On the Supreme Court docket...

On the Supreme Court docket: bleeeeeep

The future of the media’s standards for decency is in the hands of the Supreme Court.

On Tuesday morning, while the nation’s citizens are engrossed in the proceedings of a momentous election, Supreme Court justices will be contending with the issue of a Federal Communications Commission ruling that was overturned by the federal appeals court in June 2007.

The case is FCC vs. Fox TV. The matter in question is whether or not it should be lawful for the F-word and other such vulgarities to be heard more on television and radio.

In the article “On the Supreme Court docket: bleeeeeep,” David Sage of the Los Angeles Times says this:

"At issue is the future indecency standard for television and radio. Will these broadcasts remain under strict federal regulation because a mass audience that includes children may be watching? Or will a looser standard prevail, giving broadcasters and audiences more choice in what they see and hear?"

I found this article highly intriguing considering how the outcome may impact the world of television and radio as we know it. If Fox TV wins the case and allows profanity to reign supreme, just what will be considered indecent after that?

Unfortunately, this article seemed to cover a lot of broadcasters and others think about the FCC, but not enough on what the FCC has to say. Direct quotes were taken from the people at Fox TV and their lawyer, Carter G. Phillips, but there was nothing to be seen from an FCC spokesman.

However, I do believe that Sage did a decent job with handling the extensive history of this particular court case. He made sure to cover Cher’s remark at the 2003 Billboard Music Awards that had first engendered such a commotion:

"People have been telling me I'm on the way out every year, right? So f- - - 'em,” she said. 

This provoked what CNN characterized as an “unusual” federal appeals court hearing in December 2007. FCC claimed that Cher’s comment violated federal decency standards; but having broadcasted the program live, Fox TV appealed the judgment on the grounds that the “old rules” violated the first amendment and encroached upon their rights of free speech.

Having aired the banned words, Fox TV is now struggling against the fines that the FCC has pressed upon them. Fox TV lawyer Carter G. Phillips told the Los Angeles Times that, "the court has not revisited this issue in 30 years, and we would like broadcasters to be treated the same as cable TV or the Internet.”

In most situations, I don’t often have much to say criticize the way in which an article is written. However, it took me a while to get a grasp on what was actually happening, as the terminology that was more law-specific than I would like.

The broadcasters say that the old rules are an unconstitutional infringement on free speech. Also, about 9 in 10 Americans receive TV signals via cable or satellite -- yet only the broadcast industry, because it uses public airwaves, is subject to the legal rules, which were set in a different era. That means most viewers have a menu of channels that operate under different legal rules, with cable channels largely free of government oversight.

Granted, this stems from not having much experience in the realm of hard news prior to the year before this. What I will say, though, is that this particular article would not have suffered from supplemental clarification.This may be due to my own limited knowledge of electronics and court proceedings, but shouldn’t an article supposed to be written in a way that caters to a wide audience?

All in all, Sage provided sound and factual information, even if it was rather hard to discern, and it will be most interesting to see the results of Tuesday's hearing.