Today’s Washington Post brings news that the FCC’s enforcement of so-called indecency on television and radio is pretty much broken:
On the morning of June 3, 1996, Howard Stern hosted an explicit discussion between adult-film star Jenna Jameson and her father on a nationally syndicated radio show, broadcast to more than 10 million listeners.
It didn’t take long for the conversation to go from tasteless to downright vulgar.
The Federal Communications Commission, under Democratic Chairman Reed E. Hundt, took one year to determine that the radio routine violated the agency’s indecency regulations. But nearly four years and two FCC chairmen later, in February 2001, the $6,000 fine was rescinded “due to passage of time,” FCC records note.
The FCC’s actions were hardly an aberration. A Washington Post analysis of all 92 known proposed indecency fines shows that the agency’s record of policing the airwaves has been undermined by plodding investigations, insufficient fine amounts and inconsistent follow-up.
There is something to say for bureaucratic inertia. A weak, ineffective FCC is almost as good as no FCC at all. Of course, not everyone sees it that way.
The agency’s role as broadcast nanny has come under greater scrutiny in recent months as consumers and lawmakers grow concerned about the increasingly coarse content of radio and television — last year, the FCC received more than 1 million complaints about programs. Broadcasters say the FCC’s content guidelines are too tough and arbitrarily applied while some lawmakers, viewers and interest groups blame the agency for being too lax.
Broadcast Nanny. What an appropriate phrase. The entire indecency idea is built around the philosophy that Americans are either too dumb or too lazy to make informed decisions for themselves. If you don’t like what you hear on Howard Stern’s radio show, then change the channel, boycott the station, or let the advertisers know how you feel. There is no justifiable reason for the government to get involved in what is, at its essence, a private transaction between broadcasters and their listeners.
Moreover, the system itself doesn’t appear to work to begin with:
The size of the fines appears to have had little lasting deterrent value for giant media conglomerates that collect hundreds of millions of dollars in profits. For instance, just one year before the Stern broadcast with the Jamesons, Stern’s boss — Infinity Broadcasting Corp. — paid $1.7 million to settle multiple indecency rulings against the shock jock.
And despite the embarrassment that Stern has caused Infinity over the years, he has made them millions of dollars, which is one reason they are likely regretting the fact that he will be moving to satellite radio, where the FCC restrictions currently do not apply, in January. Some have proposed increasing the fines, but this is likely to have only a minimal impact when broadcasters earn tens of millions of dollars from personalities such as Stern.
And the law itself is quickly becoming irrelevant:
The FCC has struggled to balance First Amendment rights with laws that forbid over-the-air radio or television broadcasting between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. of “patently offensive” material of a sexual or excretory nature. The courts have not helped much, as the guiding 1978 indecency statute is increasingly irrelevant in an era of 200 unpoliced cable and satellite channels that do not fall under the law.
Some groups say the government should no longer monitor the nation’s airwaves because technology — such as the V-chip and cable and satellite blocking systems — allows parents to determine what their children watch.
Exactly. What does the content of one radio or television program matter when you have a choice from literally hundreds of channels, not to mention other forms of entertainment ?
And the judges don’t appear to be taking it seriously either, as this story about a fine against Evergreen Media demonstrates:
[The appeal] eventually landed in Chicago district court. As Latham lawyer Eric L. Bernthal recalled it, the judge said, ” U.S. v. Evergreen . What is this, a drug case?”
“After I explained it was an indecency case, he basically looked over his glasses and said, ‘You’re kidding, right?’
Unfortunately, the advocates of this law aren’t kidding at all.
Linked with Don Surber and bRight & Early and The Political Teen and Basil’s Blog
