It’s bad enough that Janet Jackson’s Magnificent Mocha Mammary™ caused the whole country to lose its collective mind, but now this. Lawmaker Ted Stevens (R-AK) wants the FCC to expand its quixotic attempt to sanitize our minds by applying indecency standards to cable and satellite TV and radio.
Hey, dummy, do some research. The FCC is only allowed to control broadcast airwaves because (a) those airwaves belong to the public and (b) they can be received by any TV or radio. A child could potentially find an abandoned TV, turn it on, and be assaulted by the depravity-inducing sight of Janet’s Justin-jabbed jiggler, so the FCC gets to regulate what that child might accidentally see or hear during the day.
But cable and satellite require a subscription doofus, and quite a bit of equipment and set-up. A child could not accidentally see “G-String Divas” on HBO — an adult would have had to purchase the subscription, set up the dish, and fail to lock out the channel. And the Supreme Court has been pretty consistent about this concept.
The scary thing is that they’ll try to justify this by saying the satellite airwaves (digital spectrum) and cable TV (using satellites to uplink/downlink) are using public airwaves, and that cable/satellite are so ubiquitous now that they are akin to broadcast TV. Scarier yet is that Bush may be able to give them a Supreme Court that will allow it.
*SIGH* Is there nothing left for us adults anymore? We should not be shaping our society to the sensibilities of children and blue-noses.
