Cleaning up TV Add more options, not more regulations
March 27, 2005
BY ROBERT W. McCHESNEY AND BEN SCOTT Detroit Free Press
http://www.freep.com/voices/columnists/efcc27e_20050327.htm
Washington is up in arms over indecency.
The new Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin, whom President George W. Bush recently picked to replace outgoing Chairman Michael Powell, has been leading a crusade for stricter enforcement and tougher fines.
The FCC recently has cracked down on broadcasters, leading to a rash of self-censorship of TV programs, ranging from local affiliates refusing to air "Saving Private Ryan" on Veterans Day to "Antiques Roadshow" editing out the appraisal of an antique picture with a nude image.
"We need to make the decision to air indecent or profane language a bad business decision," Martin told Congress last year.
The House already has voted to bump up fines for broadcasting indecent content from $32,500 to $500,000 per incident. A Senate bill introduced this month would allow the FCC to apply fines for indecency and excessive violence not only to broadcast TV but also to cable and satellite providers.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against regulating cable TV content on constitutional grounds, saying, in effect, if parents don't like what's on, they shouldn't subscribe to it.
Still, the indecency problem raises a number of difficult tensions.
On one hand, we have a vocal community decrying the increase in sex and violence on television. On the other, we cannot ignore the success of this content in the marketplace. "Desperate Housewives" is the No. 1 show on network TV. "The Sopranos" has garnered an enormous following and critical acclaim. Racy reality TV programs and music videos draw huge audiences night after night.
We must strike a balance between moral protest and public demand.
For many, the issue boils down to how to protect children from inappropriate content while still upholding the First Amendment rights of artists, directors and producers. It is unfair to impose a uniform solution on all Americans when tastes in media are anything but uniform.
But that doesn't mean nothing can be done for those outraged over indecency. We have an obligation to serve them as well. Fortunately, the answer is simple: Expand choice and media diversity.
What's missing from the debate over indecency is the connection between "the increase in offensive programming," as Martin describes it, and the rampant consolidation of the media industry. The big media companies are risk-averse and market-sensitive, homogenizing and replicating low-cost, high-ratings content in a race to the bottom.
But Martin and many others who bemoan sex and violence on television are the same ones enacting policies to make big media even bigger. You can't have it both ways.
The concentration of ownership in the media industry in the past few years has resulted in a decline in media diversity at the very moment the number of channels is increasing. Media consolidation has produced content and conduit giants, often under the same corporate roof. Independents and noncommercial programmers are almost totally excluded. The end result is that American consumers are left with more media channels all offering more of the same content.
We should look at indecency as a symptom of a larger problem: the lack of consumer choice and control over what they see on television. The answer to concerns over indecency, then, is not less speech, but more speech.
We should pursue public policies that expand the diversity of content on television to offer more choices, reflecting the reality that different households have different media preferences. Families should be able to choose from a wide variety of independent, alternative and noncommercial programs and channels.
To achieve this goal, we should reduce media concentration and require more independent and noncommercial content on broadcast, cable and satellite TV.
We should pursue policies that ensure that families can select and pay for the channels they want from a vastly expanded and diverse set of options, including more programming serving minority communities.
A policy mandating materials to educate consumers on channel-blocking technologies also would further empower parents without undercutting the First Amendment.
Giving everyone more programs representing a wide variety of tastes and views would increase the likelihood that consumers will get more of what they want and less of what they don't.
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ROBERT W. McCHESNEY is a professor at the University of Illinois and the founder of the media reform group Free Press, headquarted in Northampton, Mass. BEN SCOTT is policy director of the group.
================================ George Antunes, Political Science Dept University of Houston; Houston, TX 77204 Voice: 713-743-3923 Fax: 713-743-3927 antunes at uh dot edu
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