As far as I know, the law defines "child" as everyone under 18 years of age everywhere in the U.S. I do know that is the age used by the FCC as well in its regulations or policies.
There was an effort quite a few years ago (maybe in the late 80's or early 90's) to lower that age in the FCC regs. and it was shot down after full hearings, etc.
I don't feel qualified to give a specific definition of sexual innoncence and was speaking in general terms. The importance of it is up to each and every person to decide for themselves. I can't decide that it is important or how important for anyone. All I can do is
what I can to not impose upon that choice that they have.
I haven't argued for removing any choices. Anyone that wants indecency or whatever certainly has many avenues available to do so in private, and as I said in response to an earlier comment, I have never been one to argue against people's choices like that for themselves in private, as long as they do not impose on others. What could be more fair?
I don't buy a TV to not be able to ever use it. TV and radio are not exclusively just for that minority who do want indecency etc. (speaking of broadcast TV and radio - cable and satellite are different). The argument about turning the channel is a tired, worn out old one. From a practical standpoint, by the time a person can turn the channel, it is too late (as the Supreme Court has already found), and if every channel can have indecency, what channel am I to turn to to avoid it, if I don't want it?
Slash dot limits the number of comments one can post, and I am at that limit, so everyone, I probably will not be able to post anymore comments on this issue.
I was a judge for probate and juvenile cases. I am just an attorney on the Supreme Court case which is a First Amendment case. I am not and have not been a Supreme Court justice. Those that were in 1978 held by a plurality opinion that the federal statute is consistent with the First Amendment. Once they did that, the FCC is mandated by law to enforce the statute that Congress passed and that the Supreme Court upheld. I am bound to the precedent established by the Supreme Court in that case, which was the Pacifica Foundation case. They certainly were better experts on constitutional law than I claim to be. I hope this answers your thoughtful question.
Pardon me, I didn't know that breast feeding requires a woman to take off every stitch of her clothing. You must know more about it than I do. And of course, some places have a water shortage, so the whole family had better squeeze into the shower stall at the same time just to save a few drops.
Boy are you twisting things. The harm to the children does not come from the judicial system. It is diagnosed to have happened verifiably before the court is even petitioned with the case. It is expressed verbally by the child who has been harmed, and they are telling us they have been harmed. Please see my comment to Industrial Complex about nudity so that I don't have to try to repeat it. Depends on context.
You are right about one thing - we are all naked UNDER OUR CLOTHES. And now you have deemed that all women who honorably choose to save themselves for marriage are absurd? I am not a woman, so I can't take that personally. But my point was that is up to each person, in the example, a woman. It could be a man as well. But again you have twisted my words. I did not say anything like "a woman should not know what a man's body looks like". My emphasis was on people choosing for themselves. There is a huge pattern in these comments from some of you trying to make the most basic life choices for all people according to your agenda, and you simply don't get to do that. I am absolutely arguing for individual freedom of choice. You apparently have huge problem with that concept. Wearing clothes in public hardly constitutes "tip toeing around". Do you even read how absurd your comments are before sending them?
Nothing, in private b/t consenting adults. Everything, in public,in a civilized society, not to mention that people have a right to choose not to see it. Individual freedom of choice. Basic sexual fidelity in relationships. There's a way for everybody to be happy if people just respect other's choices without imposing on others.
But the court case has nothing to do with nudity anyway, just one of the other comments interjected it.
You are just plain wrong. The burden of paying for something is not on people who go out into a public place, including the public airwaves, to avoid what has been legally held indecent. The burden is one those who seek out indecency to obtain it in private. And I am libertarian enough not to argue against people's right to do that if they choose. Just don't impose it on everyone else.
The law has been settled for a long time. In the context of the current Supreme Court case, the FCC has a regulation defining "indecency". It was held by the Supreme Court to be constitutional 30 years ago, and by every lower court that has heard it as well. The same federal statute that prohibits obscenity also prohibits indecency. That statute has been upheld as well. So your statment that there is no indecency "exception" is incorrect. But the difference is, for broadcast media, obscenity is restricted 24/7, indecency currently only 6 a to 10 p. The Supreme Court, which was very liberal at the time, has held that the indecency is consistent with both the letter and spirit of the First Amendment. In the new case, the networks are not even asking the Supreme Court to revisit any of that. The only narrow issue is as to "fleeting expletives" and whether the FCC had a reasoned basis for a change of policy on those. None of this is "censorship" because there is no "prior restraint" of speech as it is defined.
The biggest problem with the V-chip is that the networks actively circumvent its operation to avoid losing ad revenue. So if a responsible parent programs it to block all TV MA shows for example, the network just (over 70% of the time) rates shows that meet the TV MA objective written criteria as TV PG so that it is not blocked out by the V-chip. And nothing gets accomplished excpet the parent can say "I tried", which they did, but it didn't help their child.
Enough said. I'm glad you are a proactive parent if that is the case.
Standards do not change over time. If they change whenever people feel like doing whatever they want, they are never really standards to begin with. And don't try to tell me what to get over or not.
Obviously, some of you are trying to tell other people how to live, change the standards, and trying to harm children, but what they hear in private talk at school or somewhere does not become a new "standard" for public speech for general audiences.
For your information, the only issue that my client is raising in the Supreme Court case is that the federal statute restricting indecency has already been found constitutional and remains so, and is not affected by the advent of the entirely ineffective and worthless "V-chip", which does not even exist for radio. How the statute is applied to a particular TV or radio show is the FCC's job. And of course
I don't edit my e-mails at the level of a legal brief.
It is subtle, but you have things completely backwards. You do not get to determine for anyone else what their rights and choices are, like you are trying to. The law is completely and unanimously settled that the broadcast airwaves are a public place, just like a street or sidewalk,and that government has a compelling interest in setting reasonable decency restrictions for all such places, in order to enable people to go to those places to do what they have to in order to live in a civilized society. Further, the Supreme Court held 30 years ago that the statute prohibiting indecency in the public airwaves is permanently constitutional, and that the FCC regulations on that are perfectly reasonable. None of that is even an issue in the current court case. The Supreme Court expressly held then that the option of turning the TV or radio off or turning the channel is not an option at all because by the time the viewer or listener can do that, the offense has already occured and cannot be reversed. That is the law in this nation, like it or not. Broadcast TV and radio are not just exclusively reserved for that minority of viewers and listeners who choose to take a chance on encountering indecency - they are for everyone. And that is exactly why there are some minimal regulations of conduct, like pretty much every other facet of society.
Thank you for your good comments. I pretty much agree with you on everything. But please understand that my comments were specifically in response to the online article about the now pending Supreme Court case, in which the narrow issue pertains exactly only to "fleeting, nonrepetitive expletives", as framed by the facts of the case (profanities made by celebrities live during award shows). Also, your reference to "a couple of seconds of breasts on TV or a few expletives" is exactly why I made the statement I did, that
the degree of harm from incidental exposure depends on what is exposed. I agree there are much worse things than the examples you gave.
You are confusing two separate issues. My comments have nothing to do with the issue of violence, such as serial killers, since the article about the Supreme Court has nothing to do with that.
Who put you in charge of deciding for all other people what is personally irreparably damaging for them? You speak only for yourself in your own little isolated world, and that is fortunate, after hearing the uncontrollable rage behind your comments.
There are a lot of flaws in what you said. Some nudity is a form of pornography. Depends on context. We can all agree, for example, I hope, that nudity in marriage is private and not pornographic. Or perhaps in other non-marriage private relationships.
Exposing a child to an unclothed human body (of an adult) is horrible parenting and can certainly be psychogically damaging.
Why do I say this? Because, it removes any possibility of that child making their own personal choices once they become an adult and old enough to make their own choices. For example, if a female child becomes an adult woman and makes the most basic, fundamental choice that she wants to marry a man and for him to be the first man that she has any intimate sexual kind of knowledge of, that choice has been taken away from her if she
has already as a child been exposed to the same kind of sexuality.
None of us, including her parents, can make that choice for her or preclude her choices as an individual. The psychological harm therefore often results from both the loss of sexual innocence, and loss of choice and control in their own lives. I know. As a juvenile court judge for over 14 years, I had many cases in which teenage and younger children suffered verifiable diagnosed pyschological damage from things like live in boyfriends just walking around in front of them naked, etc. These are just examples.
Pornography is not limited to acts - there is no such narrow minded definition of pornography.
The problem is not with American society. The bigger problem is wiht those persons and societies that do not make the above basic distinctions or allow for freedom of choice of the individual for themself, and instead try to dictate their views on others.
I didn't realize that the only standard for irreparable harm is whether or not a person specifically turns into a serial killer or not. That is an extremely narrow minded standard.
Before answering your questions, I have an extremely simple question for you. Do you or do you not believe in freedom of choice? I suspect we agree on the answer. If you answer this, I will answer your questions.
I agree with you. I wrote to Congressman Markey (who was involved in the V-chip legislation) years ago and advocated for the same thing. But given that Congress did it backwards, and the V-chip is based on the TV ratings assigned by the network foxes guarding the henhouse (they misrate the shows over 70% of the time as being suitable for children when the objective criteria says otherwise), we still need the statute and the FCC to enforce it.
Except that the American people, through their Congressional representatives, have mandated that by law the FCC's core, central, most important function is to enforce the statutory restrictions on broadcast obscenity/indecency. I guess that puts you in a small fringe minority, where you have a right to be.
"The whole premise of indecency is moot"? With due respect, what does that mean? "Indecency" is a word, that has both lay and legal definitions that are clear. If "indecency" is moot, then so is every other word in the English language. The practical point is that the hallmark of any civilization is certain minimal cultural standards of public decency,even if the definitions do not work perfectly in every detailed situation. There still must be general standards that are capable of being understood for civilazation to function at all.
I have to strongly and completely disagree with one thing you said - incidental exposure can be irreparably damaging, depending on what the exposure is to. Not so much words, but every person has an abolute right to not be even "incidentally exposed" to some things,or have their child exposed to it, an obvious examples examples being frontal nudity or other explicit pornography.
I am one of the attorneys involved in the Supreme Court case, representing a nonprofit organization supporting the FCC. It is not true that "techonology obviated the need for
decency timeslots" at any point in time. It has been proven beyond any shadow of a doubt in the case (in the Second Circuit) that 1) over 30 million Americans (more than the population of most countries) do not have any "blocking techology" for TV through cable, satellite or V-chip. It is NOT the viewers' responsibility to pay for such techology to avoid unwanted indecency as a matter of 1st Amendment law. Further, the case impacts radio, for which there is no blocking technology. 2) The major TV networks, over 70 % of the time, deliberately obstruct the "V-chip" they rely on in their legal arguments, by misrating the TV shows as suitable for younger audiences than the objective rating criteria provides for, in order to not lose ad revenue. The ultimate fox guarding the henhouse. These are among the reasons that the indecency statute, which the U.S. Supreme Court already established in 1978 is constitutional, is still critical to any quality of life in U.S. homes and public places.
Slashdot Mirror
As far as I know, the law defines "child" as everyone under 18 years of age everywhere in the U.S. I do know that is the age used by the FCC as well in its regulations or policies. There was an effort quite a few years ago (maybe in the late 80's or early 90's) to lower that age in the FCC regs. and it was shot down after full hearings, etc. I don't feel qualified to give a specific definition of sexual innoncence and was speaking in general terms. The importance of it is up to each and every person to decide for themselves. I can't decide that it is important or how important for anyone. All I can do is what I can to not impose upon that choice that they have. I haven't argued for removing any choices. Anyone that wants indecency or whatever certainly has many avenues available to do so in private, and as I said in response to an earlier comment, I have never been one to argue against people's choices like that for themselves in private, as long as they do not impose on others. What could be more fair? I don't buy a TV to not be able to ever use it. TV and radio are not exclusively just for that minority who do want indecency etc. (speaking of broadcast TV and radio - cable and satellite are different). The argument about turning the channel is a tired, worn out old one. From a practical standpoint, by the time a person can turn the channel, it is too late (as the Supreme Court has already found), and if every channel can have indecency, what channel am I to turn to to avoid it, if I don't want it? Slash dot limits the number of comments one can post, and I am at that limit, so everyone, I probably will not be able to post anymore comments on this issue.
I was a judge for probate and juvenile cases. I am just an attorney on the Supreme Court case which is a First Amendment case. I am not and have not been a Supreme Court justice. Those that were in 1978 held by a plurality opinion that the federal statute is consistent with the First Amendment. Once they did that, the FCC is mandated by law to enforce the statute that Congress passed and that the Supreme Court upheld. I am bound to the precedent established by the Supreme Court in that case, which was the Pacifica Foundation case. They certainly were better experts on constitutional law than I claim to be. I hope this answers your thoughtful question.
Pardon me, I didn't know that breast feeding requires a woman to take off every stitch of her clothing. You must know more about it than I do. And of course, some places have a water shortage, so the whole family had better squeeze into the shower stall at the same time just to save a few drops.
Boy are you twisting things. The harm to the children does not come from the judicial system. It is diagnosed to have happened verifiably before the court is even petitioned with the case. It is expressed verbally by the child who has been harmed, and they are telling us they have been harmed. Please see my comment to Industrial Complex about nudity so that I don't have to try to repeat it. Depends on context. You are right about one thing - we are all naked UNDER OUR CLOTHES. And now you have deemed that all women who honorably choose to save themselves for marriage are absurd? I am not a woman, so I can't take that personally. But my point was that is up to each person, in the example, a woman. It could be a man as well. But again you have twisted my words. I did not say anything like "a woman should not know what a man's body looks like". My emphasis was on people choosing for themselves. There is a huge pattern in these comments from some of you trying to make the most basic life choices for all people according to your agenda, and you simply don't get to do that. I am absolutely arguing for individual freedom of choice. You apparently have huge problem with that concept. Wearing clothes in public hardly constitutes "tip toeing around". Do you even read how absurd your comments are before sending them?
Nothing, in private b/t consenting adults. Everything, in public,in a civilized society, not to mention that people have a right to choose not to see it. Individual freedom of choice. Basic sexual fidelity in relationships. There's a way for everybody to be happy if people just respect other's choices without imposing on others. But the court case has nothing to do with nudity anyway, just one of the other comments interjected it.
You are just plain wrong. The burden of paying for something is not on people who go out into a public place, including the public airwaves, to avoid what has been legally held indecent. The burden is one those who seek out indecency to obtain it in private. And I am libertarian enough not to argue against people's right to do that if they choose. Just don't impose it on everyone else. The law has been settled for a long time. In the context of the current Supreme Court case, the FCC has a regulation defining "indecency". It was held by the Supreme Court to be constitutional 30 years ago, and by every lower court that has heard it as well. The same federal statute that prohibits obscenity also prohibits indecency. That statute has been upheld as well. So your statment that there is no indecency "exception" is incorrect. But the difference is, for broadcast media, obscenity is restricted 24/7, indecency currently only 6 a to 10 p. The Supreme Court, which was very liberal at the time, has held that the indecency is consistent with both the letter and spirit of the First Amendment. In the new case, the networks are not even asking the Supreme Court to revisit any of that. The only narrow issue is as to "fleeting expletives" and whether the FCC had a reasoned basis for a change of policy on those. None of this is "censorship" because there is no "prior restraint" of speech as it is defined. The biggest problem with the V-chip is that the networks actively circumvent its operation to avoid losing ad revenue. So if a responsible parent programs it to block all TV MA shows for example, the network just (over 70% of the time) rates shows that meet the TV MA objective written criteria as TV PG so that it is not blocked out by the V-chip. And nothing gets accomplished excpet the parent can say "I tried", which they did, but it didn't help their child. Enough said. I'm glad you are a proactive parent if that is the case.
Standards do not change over time. If they change whenever people feel like doing whatever they want, they are never really standards to begin with. And don't try to tell me what to get over or not. Obviously, some of you are trying to tell other people how to live, change the standards, and trying to harm children, but what they hear in private talk at school or somewhere does not become a new "standard" for public speech for general audiences. For your information, the only issue that my client is raising in the Supreme Court case is that the federal statute restricting indecency has already been found constitutional and remains so, and is not affected by the advent of the entirely ineffective and worthless "V-chip", which does not even exist for radio. How the statute is applied to a particular TV or radio show is the FCC's job. And of course I don't edit my e-mails at the level of a legal brief.
It is subtle, but you have things completely backwards. You do not get to determine for anyone else what their rights and choices are, like you are trying to. The law is completely and unanimously settled that the broadcast airwaves are a public place, just like a street or sidewalk,and that government has a compelling interest in setting reasonable decency restrictions for all such places, in order to enable people to go to those places to do what they have to in order to live in a civilized society. Further, the Supreme Court held 30 years ago that the statute prohibiting indecency in the public airwaves is permanently constitutional, and that the FCC regulations on that are perfectly reasonable. None of that is even an issue in the current court case. The Supreme Court expressly held then that the option of turning the TV or radio off or turning the channel is not an option at all because by the time the viewer or listener can do that, the offense has already occured and cannot be reversed. That is the law in this nation, like it or not. Broadcast TV and radio are not just exclusively reserved for that minority of viewers and listeners who choose to take a chance on encountering indecency - they are for everyone. And that is exactly why there are some minimal regulations of conduct, like pretty much every other facet of society.
Thank you for your good comments. I pretty much agree with you on everything. But please understand that my comments were specifically in response to the online article about the now pending Supreme Court case, in which the narrow issue pertains exactly only to "fleeting, nonrepetitive expletives", as framed by the facts of the case (profanities made by celebrities live during award shows). Also, your reference to "a couple of seconds of breasts on TV or a few expletives" is exactly why I made the statement I did, that the degree of harm from incidental exposure depends on what is exposed. I agree there are much worse things than the examples you gave.
You are confusing two separate issues. My comments have nothing to do with the issue of violence, such as serial killers, since the article about the Supreme Court has nothing to do with that. Who put you in charge of deciding for all other people what is personally irreparably damaging for them? You speak only for yourself in your own little isolated world, and that is fortunate, after hearing the uncontrollable rage behind your comments.
There are a lot of flaws in what you said. Some nudity is a form of pornography. Depends on context. We can all agree, for example, I hope, that nudity in marriage is private and not pornographic. Or perhaps in other non-marriage private relationships. Exposing a child to an unclothed human body (of an adult) is horrible parenting and can certainly be psychogically damaging. Why do I say this? Because, it removes any possibility of that child making their own personal choices once they become an adult and old enough to make their own choices. For example, if a female child becomes an adult woman and makes the most basic, fundamental choice that she wants to marry a man and for him to be the first man that she has any intimate sexual kind of knowledge of, that choice has been taken away from her if she has already as a child been exposed to the same kind of sexuality. None of us, including her parents, can make that choice for her or preclude her choices as an individual. The psychological harm therefore often results from both the loss of sexual innocence, and loss of choice and control in their own lives. I know. As a juvenile court judge for over 14 years, I had many cases in which teenage and younger children suffered verifiable diagnosed pyschological damage from things like live in boyfriends just walking around in front of them naked, etc. These are just examples. Pornography is not limited to acts - there is no such narrow minded definition of pornography. The problem is not with American society. The bigger problem is wiht those persons and societies that do not make the above basic distinctions or allow for freedom of choice of the individual for themself, and instead try to dictate their views on others.
I didn't realize that the only standard for irreparable harm is whether or not a person specifically turns into a serial killer or not. That is an extremely narrow minded standard. Before answering your questions, I have an extremely simple question for you. Do you or do you not believe in freedom of choice? I suspect we agree on the answer. If you answer this, I will answer your questions.
I agree with you. I wrote to Congressman Markey (who was involved in the V-chip legislation) years ago and advocated for the same thing. But given that Congress did it backwards, and the V-chip is based on the TV ratings assigned by the network foxes guarding the henhouse (they misrate the shows over 70% of the time as being suitable for children when the objective criteria says otherwise), we still need the statute and the FCC to enforce it.
"postbigban"- Great comments, I applaud you for them.
Except that the American people, through their Congressional representatives, have mandated that by law the FCC's core, central, most important function is to enforce the statutory restrictions on broadcast obscenity/indecency. I guess that puts you in a small fringe minority, where you have a right to be.
"The whole premise of indecency is moot"? With due respect, what does that mean? "Indecency" is a word, that has both lay and legal definitions that are clear. If "indecency" is moot, then so is every other word in the English language. The practical point is that the hallmark of any civilization is certain minimal cultural standards of public decency,even if the definitions do not work perfectly in every detailed situation. There still must be general standards that are capable of being understood for civilazation to function at all.
I have to strongly and completely disagree with one thing you said - incidental exposure can be irreparably damaging, depending on what the exposure is to. Not so much words, but every person has an abolute right to not be even "incidentally exposed" to some things,or have their child exposed to it, an obvious examples examples being frontal nudity or other explicit pornography.
I am one of the attorneys involved in the Supreme Court case, representing a nonprofit organization supporting the FCC. It is not true that "techonology obviated the need for decency timeslots" at any point in time. It has been proven beyond any shadow of a doubt in the case (in the Second Circuit) that 1) over 30 million Americans (more than the population of most countries) do not have any "blocking techology" for TV through cable, satellite or V-chip. It is NOT the viewers' responsibility to pay for such techology to avoid unwanted indecency as a matter of 1st Amendment law. Further, the case impacts radio, for which there is no blocking technology. 2) The major TV networks, over 70 % of the time, deliberately obstruct the "V-chip" they rely on in their legal arguments, by misrating the TV shows as suitable for younger audiences than the objective rating criteria provides for, in order to not lose ad revenue. The ultimate fox guarding the henhouse. These are among the reasons that the indecency statute, which the U.S. Supreme Court already established in 1978 is constitutional, is still critical to any quality of life in U.S. homes and public places.