Changing The Damn Channel

The FCC is looking into complaints that the opening to last Monday's MNF (Monday Night Football) was somehow not suitable for network television.

Last week 66 ABC affiliates refused to air Saving Private Ryan for fear that the FCC would impose historically large fines for profanity unedited from the theatrical version of the film which ABC broadcast.

That's why I admire Larry Flynt.

See, Flynt stands at the forefront of the battle for free speech. He fights for the right to say what is unpopular, inelegant, and downright nasty. And without him, we wouldn't have that right. Or the right to say what others may call offensive. Or maybe the right to say anything at all, except maybe to shout praises to god during soccer games.

For 224 years, America stood for the right of her citizens to express their beliefs, opinions, agreement, dissent, and whimsy. Since 2001, it seems that has changed. The Uneasy Queasy Call It Sleazy Crowd has been taking over the conversation about Conversation. They claim to support the right of anyone to express an opinion, but quietly demand that the opinion be in line with their own. They seek to wrest control of decency standards from the local communities to create a national policy. They use decency standards not to protect those who are unable to properly process harsh or frightful images, but to quash debate for political gain. They have co-opted the vocabulary of victimization to accomplish this task. They claim it is their free speech which is impeded, until such claims saturate our society (hardly legitimizing said complaint).

Trouble is, their demonstrated goal for America is profoundly more dangerous than the forms of speech from which they seek to protect us. While the expression of "unwholesome" speech of any kind can lead to all the societal ills to which the Don't Say Boobies Contingent says they will, it is also entirely possible, perhaps even probable, that they won't. Sure, society could crumble under the weight of such weighty ideas, but it hasn't so far—and trust me, these "indecent" ideas have been around almost as long as the media used to communicate them, including cave paint. So I doubt society is in any real danger from indecency.

But the control of ideas, the bottlenecking of thought, will break society. At least democratic society. That's because democracy, like any form of government, relies upon an informed sovereign, that can make decisions based on facts, logic, and open communication. And in a democracy, the people are the sovereign. So the people need to be informed. That means fully informed; all the ideological marketplace available to all the electorate. Warts and all.

I suspect the 66 ABC affiliates are actually voicing dissent on the recent FCC escalation for decency violations. I think they are saying, "Hey, people of our media market, if you sit back and complacently allow extremist thought police to dictate the rules for broadcast communication, you may lose something very important to America, and to a particular valiant group of Americans. You may lose everything the men of Omaha Beach fought and died for. And you may lose it to folks whose ideology is so very much akin to that which they fought against. Just remember that it is your fight. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." At least I hope so.

As for the MNF thing, well, if that offends you, I have one piece of advice; Change The Damn Channel. Or turn off the *@#&^% TV.