TV Cruelty Cops on their Way


Printed on: Thu, Apr 26, 2007
No need for Taliban of television
By Kelvin Wade

Oh no. It's been reported federal regulators will recommend to Congress within the next week that the FCC be given new powers to regulate violence in entertainment programming. On the surface, this could be a tool in helping parents parent, or if recent history is a guide, we could be set for a new round of witch hunts.

Granted, I've never understood how a nation can go ballistic over a half second shot of Janet Jackson's sagging breast, yet can watch the grisliest stuff imaginable on CBS' CSI without a peep. Blood spurting and vomit spewing doesn't faze us on medical shows like "ER."

On NBC's "Heroes" they've shown the tops of heads removed with the brains missing. Yet if a female character flashed a breast on that same show, television stations would be fined hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But this doesn't mean I want those same do-gooder censors who think they're saving us from titillation to neuter quality shows that contain graphic images that are essential to their stories. What happens when we let the FCC police loose on the airwaves? What's the standard?

What happens to a quality show like "Heroes?" A great many shows on the air, the CSI's, ER, the Law and Orders, and Fox's "24" with its torture scenes would have to be edited for broadcast.

How many punches are too many? How many gunshots?

Would cartoons be yanked? How about classics like the Three Stooges? Will Moe cost TV stations dough?

Will sports incur the wrath of the sadism sentries? Will mixed martial arts fights, where competitors fight with few rules, pass muster? What about boxing? The NFL? Will professional wrestling have to become even faker? No doubt self-appointed morality guardians like the tiny but vocal Parents Television Council would be faxing the FCC all day and the networks would cave.

Remember the PTC? In 2003, the FCC estimated that 99.8 percent of the complaints they received came from that group. So why should the Taliban of TV morality decide what America sees?

The FCC won't, of course, be regulating the news. We will continue to be able to see the bloody aftermaths of suicide bombings, dead bodies, psychotic ramblings of school shooters or acts of violence caught on video after a cursory warning that "the following images are graphic."

Another beef with the proposed new powers is that the FCC will ask to be able to regulate basic cable programming, too. It's one thing to regulate public airwaves, but another to censor content that viewers pay to receive. If I want to pay to see hooters and violence, I should be able to do that.

Proponents will cite studies showing the harmful effects of violence on children. But never has there been more choice for kids on television. V-Chip technology and the ability to lock out channels are standard now.

Television isn't only for kids. And while I've been concerned by some violence I've seen on TV, I'm worried that the cure could kill good adult television. If Washington regulators feel they can do a better job with what we see on TV, they belong in Hollywood writing and producing, not in D.C., censoring.

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