Censorship
This Friday is it. This will mark the last day that Howard Stern will be on regular radio. After that you will be able to hear him on Satelight radio (Sirius Radio, to be exact) on January 9th 2006. Why did he leave? Because the FCC is INSANE!!! They have gotten WAY out of control and are limiting the rights that we have in our Freedom of speech. They are restricting the trade of information and putting tariffs on what you are able to think and feel. Radio has become The FCC's bitch. Let me give you a recent example:
Janet Jackson showed her boob on national TV during the Super Bowl. All CBS affiliates who showed it were fined several months later for the incident. But, did the FCC come down harder on all television broadcasts? Nope. They came down harder on radio. It was after that moment in Super Bowl history that radio got new restrictions wrapped around it. Here's how insane they are:
If I should say "Fuck" on the radio, my finantial future is ruined. For a nano-second of the right combination of sounds placed together on the radio, I am crushed finanitally. I can be fined PERSONALLY up to $500,000. Anyone reading this have that lying around? This is not only where it ends, a second fine can be given to the radio station of $3,000,000! Most radio stations can afford that if they are in a major market. Stations out of the top 50 markets would have to go under. And they would probably sue the DJ for their losses, adding onto the $500,000 that the DJ would be out. This would snowball from the DJ saying it OR even a listener! If one of the people that I put on the air accidentally slips up and talks like a normal human being, I take the heat.
See how stupid it's become? It is a never-ending ruination of the freedom of speech that we hold so dear. THAT is why Stern is leaving. Who would put up with this kind of crap?! Who could afford to? He is one of the few that would be able to. Mancow and the rest, perhaps. But why continue to wage a battle against a governmental agency that is being swayed by the wacko religious right.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm Catholic and I attend mass each week and believe what I believe. However, it is the wackos that are so far right that have pushed for these stricter laws not even taking into consideration the average DJ or the fact that there is a channel select knob on their radios. It is this collection of wack-jobs that I liken to the extreme Muslims who fly planes into buildings for Jihad. Most Muslims are kind, rational people. Most Christians are as well. It is the extreme nut-jobs that give the rest of us/them a bad name.
And what does it all boil down to? Bad parenting. Yup. Bad parenting. The biggest argument that the wackos use is "for the sake of the children." Bullshit. You don't like the message being put out, so you want to change it. It has nothing to do with the children. However, if your 10 year old is listening to Stern, you are a bad parent. Yup. It isn't Stern's fault. It is the parent's fault. Stern is OBVIOUSLY meant for a twisted, sick adult audience. (And trust me, there is a nitch that he's filling quite nicely!) He is NOT designed for those who still watch Saturday morning cartoons.
It is these brain-dead parents that are not PARENTING that are ruining it for the rest of us. They are the ones who can't figure out how to use the damn V-Chip on their TV (Most TV's after 1996 have this BUILT IN) to prevent their kids from watching all sorts of wretched shit on TV. What does this amount to? BAD PARENTING. That is the key to this WHOLE thing. If you were a good parent, you'd have channels with a rating that would be inappropriate for your child BLOCKED! Take the extra 5-10 minutes to program the V-Chip to do that and the rest of us can make up our mind what we want to see and what we don't.
We don't need the Puritan based government to decide for us. We are rational adults. We should be able to decide. Why does the government want to step in? To control the flow of information. 1984 has come and gone. And I'm not talking about the Van Halen album. So, from some perspectives, the wacko religious right could be seen as scape goats from a governmental agency that wishes to control the flow of information. Because information controls how we react to life. It forms our opinions on topics. And thus it would also influence our feelings on political aspects and would thus sway us, eventually, toward one candidate or another.
So, this is bigger than Stern. This is bigger than the average parent. This is a LONG ASS POST! But, if parents would parent and start getting INVOLVED in their child's life, none of this would be an issue. None of this.
You let your 10 year old listen to Stern = BAD PARENT.
You let your child watch movies that are rated for older people (for example, an "R-rated" film being seen by a child under the age of 17) = BAD PARENT.
You don't have time or the desire to obtain the knowledge on how to set up your V-Chip = BAD PARENT.
You work so much you don't have time to be involved in your child's life and let the radio/TV/and or other forms of media raise your child = BAD PARENT.
Your child listens to hardcore explicit lyrics in music from CD's or the radio = BAD PARENT.
The media should NEVER be blamed for the actions of a child. The PARENTS need to be blamed. The FCC fines are doing nothing productive and are completely out of line. Good bye, Stern. We'll miss you.
Janet Jackson showed her boob on national TV during the Super Bowl. All CBS affiliates who showed it were fined several months later for the incident. But, did the FCC come down harder on all television broadcasts? Nope. They came down harder on radio. It was after that moment in Super Bowl history that radio got new restrictions wrapped around it. Here's how insane they are:
If I should say "Fuck" on the radio, my finantial future is ruined. For a nano-second of the right combination of sounds placed together on the radio, I am crushed finanitally. I can be fined PERSONALLY up to $500,000. Anyone reading this have that lying around? This is not only where it ends, a second fine can be given to the radio station of $3,000,000! Most radio stations can afford that if they are in a major market. Stations out of the top 50 markets would have to go under. And they would probably sue the DJ for their losses, adding onto the $500,000 that the DJ would be out. This would snowball from the DJ saying it OR even a listener! If one of the people that I put on the air accidentally slips up and talks like a normal human being, I take the heat.
See how stupid it's become? It is a never-ending ruination of the freedom of speech that we hold so dear. THAT is why Stern is leaving. Who would put up with this kind of crap?! Who could afford to? He is one of the few that would be able to. Mancow and the rest, perhaps. But why continue to wage a battle against a governmental agency that is being swayed by the wacko religious right.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm Catholic and I attend mass each week and believe what I believe. However, it is the wackos that are so far right that have pushed for these stricter laws not even taking into consideration the average DJ or the fact that there is a channel select knob on their radios. It is this collection of wack-jobs that I liken to the extreme Muslims who fly planes into buildings for Jihad. Most Muslims are kind, rational people. Most Christians are as well. It is the extreme nut-jobs that give the rest of us/them a bad name.
And what does it all boil down to? Bad parenting. Yup. Bad parenting. The biggest argument that the wackos use is "for the sake of the children." Bullshit. You don't like the message being put out, so you want to change it. It has nothing to do with the children. However, if your 10 year old is listening to Stern, you are a bad parent. Yup. It isn't Stern's fault. It is the parent's fault. Stern is OBVIOUSLY meant for a twisted, sick adult audience. (And trust me, there is a nitch that he's filling quite nicely!) He is NOT designed for those who still watch Saturday morning cartoons.
It is these brain-dead parents that are not PARENTING that are ruining it for the rest of us. They are the ones who can't figure out how to use the damn V-Chip on their TV (Most TV's after 1996 have this BUILT IN) to prevent their kids from watching all sorts of wretched shit on TV. What does this amount to? BAD PARENTING. That is the key to this WHOLE thing. If you were a good parent, you'd have channels with a rating that would be inappropriate for your child BLOCKED! Take the extra 5-10 minutes to program the V-Chip to do that and the rest of us can make up our mind what we want to see and what we don't.
We don't need the Puritan based government to decide for us. We are rational adults. We should be able to decide. Why does the government want to step in? To control the flow of information. 1984 has come and gone. And I'm not talking about the Van Halen album. So, from some perspectives, the wacko religious right could be seen as scape goats from a governmental agency that wishes to control the flow of information. Because information controls how we react to life. It forms our opinions on topics. And thus it would also influence our feelings on political aspects and would thus sway us, eventually, toward one candidate or another.
So, this is bigger than Stern. This is bigger than the average parent. This is a LONG ASS POST! But, if parents would parent and start getting INVOLVED in their child's life, none of this would be an issue. None of this.
You let your 10 year old listen to Stern = BAD PARENT.
You let your child watch movies that are rated for older people (for example, an "R-rated" film being seen by a child under the age of 17) = BAD PARENT.
You don't have time or the desire to obtain the knowledge on how to set up your V-Chip = BAD PARENT.
You work so much you don't have time to be involved in your child's life and let the radio/TV/and or other forms of media raise your child = BAD PARENT.
Your child listens to hardcore explicit lyrics in music from CD's or the radio = BAD PARENT.
The media should NEVER be blamed for the actions of a child. The PARENTS need to be blamed. The FCC fines are doing nothing productive and are completely out of line. Good bye, Stern. We'll miss you.
posted by John Mc. @ 12/15/2005 11:33:00 AM
1 Comments:
At 5:10 PM,
Anonymous said…
Ok...time to add a few facts to your statement on censorship:
1. I really DOUBT Howard Stern is jumping from standard radio to Sirius because of censorship. Let's just put it this way...do you really think that the $500 MILLION five year deal (yep, that's ONE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR!) has NOTHING to do with Stern's decision? Let's put it this way...he's telling his dumbass audience that he's making this switch out of principal. That's a crock of shit, because it took a $500 mil five year contract to get him to do this!
2. The Supreme Court of the United States has interpreted the constitution to say that the government cannot block the freedom of speech, BUT they can restrict venue (i.e. the radio). The reason for this is because not everyone in public wants to have to listen to this.
3. I agree with you on the parenting thing, BUT you fail to recognize the following facts:
a. Parents cannot be around their children 100% of the time (they have to go to school, for example). IF there were no indecency laws, it would be impossible for a parent to have control over what their children do when they are out of the house (by law).
b. How does a parent censor what their kid hears as they are playing at the beach and some adult is listening to Howard Stern on his/her radio, where anyone walking by HAS to hear it?
Here's my opinion: With freedom of speech, comes RESPONSIBILITY...something our generation likes to throw out of the window. I STRONGLY feel that the First Amendment was NOT created so that Howard Stern can talk about some woman eating out another woman while he watches.
Basically, I do not think that Howard Stern is a noble champion of free speech. Instead, I consider him an entrepreneur, who just figured out that if he says raunchy stuff on the air, people will pay him big bucks for it (because there are enough dumbasses out there to listen to it!) I truly believe that if Howard Stern was paid $600 million for five years to never swear or talk vulgar again, he'd do it in a second. He manipulated his shallow audience to think that his decision to go to Sirius was a noble one, when in fact, he is just getting paid WAY TOO MUCH to say "heh...she's touching her tits...come on, sit on my face and touch her tits."
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