If you turn on your television today, you’ll find much more violence, sexual innuendo and foul language than in past years - stuff you might not want your kids to watch.
The same is true for radio, and while it can’t be said that the Internet has more explicit content than in the past, it can be said it is a new medium providing us with more explicit content than we could have imagined 10 years ago.
During the 2000 presidential campaign, this objectionable material appearing in the media was an issue. The surprise was that Democratic vice presidential candidate Joseph Lieberman was the one pushing government regulation of media content.
More recently, the Federal Communications Commission has come under fire for its perfunctory enforcement of radio and television. The FCC is responsible for regulating content in those forums from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.
In Tuesday’s USA Today, a columnist cited several instances in which the FCC failed to react to questionable content on the radio. One of the cases involved a 27-year-old radio personality claiming he had sex with a 9-year-old.
On the other hand, the commission did find it necessary to fine KKMG-FM, a radio station in Pueblo, Colo., $7,000 for airing the radio-edited version of Eminem’s “The Real Slim Shady.”
Yes, the FCC needs to get its act together and start enforcing its regulations fairly, but it needs to watch out. Restricting objectionable content flirts with a very thin First Amendment line.
Many people don’t want to hear Eminem on the radio. Many people don’t want to hear the Backstreet Boys on the radio. The same is true for everybody: Their radios all have a power button.
It can also be argued that radio and television is being broadcast to children whose parents don’t want them to be exposed to explicit material and therefore, that material should be banned by the government. But it is not the government’s role to parent American children.
The Parents Television Council is currently calling concerned parents to action in response to a “South Park” episode that used a certain expletive 162 times.
While the episode might have exhibited poor taste, it shouldn’t be a problem for parents. If parents don’t know where their child is at 10 p.m. (Air time for “South Park”), they need to worry about much more than television content.
A basic concept concerning freedom of speech is that we must not force our ideals upon others. For some, a perfect society would have no obscene television or radio content, but this could be a miserable society for others.
Media is largely market-driven. “South Park,” for example, is not trying to force obscenity on people - people want obscenity. If this weren’t true, television and radio programming would not be profitable.
The FCC needs to keep explicit material off the airwaves from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., and start doing a better job of it. But after that - and this includes the Internet - it’s free range for whatever people want.
Why shouldn’t we ban objectionable media content? Because WWF fans can never be made to like ballet.
