What would be considered as inappropriate?
My basic position is that rights should not be limited by the government unless it is clearly demonstrated that without such limits a greater, and direct, threat to rights of others exists- such is the limits freedom of movement, limits on the right ownership of assault weapons etc. Therefore when discussing banning trans-fat, or smoking, I consider the actual damage they might or might not cause as irrelevant to the debate.
This is also my position when discussing the proposal of the FCC to regulate the content broadcast on TV. I consider arguments about the actual effect of broadcasted violence as irrelevant to the debate about the right of the government to regulate, and limit, any content.
This being said I really liked this argument:
What’s violence, anyway? I wince at almost everything. If someone with my sensibilities is put in charge of this operation, we’ll be stuck with nothing but Charlotte’s Web all day long. That can’t be appropriate.
Come to think of it, Charlotte’s Web is actually pretty painful. You have to worry about Wilbur being slaughtered the whole way through. Forget it, it’s off the list
Even if we accept the right of the government to regulate violent content the term itself is so vague and open to too many interpretations, not that it ever stopped us before…
Tags: Big Government Regulations Freedom of Speech Trans-Fat Smoking
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Rogel @ May 1, 2007
Well then I know how you and I are going to be rich. Lets create the VioTV. A broadcast network dedicated to extreme sex and violence. Now, since the Hollywood version of these things is admittedly lame, let’s get the real deal. We’ll film wars, offer cash incentives to soldiers out in the battle field to film casualties. We’ll even double the reward for pictures of our own dead. Amputated bodies will receive 10% bonus as well. Live rape coverage is great too. The more violent – the better.
I’m sure viewings will go through the roof. Come to think of it, it’s not only a way to make money, it’s our democratic responsibility! People die in wars, right? Now people have a right to not just know that – but to see it. How many Americans have actually SEEN the horrors of war? Of rape? Of violent crime? Is it not our civic duty to show it all?
How dare government try and block these things. My kinds have the right to see rape!
I realized long time ago that I probably wouldn’t become rich, and I’m fine with this. The fact that someone has the right to broadcast violence, or porn, doesn’t mean that I want to do it - or to watch it. By the way one of the best TV shows, and one of the few I’m actually watching, The Sopranos - is extremely violent.
Rape, and violent crime are to the best of my knowledge against the law. broadcasting them, instead of preventing them , would be a crime as well.
Now to the real point - I know what is good for me (and if not, I am sure I know better than the less intelligent person who choose to get a job in the government bureaucracy). I also care about my children more than Ayatollah Martin does. I don’t need the government telling me what appropriate for me to watch, nor do I want them to decide what is moral or not. We know where it start, and we can get a very good idea where it will not stop.
You may very well know better than the uneducated government clerk. Your next door neighbor may, or may not. You’ll probably assume he does, because we tend to seek out neighborhoods which house people of similar income and education as ourselves.
What you forget, choose to ignore, or simply don’t care about, is the fact that we still live in societies, and should (at least according to my moral perspective) have social responsibility. I myself have acquired higher education. Some would say I’ve got too much of it. But, only some 20% of my fellow countrymen (and women of course) have a Bachelors degree.
I’ve also got the funds provide my own child with after school activities. He’s just one year old now, so that’s no real concern – but it will definitely be in the future. At a young age, I can now provide more financial security than most of my countrymen (and women… especially women). But most people don’t have the tools I’ve got (and I assume you’ve got as well).
Children in low income families watch double, or more, hours of TV a day than my children will (statistically, of course). They will, be subjected to whatever is on, and will neither have a good alternative (as the same shit is on all channels) nor the sense to choose better. I doubt my well educated child will have that sense. Sensible decision-making comes with age, education, experience and a little god given common sense. Children don’t have that. Some adults don’t either.
In a society, don’t the ones who do have responsibility to the ones who don’t?
Oh, by the way, in reference to the slippery slope danger you end your comment with… I am all for stopping government when government needs stopping. I’d just rather do it then, instead of letting them off the hook now. Government has important functions to carry out, and I see no reason to let them shy away form this responsibility just because there’s a chance they’ll do things wrong. If and when they do, then I’ll exercise my freedom of speech.
I was never fond of the idea of the philosopher king, or applying this concept to children’s education. I can also say that I never liked the idea of children being educated by “the society†as a collective, as it was experimented, and failed in the Israeli Kibbutzim.
When did we stop the slippery slope before? If the idea of social responsibility was limited to a safety net that would protect individuals from extreme economic hardships, we have now expanded it into the fields of general education, preventative health and even morality.
I was, unfortunately I have to add, involved in regulatory processes and regulatory hearings. It is amazing how fast the process is disconnected from the operational reality it is trying to regulate, how many foreign interest affect it and how the bureaucracy protects old structures and regulations even when they stop being relevant (it they ever had been). The slippery slope is inherent in the process and arguing that
has very little base in reality. In fact, you could probably count on the fingers of one hand instances where the size of a government program was reduced or its scope narrowed. More importantly, government systems, structures, or organizations rarely determine that they hold too much power and decide to divest themselves of some of it – whether or not people decide to use their “power of speech†after the fact.
Children of poorer parents have, statistically of course, poorer vocabulary. It isn’t only because their parents have poor vocabulary but because they are having fewer conversations with their children. Since we are in the mood of a responsible society why shouldn’t we regulate the amount of minutes parents should talk with their children, the amount of books (and their content) they should read to them, etc.?
And by the way, why are you suggesting limiting my access to choose what crap my children will watch instead of preventing the unworthy parent access to TV? We can set a parenting worthiness test that only those who will pass will be awarded the right to purchase TVs? And while we are at it, maybe we should limit the right to vote only to those who are educated enough? It will be only responsible.
1. Regulation of TV content has nothing to do with anything but TV content. If you think that prohibiting certain violent broadcasts will deteriorate into regulation of your personal relationship with your kids – than you totally miss the point.
2. Educate your kids however you like. We are talking about the PUBLIC commodity of PUBLIC BROADCAST. Public, not as in government ownership… but as in PUBLIC. Whether you like it or not, the public attributes of this matter are inherent. Unlike education (therefore the KIBUTZIM have nothing to do with it).
3. We limit the right to vote by age, and place of birth. Find me a moral reason why education is less worthy, and you can have my kingdom again.
4. No DEMOCRATIC system limits voting behavior more so than the American one. Limits on political participation are far more complex than you seem to acknowledge. It strikes me as hypocrisy (to say the least) to claim that regulation of TV is anti democratic while electoral engineering is the flavor of the day. We regulate everything and anything, so why not TV?
5. Turn things upside-down and inside-out as many times as you please, and you’re still left with the decision of whether you do, or do not, believe in social responsibility. I do.
Calling something social responsibility, regardless how many times, doesn’t necessarily make it so. It is similar to the proposed new principal of the Khalil Gibran International School in Brooklyn that refused to acknowledge the fact that the 9/11 terror attack was carried by Arabs. Whenever someone is talking about the greater good and the good of society I’m checking what new thing going to hit me.
I’m not sure that I understand your point about Public Broadcasting, if what you advocate is to regulation of those broadcasting channel that belong to the public - such as channel one in Israel or PBS in the USA - I have no argument with you. You can regulate them all as much as you like. I was talking about private networks . What is in the public domain should be regulated by the public, therefore I want to minimize the public domain. (unlike you that want to expand it, and than regulate it for death!
)
Nowhere in my comment would you find that I made an argument about the quality of the American voting system. To the best of my knowledge the American broadcasting is regulated even more, in practice at least, than the Israeli broadcasting. What I claim is that your paternalism can be translated into more intervention by those who “know better”. We can argue the moral of limiting people rights to vote base on property (why someone that don’t pay taxes should have the right to decide how to allocate them?), Education or many other factors. Or we can say that we limit the scope of government. I prefer the later, it is much more responsible and moral.
You can turn things upside-down and inside-in but you can’t force civility by law, quite the contrary.
1. I am a proud paternalist. An elitist too. Never did these words scare me. As we’ve previously discussed somewhere, governments and elites control the broader public whether is acknowledged by themor not. This being the case, I would far rather have it in the open. You have your experience, and I have mine. In mine, every time less government control was advocated (in a formerly existing context of a functional democratic regime), no civic freedom was gained. Instead, control was shifted from elected or publicly controlled bodies to private, out of control, functionaries. It is my view that in democracies, the control of government is the lesser of evils.
2. To the off topic of tax paying and the right to vote… if this logic is sound, than by all means poor people should not take part. Come to think of it, given the right to vote, or not, they don’t have much influence anyway… The only reason we “let” them vote is so that they themselves stay blissfully unaware of what our modern day “government by the people and for the people” has become (government by the rich and for the rich…).
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