As time goes on, it becomes more and more apparent to me that the Roundheads are back with a vengeance, bent on imposing their misguided moralistic values on anyone they can reach.

The most recent example is the decision by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin to slap CBS (yes, campers, The Tiffany Network) with a 3.6 million dollar fine for a scene broadcast on its show “Without A Trace”.

The episode in question aired in 2004, and featured at some point a scene involving group sex between (and, I would imagine, among) teenagers. Prompted by what they claim amounted to massive complaints from sensitivities-bruised viewers, Martin and his Puritan Raiders determined the sequence to meet their definition of ‘indecency’. Now, according to court decisions and Congress’s own guidelines, the indecency sanctions only apply to programs broadcast across the airwaves between the hours of 6:00 am and 10:00 pm. However, it appears that in the Central and Mountain time zones, programs otherwise broadcast at 10:00pm are aired at 9:00pm. Hence, the fines apply only to those stations that aired the program in those time zones.

This is only the latest example of Martin’s overzealous – one might even accurately invoke the word ‘crusading’ – efforts to control the moral tone of broadcast radio and television. In a recent comments, he has even complained that the current fine limit of $32,500 per incident is inadequate, and has endorsed some Congressional proposals calling for fines of half a million per incident of ‘indecency’.

So, how is ‘indecency’ defined by the FCC? Simply put, the definition goes something like this: any "language or material that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium, sexual or excretory organs or activities."

Okay. I’ll bite. How do you determine that it is offensive? Offensive to whom? Which community standards? Who establishes these standards? What are sexual organs? Are breasts sexual organs? The last time I looked, they were lactation organs designed to provide nourishment for children. Men’s breasts certainly aren’t sexual organs, right? Does this indicate discrimination?

Obviously, this definition was written with such intentional vagueness that it allows any overenthusiastic prig – at least any overenthusiastic prig who’s been endowed with power and authority far exceeding his ability to responsibly wield it – the opportunity to presume that his values are the only values that matter, and to beat broadcast malefactors over the noggin with unreasonable fines in order to shut them up, or shut them down.

Earlier today, I sent Chairman Martin an email, which I will share here:

“I am a psychologist, and a founding member and past president of the North Carolina Association for Management and Treatment of Sex Offenders. I have been recognized for years as an expert in the North Carolina courts on sex crimes committed by children and adolescents, and on the etiology of those criminal behaviors.

I am appalled at your stance regarding "indecency" on broadcast television, and especially your endorsement as FCC Chairman of the recent decision against CBS and "Without A Trace", which resulted in a fine of 3.6 million dollars.

Besides the chilling effect on First Amendment Rights, your stance, which you have repeated time and again, is completely without scientific support.

The United States President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography, established during the Nixon Administration, issued a 1970 report which found absolutely no evidence that exposure to explicit sexual materials plays a significant role in the causation of delinquent or criminal behavior among youths or adults. This Commission could not conclude that exposure to erotic materials was a factor in the causation of sex crime or sex delinquency.

Further, while only a single study (Zillmann and Bryant, 1982) determined a deleterious effect on children by viewing sexually explicit material, these findings have never been replicated, indicating either methodological error or investigator bias on the part of Zillman and Bryant. In fact, as stated in a Ph.D dissertation by Christopher D. Hunter (Hunter, 2000), ". many other studies -- including the Donnerstein and Linz (1985) study described earlier -- exposing participants to several experimental conditions (violent porn, nonviolent porn, control) have found that exposure to nonviolent porn produces few or no adverse attitudes towards women. From a review of this literature, Linz (1989) notes "We would have to conclude that the data, overall, do not support the contention that exposure to nonviolent pornography has significant adverse effects on attitudes toward rape as a crime or more general evaluations of rape victims (p. 74)."

Therefore, the FCC's crusade against "indecency", which by no means can even be thought to reach the level of pornography, cannot be supported by any credible research findings. As such, it can only be interpreted as an expression of backward Puritanical attitudes and an unhealthy view of sexuality in general. Congressional action authorizing the censoring of undefined 'indecency' represents nothing more than a pandering to the religious prejudices of a vocal minority of the American people. That attitude, based on your own statements as the FCC Chairman, is one that you share. In other words, you are imposing your own stunted views of sexuality on the American people, without regard to documented scientific evidence that this material poses absolutely no harm to the people whatsoever.

What we DO know, however, is that the attitudes of children are strongly affected by exposure to violent depictions. Study after study, including those by Bandura, and by Feshbach and Feshbach, and which have been replicated time and again, have concluded that exposing children to violence does lead them to imitate this violent behavior. The FCC, however, with its head firmly stuck in the American viewing public's pants, has chosen to ignore this overwhelming evidence. On any evening, on any channel, children are offered scene after scene of graphic violence, shootings, stabbings, beatings, strangulations, mangling, and aggression. No actions have been taken against any broadcast television station or network based on the depiction of violence, no matter how gory, bloody, or prevalent.

This depiction of violence inflicted on one person by another has been conclusively demonstrated to result in aggressive and delinquent behavior, and is the TRUE indecency on broadcast television. Yet, the FCC allows it go on virtually unchecked.

It is my contention, Mr. Martin, that your values are misplaced, your policies are seriously flawed, and that you are yourself a menace to the American viewing public. It is clear, beyond any chance of a reasonable doubt, that your stance, which dictates the policies of the Federal Communications Commission, is predicated on nothing more than your own religious and social prejudices. As such, they are a reflection of the overall misdirected priorities of the Bush Administration, and I can only hope that you will not inflict too much irreparable damage to this country before the next presidential election. At that time I will be very happy to see you removed from your position of badly wielded authority, and replaced with an enlightened FCC Chairman who will base decisions on facts rather than unsupportable religious and moral chauvinism.”

My spleen properly vented, I was able to get on with my day. However, as I considered Chairman Mao’s…. er, Martin’s Cultural Revolution, I have noted some troubling inconsistencies.

The courts have maintained almost from the birth of the Republic that obscenity is not protected speech. In the case of indecency, however, the rulings have not been quite so clear cut.

The courts required, as part of the test for obscenity, three specific factors. They included: 1) the nature of the speech; 2) whether the speech violated prevailing community standards; and 3) whether the speech had any redeeming social value. Great works of art, for instance, since they are presumed to be part of a body of work that enriches the soul and have withstood the test of time, would be exempt, since they did have redeeming social value. It would appear, from the courts’ definitions of obscenity, that only local prosecution would be possible, since the community’s standards would have to be violated in order for the work to be judged obscene.

Such is not the case with indecency. The entirety of the work – its purpose, artistic intent, newsworthiness, etc – is of no consequence whatsoever. Show a peek of tit or a naked bum, and the work is automatically indecent. Context is unimportant. Social relevance is unimportant. If it rides the airwaves between 6:00 am and 10:00 pm, and it contains material that Kevin Martin, FCC Chairman, believes to be indecent, you are – by Gawd – going to be in for a little wallet lightening!

And what exactly would constitute indecency during these hours? Well, campers, you don’t actually have to show sexual organs. All you have to do is mention them. You don’t have to depict real or simulated sexual activity on-screen. All you have to do is describe it.

You know, my faithful readers, back in the 1930’s there was this obnoxious little prude named Will Hayes, who was appointed by President Harding to be postmaster general. If he had stayed in that position, he probably would never have been a bother to anyone. Instead, though, he accepted a position as the first president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA).

The MPPDA later became known as the Hayes Office, which was imbued with the power to pass judgment on every film made in Hollywood. Hayes, a rock-ribbed Presbyterian, based his determination on the fitness of films on his religious convictions. Assisted by Joseph Breen, a puppet of the Catholic Legion of Decency, the Hayes Office whitewashed American films just as they were coming of age. The effects of their well-intentioned but ultimately disastrous meddling was that the development of film as an art form – at least in the United States - was stunted for almost three decades.

The Hayes Code, as the edicts from the MPPDA office were referred to, were based on a single overarching directive: No picture shall be produced which will lower the moral standards of those who see it.

The assumption was clear. The motion picture, as a communications medium, was considered so intensely powerful that the mere exhibition of a moment of indecency – as defined by Hayes and Breen – threatened to undermine and erode the very core of an individual’s lifetime of social and moral development!

Kevin Martin’s attitudes at the Federal Communications Commission appear to be very similar. His single-minded crusade to eradicate the broadcast airwaves of any hint of human sexuality smacks of the very same Puritanical mischief that almost destroyed American filmmaking over seventy years ago. He appears absolutely convinced that if some kid from Nebraska sees a two-second image of Janet Jackson’s jug, it’s only a matter of time before he’s cruising the blue highways in a pickup truck, trolling for hitchhikers he can rape and murder.

The very best research available, of course, assures us that this is poppycock (Oops, I said cock – titter, titter. Oops, I said tit…). Research doesn’t mean a damned thing to Martin. Like his Royal Appointer, King George of Crawford Texas, Martin doesn’t want to be confused by the facts. He has his opinions, and that’s enough for him. As a result, it’s only a matter of time before the programming on NBC, CBS, ABC, and FOX is watered down to an almost intolerable, mind-numbing solution of ‘The Waltons’, ‘Gentle Ben’, and ‘Touched By An Angel’, which will drive viewers inexorably to the welcoming arms of cable television, where free thought and artistic expression continue to live happily unmolested.

Until, of course, Kevin Martin and his band of merry party-poopers decide to clean up that Artful Dodge City.

And don’t think for a second they haven’t considered it.

Gotta boogie...
R