Staying abreast of television
The House passed a bill today called BDEA (Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act) which increases the maximum fine that the FCC can levy against a broadcast network tenfold to $325,000. The Senate passed it last month and President Bush will no doubt promptly sign it.
The issue has been raised because of a couple of high-profile issues, most notably Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction at last year's Super Bowl.
I can empathize with the issue--kids watching TV shouldn't be exposed to others being exposed, especially during family programming. I worry though about the segmentation that this will cause between Broadcast, and Cable/Satellite programming. If you extrapolate this, it would seem to lead to a strange bipartite world with candy-coated tv on the major networks and anything goes elsewhere. I can't argue that there's a social evil here, but it does seem odd and vaguely unstable.
For what it's worth, even adults don't always like adult programming. IMHO, Howard Stern was much funnier when he had to talk around subjects. Hearing him on Sirius was a let-down. The endless barrage of explicit dirty words was depressing. Is it possible, just a wild thought here, but could it be that the oft-forgotten Free Market might kick in and self-regulate without governmental interference?
Posted on June 08, 2006
