from doing it again, if 'only' in prison. When I say that I support the death penalty, I remember the incidents like the bank killings in Nebraska, that happened when I was visiting my parents there. Four people walked into the Bank, shot and killed everybody there, without taking any money. We listened to the events on the radio, and yelled when the anchor talked about the possibility that the police were tracking the suspects using the onstar system on the SUV they stole(which was ditched shortly after). The Wisconsin shooting of seven hunters this year. Columbine. Oklahoma City. Dahmer. I don't necessarily require that Scott Peterson be sentenced to death.
On the other hand, when in high school, I deliberately tried to be extreme to piss off my civic issues teacher. I proposed having a lottery system whenever a prisoner came to a prison that put it over capacity. You would get a ticket for each full year of sentence remaining. 200 tickets per life sentence. The person whose number is drawn gets executed. I even backed it up with principles from the psychology class I was taking at the time. It was about how random, low-probability risks/events can actually have a larger psychological effect than a sure thing.
My problem with the implementation in this country is that it seems all too often that if you've got enough money to pay a good legal team to raise enough reasonable doubt and/or stack the jury in your favor, you at least avoid the death penalty, and maybe even get an acquittal. If you're poor and get stuck with the schmuck from the Public Defenders' office, you're right fucked, mate.
If you have enough money you can also get out of: Life sentences, serving any time for murder (OJ Simpson?), can park in handicapped spots (the occasional $200 fine fits in the budget), speeding, driving drunk, using drugs... If nothing else, being up for a death penalty case gets you the good public defender.
If their crime was heinous enough (child rapist/killer, etc.), their prison mates will take care of them in time.
I realllly don't like this. As much as I grin about dahmer getting it, we're trying to teach prisoners how to act properly, and shanking somebody in the restroom isn't proper.
the entire prison system should be segregated between violent and non-violent offenders
I like this idea. It's already implemented somewhat in the form of minimal to max security prisons. You put the dangerous ones in max, and let the embezzler sit in min where it's cheaper. As for Martha being comfy, well, women's prisons are about as nice as you can get in the penal system. And it's not like Martha's dangerous. The sheer hassle of this should keep her on the straight and narrow.
Remember the legalize drugs thing? I'd try to get the prisons back down to capacity, allowing more programs that might actually push reform.
Sorry, I hadn't even heard about the movie "The Execution of Wanda Jean". I mostly watch action and sci-fi flicks. It does raise an interesting issue, about the execution of not only 'retarded' people, but also minors, mentally disturbed, and just plain stupid. The problem this raises is that you can quite successfully argue that every murderer is mentally disturbed. Criminals tend to have lower than average intelligence (or at least the ones who get caught are). As far as being "borderline retarded", how is that determined? Do I realize that every person on death row is more than just a figure, that
I don't read AC A human right
A bunch of liberal wimps.
'It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.'
I think he missed the election results.
If I may say so, life is a game, and there's so much to do and so few turns.
-Reiner Knizia
Some folks didn't want MLK Jr. and his fellow Montgomerians boycotting the bus company, either, yet I'd bet 98% of initial boycotters were from once source -- black followers of MLK Jr.
Complaints aren't made to fuel a flamebait argument, they're made because immorality objectively exists. Subjective responses to immorality do not disprove immorality's objective existence.
We desire a society that fosters human love, and so we will fight, to a prudent extent, the objective hinderances in plain view.
hi, I like pancakes -.-- -.-- --..
I thought it was "A fool and his money are some party."
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
I think your points were excellent but fail to go far enough. But I have to thank you for the stimulating personal anecdote. This polling data has been over-hyped completely. Perhaps one of the reasons it has is because the national media really doesn't like the entire topic of moral values and because organizations like the New York Times and ABCNNBCBS have had scandals of their own recently and because their editors and owners are evalutating the rise of alternative media and Fox News as the choice of many conservative and younger consumers, something which worries the American media establishment. As it well should.
I think that this 'moral values' choice may be so all-encompassing that it received more response than might be justified in a better constructed and more in-depth poll.
For instance, liberals might have chosen the 'moral values' answer because they truly view Bush as immoral: on how Bush was elected (selected) in 2000, on tax cuts, on vast increased deficits and expansion of debt on Bush's watch (discretionary items, not military), on war in Iraq, on the failure to find WMD in Iraq, on his intention to appoint Scalia-type anti-abortion justices to the federal bench and the Supreme Court. Some of the other poll choices might take in some portion of these concerns but only 'moral values' might address all of them.
Among conservatives, I know some who refused to vote for Bush because of the failure to justify his Iraqi invasion pretext, the vast Pill Bill, the mind-boggling deficits and debt he ran up after the GOP had worked so hard to reduce deficits and debt, dissatisfaction with the liberalism of some of his appointees, his failure to truly push the Senate to confirm conservative judges like Estrada. Again, their choice in such a poll would actually be best described as 'moral values'. But against Bush, not for him.
There are many independent voters who might take another tack, choosing to vote for or against Kerry on the basis of his military record or his Senate record. There is undoubtedly a segment of voters who chose their candidate based on their military service. And many of them would say that they weren't voting on the present military policies of either candidate but on their moral judgment of each candidate in his early adult years and how he handled any subsequent controversy surrounding his military service.
You might also find 'morals' voters in groups like older people who didn't think much of the Clinton scandal and who didn't want any repeats of it. Kerry, the present and former husband of wealthy heiresses, didn't look so good. And many devout Catholics didn't care for the annulled first marriage and for Kerry's apparent double-talk about abortion. I think the shadow of Clinton's scandal still hangs over Democratic candidates. Especially one like Kerry who has a few skeletons in his closet.
Sure parents need a break at times but what about those without kids? Should out TV shows be destroyed for Jr.?
If morals were separated from Christianity and other religions (and it can), we wouldn't have so many problems caused by Christianity like sex, etc.
The PTC and other American Moralists should stop listening to Howard Stern if they are offended by it.
Just a thought...
"Lone Activist Group Submits 99.8% of FCC Complaints"
You misspelt lame.
As I understand it, the original thought, which came from old African proverb is this: "The village raises the child." It is my opinion that when it's changed ever so slightly to say, "It takes...", it embodies a major shift in the overall connotation and/or meaning. In this case, the change was perfectly suited to the kinds of policies favored by the Democratic party (in support of the so-called nanny state).
..."It means that really a tiny minority with a very focused political agenda is trying to censor American television and radio.'"
Of course, because apparently most americans do not respect different opinions. There is just one: Theirs and all others must be supressed.
(And when this post gets modded down that just proves the point)
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
My point, in the original post, was one of responsibility. I know the world has a number of unsavory, undesirable, dangerous and just plain evil things in it. I've traveled fairly extensivly, and lived in third-world nations, large cities etc. And, no, I don't want to expose my children to everything that's out there. However, sooner or later they'll be living in the middle of it. Life is about choices. While you can't choose everything in life (after all, I'm still not rich!), you generally get to choose what you watch, what you read, who your friends are, and whom you marry.
There is an old aphorism, "As a man thinketh in his heart so is he". Thought leads to action. This was drilled into me during years of martial arts, as well as religious instruction. By making these small decisions, you form your character. Anyway, without throwing too much philosophy into the pot, I believe that a person can choose who they want to be, rather then automatically becoming the lowest common denominator of the influences around them. I hope to teach my children to choose those things which enoble and uplift, to seek the good.
I shelter them when they are very young, I try to be actively involved in their lives. As they get older (my son is 17), I let them make more of their own decisions, and only intervene if I think a choice is likely to be dangerous. My son will soon be completely on his own, and I hope I have taught him to make good decisions, because I'm sending into a world full of everything imaginable, both good and bad. He has to choose which of those things he will embrace. I hope that, by exposing him to more and more of the "real world" over the past 17 years, and letting him make his own decisions as he's grown in wisdom and maturity, that he will be prepared to meet life without any oversight, and choose the better part.
So, am I a poser? I hope not. I'm really a parent. I love my family, and would like them to find as much happiness in this life as they can. I believe the choice is theirs to make.
Checking the "About Us" page of an organization's website is not really adequate research to determine the character of an organization. It's more informative to look at their actions, like this. Oh and there's also this little nugget of hypocricy. And, well, Jeff Jarvis deals with the numbers game that PTC tries to play. An organization whose membership is 0.3% of the population producing 99% of the complaints to the FCC seems a little disproportionate. All this is just the tip of the iceburg. The PTC is not the good guys they pretend to be.
Also keep in mind that these are the people who are horribly offended at the hilarious spanking incident on Angel.
What we have here is a case of a few people with no sense of humor capitalizing on a million Americans who don't realize what they're really supporting.
See https://www.parentstv.org/ptc/fcc/fcccomplaint2.as p.
Feel free to use any of the names from the PTC as well as their business address.
Complain about crap like 7th Heaven, Full House, and the other mindless cookie-cutter crap that the networks are churning out.
I sure did!
Religion is for people afraid of going to hell.
You would never vote for a democrat so please stop saying such ridiculous things.
Why not? I'm for pro-choice, for gay rights, balanced budget, legalized drugs, free speech, the environment, and equal opportunity.
You say your against big governmant which has increased 100 fold during Bush
During Clinton's time, government consumed approximately 30% of the economy. You could barely triple the federal government before taking everything up. Did you miss the part where I said I'm unhappy with Bush? I think he spends our money way to easy. Use your veto power! Clinton had the dotcom boom. Bush had the crash of that, 9/11, Enron, and worldcom. That depressed income quite a bit. Conservative economic theory states that lowering taxes (expenses) on
wanted a tougher stance on terrorism yet Bush changed his whole focus from terrorism to settling old scores
I happen to think that Iraq was supporting terror, evidence has been found that he had, and hopefully in a few years resources will be freed up from Iraq, allowing us to go after others. And Iraq needed to be taken care of. If anything, the War on Terror delayed the invasion of Iraq. I felt things were coming up even before 9/11
He has Musharraf chasing the terrorists now, which I am sure will work once he( musharraf) stops funding and hiding the terrorists.
Other than invading Pakistan, who else is Bush going to 'work' with?
As far as taxes go you think they will go lower? Do you understand anything at all about world finance?
I don't know what you mean by "world finance", but I do know enough to know that having a balanced budget and not having to pay interest allows a lower income level to match that of a higher one.
? People have to want to buy U.S debt in order for us to continue to deficit spend, but when you continually tell all the people in the world who would buy our debt to eat shit what do you think will happen?
I don't think that we should be deficit spending. I'd be cutting spending left and right, before cutting taxes. Once we stop having to borrow more money, we'll pay the bonds on schedule until they expire.
Not to mention the more bad policies deflate the dollar causing investors not to buy the dollar as an investment.
And with the dollar being worth less, that increases the cost of foreign products, reducing the demand for outsourcing, keeping jobs in the USA.
For the first time in a long time the dollar is not the currency of choice to buy anymore. You would think that with the deflation of the dollar and the inflation of the Euro the Europeans would be buying american products like crazy but they are not because the hate Bush because he has called them all kinds of things
I haven't heard Bush call the Euros any names, but I've seen plenty of Euros calling Bush various nasty things. They hate him, not because of what he's said, but because he's shown them to be irrelevant.
I grow tired of this I didn't vote for Kerry becuase of what he said after Nam. Please at least he went and fought unlike that coward Bush.
Yes, Kerry went and joined the Navy and requested duty with Units that were safely patrolling the coastline at the time. When he got there, the mission changed to a more dangerous one. Then he arranged to get three purple hearts and get out. Meanwhile, Bush qualified in a plane that had a higher death rate for the pilots than the swiftboats.
The sister unit of Bush's squadron did deploy.
Bush is an idiot.
According to tests, Bush is smarter than Kerry.
or for that matter anyone other than Bush
You would have voted for Hitler? Pol Pot? Stalin?
I'll turn it around. There are many people I would have voted for rather than have Kerry.
I would have definately voted John McCain
Believe it or not, I would have had a harder choice if he had won the primaries.
Kerry was a good man, not the greatest pick mind you, who served his country and can lead un
I don't read AC A human right
1337th post!
Just some info: PTC is a subsidiary of Media "Research" Center (www.mediaresearchcenter.org). (MRC was also sued by the WWE as the parent organization of PTC, they're run by the same guy.)
I'm pretty sure CNSnews.com or NewsMax.com is involved too... but either I forget how, or I never really figured that out.
You people never complain when it's a very, very small minority complaining about some liberal cause. Fucking hypocrites.
I don't have to prove the changes would be bad, you have to prove the changes would be good. The burden of proof is on you, not me.
Did your grandparents say the same thing to mixed race couples that wanted to marry? The arguments against gay marriage are the same ones used against inter-racial marriage. More to the point, this country does not and never has operated with a system of banning everything in sight until its worth has been proved. With the exception of some consumer products, its been the exact opposite. But, okay: gay couples would have the same marriage benefits that heterosexual couples do. Also, other issues can be a pain in the ass if you aren't married: inheritance if one partner dies, making medical decisions in case of incapacitation, and making legal choices for their children.
There, that was easy. Okay, now how is homosexual marriage going to be a negative affect on anyone? Is it going to make you start beating your wife? Is it going to make your wife start beating your kids?
Two things put the big lie to all this "marriage protection" bullshit: arranged marriages and the divorce rate. Okay, they didn't have gay marriage in Greece, BFD. But far from being the "bedrock of civilization", throughout history and in cultures throughout the world, marriage often wasn't for love, it wasn't for children, it was a business deal between two families. Next: over half of all marriages end in divorce. Even if every homosexual couple got married and that marriage failed, there still would be far more failed heterosexual marriages than homosexual ones. The fact that all "marriage protection" laws either passed or proposed start and stop with denying marriage to gays, and do nothing to lower the divorce rate, proves that this isn't about protecting marriage at all. Its about hating homosexuals.
You aren't, as Bush said, ensuring a "good and decent society", you're engaging in xenophobia in the tradition of Jim Crow, the Chinese Exclusion Act and Executive Order 9066. And history will judge you as such.
Context is everything.
Not when it comes to enforcement, its not. Either you broke the law or not. And another whole problem with the completely arbitrary enforcement by the FCC is, nobody knows whats safe. Just look at all the tv stations that refused to air Saving Private Ryan because they might be fined by the FCC.
...by any measure that justifies the use of the word. The problem with you right wingers, is that you are A) sissies, B) sissies who can dish it out but can't take it, the worst kind of sissies, and C) total hypocrites with no standards or consitency. Common, Clinton couldn't so much as fart in an elevator without the media turning it into a scandal. Just look at how much Genrich hyperventilated for "being force to exit form the rear of the plane." How many investigations were there into Vince Foster and Whitewater. How many of those turned up dirt on the Clintons. Out of all the journalists who went after that story and were wrong (100% of them), how many appologized?
Now, lets move on to your boy. Where's the media facination in Bush's stock deals that brought a government investigation? Where was the scandal surrounding Bush after he sat in a classroom reading a book when he knew our nation was under an attack? Where were all the decency & morals obsessed Republicans when the Vice President was telling a Democratic senator to fuck off on the senate floor?
You know the whole Dan Rather story or were you under a rock during that week?
Yep, Rather got a black eye for that one, nevermind that it was just one piece of evidence in an otherwize solid program. But remember what I said about you guys being total hypocrites? Bush. Nigerian. Yello. Cake. It was even in a memo. Go find me a single mainstream media source that demanded Bush to resign after that debacle. For that matter, where's the media pundits decrying Iraq war, calling it the greatest deciteful clusterfuck by any president since the Gulf of Tonkin incident?
And yes this bias does in fact exist.
Yes, it does. Its just 180 degrees opposite of the way you think it is.
the PTC can't cope with reality and want to hide it from there children which is a dangerous thing as they themselves won't be able to cope. PTC pareents are raising there children to be helpless.
Saying Apple is better than MS is like saying Botulism is better than rabies.