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FCC to Fine Curses More Than Nuke Violations
DiZNoG writes "With Congress debating new higher fines for broadcast indecency in the wake
of last year's 'wardrobe malfunction' and Howard Stern's antics, Rolling
Stone has published
an interesting perspective on things. Rolling Stone did a review of fines
levied by other federal regulatory bodies, and has found the new indecency fines
disproportionately large compared to other fines. According to the article,
if the bill passes then 'for the price of Janet Jackson's 'wardrobe malfunction'
during the Super Bowl, you could cause the wrongful death of an elderly patient
in a nursing home and still have enough money left to create dangerous mishaps
at two nuclear reactors.' The article further states the largest fine the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission levied last year was $60,000, this new bill would
allow broadcast indecency fines up to $500,000. Glad I keep my broadcast cursing
to a minimum, now if I could only get a handle on those pesky dangerous nuclear
mishaps."
Playboy magazine had an article some years back during the war on drugs (boy, I'm glad we killed all those drugs and only have partially nude pop stars and terrorists to deal with) comparing typical prison sentences for murder and rape vs. selling LSD to an undercover cop. Guess who the government thinks is more dangerous --- as measured by length of time served?
Same sort of story there.. You get less time if you actually commit a crime and steal a cd then if you commit a copyright violation and copy the same thing.
Its all about who has more money..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The point is not that "people don't matter". Fines are a motivational tool used to enforce regulations. The level of the fine is an incentive to the individual or business to not violate the regulation. Fines must be set at a level that is prohibitively high, if a business can make one minor mistake and lose everything, the risk is too high and many people will not go into that business, and the cost of the increased risk, and the reduced supply will be passed onto the consumer. At the same time, the fine cannot be too low or it will not be adhered to. If show breasts, swearing, etc. only cost $60,000 per incident most networks would seriously consider running Sex and the City, the Sopranoes or uncut R-rate movies on prime time TV, because they'd make that cost up and more in viewership. This effectively defeats the purpose of the regulation because the fines are not effective motivators.
To be clear, my point is not that we should or should not allow Howard Stern, boobs, or Sex and the City on primetime broadcast television, rather I'm saying that fines have to be proportional or they prove to be ineffective.
For the grandparent who referred to the low fines for nuclear power plants. $60,000 was "the Nuclear Regulatory Commission levied last year". There is no information in the post or in the article about what these fines were for or what the maximum penalty for the plant would have been for a situation that could have actually led to a nuclear incident. For all we know that fine for not putting the wet floor sign up in the men's restroom after it had just been mopped.
Violating decency rules can occur accidentally. For example, a bystander yelling "Holy shit!" when watching a crash take place on live TV.
Such occurred on CNN when they broadcast the video footage of the planes hitting the WTC. The newscaster shrugged "I apologise for the language, but think it's appropriate nonetheless".
Said footage was aired HUNDREDS of times around the country, unbleeped, and the FCC turned a blind eye to it.
The major problem isn't the language, the psychotic religious right being in charge, who are trying to legislate morality.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
Excluding the people who disagree, and then saying "everyone agrees" really doesn't tell us much. Not that I don't agree with your basic point, I just think you need to work on your argument a little.
Normally, I would agree - That sentence counts as an invalid argument.
In this case, however, it forms a central theme to the argument... Namely, we CAN disagree on whether or not Janet's nipple actually hurts anyone. We can throw various developmental psych theories back and forth, each supporting our point of view more-or-less equally well.
You can measure radiation levels. You can calculate economic damages based on evacuating and totally closing an area off indefinitely. You can count the dead birds in Alaska.
It strikes me as absurd that we would punish something that some people find vaguely "offensive" at anywhere near the level we would punish an objectively damage-causing act (It actually baffles me that we would punish the former category at all, but that gets into an entirely different topic).
True, my choice of phrasing committed a fallacy. But, IMO, a very revealing fallacy, once corrected.