Freedom of expression.... denied!

[LV426]

Indecency Uproar Taming U.S. Network TV (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=638&ncid=762&e=1&u=/nm/20040412/en_nm/media_advertising_in decency_dc)
2 hours, 8 minutes ago Add Entertainment - Reuters to My Yahoo!


By Michele Gershberg

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Whether you believe it is a new sexual McCarthyism, or you see it as a long-awaited campaign against programing that's crossed the line into indecency, U.S. television is about to get toned down a notch.


http://us.news1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/nm/20040413/amdf523924.jpg
Reuters Photo



Broadcasters may stage a retreat from edgy shows over the next few seasons as a regulatory campaign to clean up the airwaves gains surprising strength from election-year politics, media analysts said on Monday.


In a sign of what's to come, even underwear vendors are rethinking how they use sex to sell. Television network CBS confirmed on Monday that the much-hyped Victoria's Secret lingerie fashion show, an annual special, would not air this year.


Shari Anne Brill, director of programing at media buyer Carat USA, said racy programs have not lost their popularity, but networks are becoming more wary of being labeled indecent.


"There will be stricter self-regulatory guidelines because it seems that in this climate, everyone is afraid to cross the line," Brill said.


Provocative programs known to win ratings might receive a partial scrubbing to tone down storylines. Networks may be quicker to scrap weaker shows famed mainly for their shock value and scrutinize new scripts far more closely.


"This new hypersensitivity of the past year or so is changing the content of broadcasting," said Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture at Syracuse University. "Right now everybody is looking to take the heat off, turn the public attention down a few notches for a season or two."


Analysts said Victoria's Secret owner Limited Brands appeared keen to avoid negative publicity as Washington boosts indecency fines, especially since its last runway show drew lukewarm ratings and failed to push up sales.


Industry insiders largely declined to comment on the pressure an anti-indecency campaign could exert on their new program strategies.


But media watchers said the chilling effect of a Federal Communications Commission (news - web sites) crackdown -- which radio shock jock Howard Stern has likened to a "McCarthy-type witch hunt" -- is already creeping into programing plans.


It is a shift from the past five or six years, when broadcasters have sought to emulate daring and popular shows on cable television -- including HBO's Mafia crime series "The Sopranos" and sexual misadventure story "Sex and the City."


"They're going with a very homogenized, much more family-centric route, moving completely away from the edgy type of content," said media industry commentator Jack Myers. "The ability to take risks and break down established taboos is at an end for now."


Broadcast networks and the media conglomerates that own them -- including Viacom, Walt Disney Co. and News Corp., are loath to fight for foul language during a U.S. election year, especially as they seek regulatory concessions on other issues, including ownership laws, analysts said.


Public outrage against televised nudity and foul language mushroomed after singer Janet Jackson (news)'s breast was exposed during the Super Bowl telecast in February, adding fuel for raising FCC (news - web sites) fines on indecent material.


Some advertisers turned skittish even earlier as protests over perceived indecency gained ground ahead of the 2004 vote.


Youth retailer Abercrombie & Fitch pulled a catalog featuring scantily clad and naked models off store shelves, while automaker Chrysler cut a sponsorship of the "Lingerie Bowl" -- a televised game of tackle football between models in bras and panties.


Last week, broadcasters got a stronger taste of their vulnerability when the FCC proposed a $495,000 fine against Clear Channel Communications for comments by Howard Stern. Clear Channel had already dropped Stern. (Additional reporting by Jean Scheidnes)

[Lance Walker]

Actually I agree with what the FCC is doing and I think that this has been a long time coming. I mean, do we need nudity and scatily scad women on prime time tv? Do we need to see indecent things like people eating worms on N.B.C's Fear Factor or the scores of "quality programming" shows found in the "reality" shows like Who wants to marry a millionare?, Average Joe, and Joe Millionare, and so on and so forth? I think not.

The truth is that broadcasters should NOT be using sex to sell things, particularily on prime time television where children can see it. I mean, what do you say to a five year old when he asks you why the pretty woman is walking around in her underwear during a victoria secret commercial?

The Janet Jackson scandel, in truth, opened up some doors that NEEDED to be opened when it comes to limiting certain types of programming, particularily during times when young children might see it. I'm not saying that we should elimate such types of programming totally, just that broadcasters should be cautionous with the types of programming that they chose to air. In fact, forcing broadcasters to review what shows they show and the content in the scripts produced by the shows they DO chose to show, could have positive aspects since it might force them to produce more quality material and hopefully, quality shows.

Though there is one thing I do worry about out of all of this. Given that our lawmakers are finally doing what they are supposed to be doing by making sure indecency is limited on television and the FCC is once again doing the things it is supposed to do, since it is the government we are talking about here, just how long will it be before they go beyond what they are supposed to be doing on the FCC and start limiting types of programming by labeling them indecent when infact they aren't indecent and such actions only serve to limit freedom of speech and expression?

Well, I'm off all.

Later,

Lance Walker :cool:

[Wraywolf]

Lance, one question, Why? Why should sex be so Taboo?

And if you say something about children, I will SO kick your ass.

[DeadDoll]

Just because it's not on t.v. doesn't mean children won't see it. People dress like provocatively in public all the time. Big deal. Granted there is Alot of crap on t.v., but hey some people want to watch that crap. And if everyone is "so worried" about the children, then how about actually pay attention to them, and be good be parents by Not using the t.v. as a substitute because your "too busy". T.v. shouldn't blamed for corrupting the youth when parents fail to be active in their children's lives.
But that's just my point of view.

[Wolf-Bone]

Lance, I agree that many of the programs you mentioned are crap. But they would still be crap even if you took out the "sexuality", which there isn't much of in the ones you mentioned.

My issue with reality tv is mainly that the term itself is an oxymoron. Most of the ones on the air now REVOLVE around a lie at someone's expense, for example Joe Millionare and Playing It Straight. Now if the purpose of those shows was, as they lead the gullible subject of the contest, simply to put them on some blind dates in hopes of finding Mister or Miss Right, that wouldn't bother me.

In Joe Millionare, they took a blue collar guy and gave him a fake identity, and tried to see what a bunch of women would do to marry a rich man, then how they'd react when they turned out to be someone from *gasp* a lower social class! You know, where I come from, we RESPECT a man who busts his ass for a living regardless of how little money he makes (or how little respect society shows him, in the case of shows like this), and I found the idea behind the show offense on a very personal level.

Playing it Straight takes a bunch of guys, half gay and half straight, and makes a woman try to determin who's straight by eliminating the one's she suspects to be gay. From what I've seen on this show, it doesn't matter how nice, attractive, or compatable a guy is. If he likes art, knows how to cook, uses a hair dryer, or "acts funny", he's less of a man, and therefor a flaming faggot. An article on msn a while back used this show as an example when talking about how homosexuals are still "the proverbial old maid card" in society's deck of cards.

I take issues with programs like that not because "THEY DESECRATE THE SACRED INSTITUTION OF MARRIAGE!", which the contestants can't care too much about if they're trying to marry someone they can't possibly know well enough on TV. Instead, I'm more concerned about the fact that these shows try to reinforce dying taboos and stereotypes rather than shatter them.

They have almost nothing to do with sex, which CAN be maturely discussed and still be explicit (think Degrassi, Fast Time at Ridgemont High), and everything to do with using social status as a gimmick.

However, I never saw how Playing it Straight, Joe Millionare, The Simple Life, or any others ended, because after seeing the first episode (if I even sat through the whole thing), I decided it definately wasn't my idea of entertainment and quit tuning in. And if people ARE tuning in, that's them, and that's society, which the media mirrors far more than it truly influences. If everyone else thought along my lines, they would've stopped watching along with me, and the ratings would've tanked. But if they keep tuning in every week, it obviously appeals to them on some level.

Either way, when the ratings speak, so do the people. The FCC believes IT should speak for the people. But Lance, if you're like me and you didn't bother watching, you casted your vote. What the FCC is trying to do is much like what the Bush admin had to do in order to get the dangerously broad spectrum of power it's gaining: rig the election.

[Lance Walker]

Interesting viewpoints people. And I agree with some of the things said.

My reply to this post came because I, for one, am fed up with this whole "let's use sex to sell things because people will like it and thus buy" philosophy that our society has seemed to adopt it. Though I won't dismiss the power of sex to sell an object, no matter what it might be, I'm just tired of the whole thing is all.

And frankly, I got the impression that before the super bowl that companies and networks were giving us the message of "Yeah, we know you want it. We know you like it. And we're absolutely certain that YOU WILL BUY this product because of the way we're selling it because you're a dumb animal." when it comes to sex. Well, maybe that is a bit of an extreme example when it comes using sex in avertisements, but I got the distinct impression that companies were using sex because they really thought that people couldn't resist it's influence and, if they exposed us to it enough, we'd end up buying that product.

Which is why I kinda like what the FCC is doing in regards to limiting sexual content in shows and such. Frankly, I think that it is something that should have been done a long time ago and our lawmakers have been sitting on their collective asses until something like this came along to make them take action.

Though I do understand what you guys are saying though. The problem with the government and its intervention into anything nowadays, even before the current administration, is that either they don't get involved in things they NEED to get involved in, or they DO get involved in things they DON'T need to be involved in. Like the time I saw a report on Sixty Minutes, where, believe it or not, the government was actually regulating and enforcing the size that holes in cheese could be. And whenever they DO decide to get involved in things that they should be involved in, well, although I agree with them on this, I do find that they tend to either do too little to fix the problem or too much. It's the too much part that I'm worried about when it comes to the Bush administration.

And on current shows deemed quality entertainment like Who wants to marry a millionare? and the like, I agree with you WolfBone when you say that although we were obviously turned off by such shows, obviously some part of society must like these shows since they keep coming back for more. Personally, I wish shows like these would just flat out tank, since hate shows like these and only like dating shows like Blind Date and such.

Though I will admit that Survior All stars and The Aprentise appeal to me, the first because I used to be a fan of the show through about season four or five when I lost interest and only now do I think it's getting interesting again, and the second one because although it is edited a certain way to make people come off looking a certain way, it seems to have very little to do with the current standard of reality tv and is really more about having what it takes to make it in the world of buisness than anything else. Even so I only watch these shows when the mood strikes me, and that isn't very often.

Personally, I think that you hit the nail right on top of the head when you discribed what "reality" tv is and that is it doesn't have anything to do with reality and really is nothing more than a social experiment devised by greedy television executives and producers.

Well, I'm off.

Later all,

Lance Walker :cool:

[Ves]

Oh my God! Janet Jackson has a breast! and it got shown on TV!
Run to the hills!

As the Offspring put it:-
"This album contains explict depictions of things which are REAL
These real things are commonly known as life.
So if it sounds sarcastic - don't take it seriously
If it sounds dangerous - don't try it at home or at all
If it offends you - just don't listen to it."

If you're a parent worried about your kids seeing stuff, then exercise that thing called "Parental Discretion" don't expect the broadcasters to do it for you and at the same time limit those of us that have decided not to breed.
Thankyou.