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So...the FCC is beginning it's crackdown on Cable television. FCC Chairman Kevin J. Martin, after reviewing a recent episode of "Keen Eddie" wherein a prostitute is hired to extract semen from a horse, off screen she lifts her shirt and the horse dies. I am unfamiliar with the show, so perhaps animal husbandry is a recurring theme. And prostitutes. Maybe they're a running theme too. Regardless, Mr. Martin wrote the following, prior to his being made the FCC Chairman:
"Despite my colleagues' assurance that there appeared to be a safe distance between the prostitute and the horse, I remain uncomfortable."
These are the words of the newest FCC Chairman. Now, I'm no psychologist, but if that doesn't just scream, "I want to have sex with a Horse", I don't know what does.
Anyway...The Horse-Sex Fantasizer is apparently planning to head a crusade began by his predecessor, tossing out fines to television stations for the content using the ambiguously defined "contemporary community standards", which basically means to kowtow to the loud minority complaining about their apparent inability to change the channel or turn off the television.
When I started thinking about why that is wrong and should be stopped, I thought about my atheism. In that respect, I'm the vocal minority telling the religious right to get off my money, or stay out of the schools or my government buildings. The distinction, however, is that while I have no problem with them having the choice of watching or not watching soft-core porn on Showtime, I do have a problem with them FORCING me to deal with their imaginary friend. I can't evade using money, or (if I had children) prevent my child from being exposed the ten commandments at school or government buildings if they were there. In both cases, they are bending the world I live in to celebrate their beliefs. Whereas my position allows people to make a decision for themselves regarding what they consider moral or ethical.
Now, my other problem with the dishing out of fines based on "community standards", is that it isn't a capitalist notion. Capitalism has a natural mechanism for removing something that the community doesn't want; the community doesn't buy said product, or use said service. Obviously, if these programs are popular enough to bring in the rivers of money that these channels enjoy, they meet any definition of what a community standard are.
In fact, if you really think about it, the boilerplate "conservative" principals are being violated as well, since granting the FCC this abuse of power would increase the size and power of government, a fundamental definition of "Conservative".
The natural consequence, and probably the objective, of these policies are censorship. Not obvious censorship, in the sense that we could look at the rules and understand what they are trying to ban or stifle, and hold them up and yell and scream. But a slow creeping censorship, where the broadcasters start to make decisions based on fear of retribution by those more easily offended than others. Then, we're all watching this watered down bullshit; news that doesn't have any real information, entertainment that doesn't take any chances.
Maybe if we used our tax dollars to get this guy a slutty horse to fuck, he might loosen up a bit? |
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