Your Taliban At Work
Word's out that somebody may have used a rude word on television at some time. Quick -- send the feds in to catch them!
Call me a liberal if you will, but I don't think the government really needs to protect us from the possibility that a spectator at a sports event may have cussed near a microphone.
WASHINGTON (Hollywood Reporter) - In its continuing crackdown on on-air profanity, the FCC has requested numerous tapes from broadcasters that might include vulgar remarks from unruly spectators, coaches and athletes at live sporting events, industry sources said.
Tapes requested by the commission include live broadcasts of football games and NASCAR races where the participants or the crowds let loose with an expletive. While commission officials refused to talk about its requests, one broadcast company executive said the commission had asked for 30 tapes of live sports and news programs.
"It looks like they want to end live broadcast TV," said one executive, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity. "We already know that they aren't afraid to go after news." FCC Combing Air Tapes for Dirty Words
Call me a liberal if you will, but I don't think the government really needs to protect us from the possibility that a spectator at a sports event may have cussed near a microphone.
posted by JimK at 3:49 PM
25 Comments:
Actually, as for the the simile in the title of the blog, any instances of the FCC beheading miscreants in a soccer stadium?
This Taleban does things like makes men masterbate on each other, drags them around on a leash, kidnaps and rapes teenage boys, murders families and rape their daughters, executes babies point blank, shoots people at random for driving on the same road as them ... but no, no decapitations in the stadium, that have made the news.
Anon 2.1
Among other things, she secretly filmed footage of a public execution in a football stadium in which a woman was "shot dead to the cheers of the watching crowds."
No cheering is allowed at sporting events, but at executions, apparently, it is encouraged and expected.
On April 27, 2000, several Taliban went into the dental office of Dr. Nader Sina in the city of Herat. There being no female dentists in Herat, the doctor was filling some women's teeth. The women were whipped, the dentist was jailed, and the clinic closed.
On May 22, 2001, an unmarried couple accused of having sex were taken into a sports stadium in Kabul and each given 100 lashes in front of thousands of cheering spectators, most of whom were members of the ruling Taliban militia.
But lashings are also administered to couples who have committed even minor offenses such as walking together.
Stadium officials say dozens were executed and hundreds more punished on the soccer field by the Taliban. Doing it in public was a way of warning the population of the price of breaking the law.
So was leaving the evidence in sight.
Football coach Zaid Mahsiam Masari showed me the exact spot where the punishments took place -- center field, where everyone could see.
"One morning I came out here, and there was a big barrel on the field," he says. "It was filled with amputated hands and feet. The teenage players out for morning practice were so upset they could not continue playing."
Under the Taliban, the stadium in Kabul was used for public executions and amputations, sometimes before football matches.
Taliban Use Beheadings and Beatings to Keep Afghanistan's Schools Closed
By Tom Coghlan
The Independent UK
Tuesday 11 July 2006
this is all sounds just like the FCC
let's just do away with laws altogether so we won't be just like the Taliban
either Taliban or anarchy- a TTF classic dichotomy
... a TTF classic dichotomy ...
Boy, Anon, this really bothers you, doesn't it. You just can't see any similarity between atrocities committed in the name of democracy and those committed in the name of Islam, can you?
Actually, I can see a difference. Their atrocities are brutal. Ours are depraved.
You know, don't you, that the rest of us reading this are aware that the "TTF classic dichotomy" is ... something you just made up
JimK
"atrocities committed in the name of democracy"
fines are atrocities?
classic TTF twist
Good one, Anon. The FCC is just one agency working for the administration that's doing these things.
JimK
I can certainly see how there is nothing going on in the US today that needs more scrutiny than bad language on TV- unless it is gay marriage, immigration and flag burning. Thank goodness, the gov't is protecting me from all of that. Families mugged on the Mall, murder on the rise in DC, floods here in Maryland, education is in trouble but at least no one will get away with saying the fbomb on TV.
rapes teenage boys????
What ever happened to: don't ask, don't tell, don't call them gay!
kidnaps and rapes teenage boys?
Don't ask dont tell.
Was that supposed to be a joke?
"doing these things."
Doing what things? Other than fines, what "atrocities"? What at all that is comparable to the Taliban?
Jim writes,
Your Taliban At Work
Jim, while I recognize that a catch-the-eye and provocative title help an otherwise dull news item stand out, you cannot possibly believe that there is a parallel between the Bush Admin and the Taliban?
Word's out that somebody may have used a rude word on television at some time. Quick -- send the feds in to catch them!
The public airwaves are just that...PUBLIC, and as such are regulated for the benefit of all. Last weekend I got drafted by the Mrs. to attend a work related function that required that I attend a comedy club. I have never in my life heard such coarse and vulgar language - the wife and I got up and left after a little less than a half hour. Though I have NO interest in ever going to a comedy club again, I have no problem if others want to fork over their money to take in such "entertainment". I have no interest in forcing my views upon others in private venues, and I would oppose anyone that would attempt to do so.
Call me a liberal if you will, but I don't think the government really needs to protect us from the possibility that a spectator at a sports event may have cussed near a microphone.
I agree, but in attempting to keep tv PG-13 the FCC may need to push back a bit the readiness of some broadcasters to gain viewers by pushing the envelope. Still, live broadcasts wherein spectators and participants use obscene language ought not to be punished with the same severity as those who should know better.
This reminds me of the op-ed I posted a few days ago (from the LA Times), which in turn prompted three letters to the editor (with all three letters seeming to miss the point of the op-ed by Allen). Still, the first letter was by far the most over-the-top.
The title given the letters?
Religious devotion need not mean extremism
July 13, 2006
Re "Liberal Christianity is paying for its sins," Current, July 9
Charlotte Allen's opinion is frightening for its unabashed rationalization of extremism. She states the obvious — that the stricter the church dogma, the deeper the adherence — and conveniently avoids mention of the effects of extremism, such as murdering gays, firebombing family planning clinics or flying airplanes into skyscrapers.
I dare anyone to go back and read the op-ed by Allen and show where she even remotely justifies any of the three. Rather, what Allen was attempting to do (and this letter writer willfully ignores) is to give a credible explanation for the reason that old mainline Protestant churches find their ranks thining out.
What the letter writer lacks, as well as the title and substance of this blog entry is context and perspective. Other than Fred Phelps of Topeka, Kansas, I know of no Christian denomination that sympathizes with or advocates violence against gays/lesbians. In like manner, the major thrust of the Christian response to "family planning clinics" (now there is a revisionist definition of a word, especially since I just read a report from the Guttmacher Institute that 80% of abortions are to women that are not married) has been to set up Crisis Pregnancy Centers and direct their time, energy and money in taking marketshare from "family planning clinics". All the pro-life folks I know are too busy to even notice what these so-called clinics are doing, much less even consider assisting them by fueling their martyr persecution complex. I know I would not...
When was the last time you heard of a religious moderate strapping dynamite around his chest and walking into a wedding? Or an atheist setting fire to a cross on someone's lawn?
More false dichotomy...who is the extremist...really now?
Given the choice of a world of religious extremists or churches evolving their moral codes to fit the times, it is clear to me which is more dangerous to society at large.
If this is what letter writer Bill Gervasi thinks constitutes orthodox Judeo-Christian teachings then it is clear that he has not stepped a foot (much less spent any time) inside of a denomination
that does not revise its' teachings to fit the fads and fashions of present day society.
BILL GERVASI
Ladera Ranch, Calif.
And then Jim writes,
Boy, Anon, this really bothers you, doesn't it. You just can't see any similarity between atrocities committed in the name of democracy and those committed in the name of Islam, can you?
"Atrocities"??? Jim, you can't be serious about this word choice...can you? Well, assuming you are, I would have to agree with Anon here that there is no similarity whatsoever between regulation of public airwaves and life under the Taliban.
Actually I can see a difference. Their atrocities are brutal. Ours are depraved.
Jim, do you understand what the word depraved means? First off, depraved is an adjective which is defined (by the American Heritage College Dictionary, 3rd ed.) as "morally corrupt; perverted". Now, please explain to the rest of us exactly how attempts by the FCC to hold broadcasters responsible for the content of their broadcasts are depraved (as opposed to merely brutal, as under the Taliban).
You know, don't you, that the rest of us reading this are aware that the "TTF classic dichotomy" is ... something you just made up
Not a week goes by that I don't see a letter or op-ed by the same mindset as Mr. Gervasi...or, for that matter you, Jim. Time to tone it down a bit, don't you think?
Interesting that Anon and Orin both use the same technique, apparently without being aware of it. Both of you compare the worst of the Taliban with the least of the current administration's oppression. Let's say these FCC inquisitions are about equivalent to the Taliban going through the marketplace with whips, punishing women who have the temerity to venture in public with their faces exposed.
The way the Taliban enforces their bizarre religious code is brutal. They chop off heads and hands, they whip people till they bleed. Do you want to compare that to the way the current American leadership enforces its cultural demands? Look at how we impose our will in Abu Ghraib, in Haditha, the recent murder and child-rape in Baghdad, in Guantanamo, in secret prisons around the world. The theme is one of depravity, often sexual depravity, it is the way our American leadership expresses itself in the world.
But really, in this post, I wasn't going there, you guys brought up the brutal stuff. I am sure that the Founding Fathers never intended for their great government to spend its time and budget enforcing petty linguistic taboos. Fundamentalism is fundamentalism, whether you're Christian or Muslim. Here and there we have a situation where a radical religious minority is making decisions that affect evryone.
I'm against it.
JimK
"Here and there we have a situation where a radical religious minority is making decisions that affect evryone"
Not here. The notion that a minority somehow manipulates the government through chicaneery is sheer fantasy on the part of Democrats. Moral standards are supported by most Americans and government action to support them is moderate and reasonable.
"The notion that a minority somehow manipulates the government through chicaneery is sheer fantasy on the part of Democrats. Moral standards are supported by most Americans and government action to support them is moderate and reasonable."
Wow. That's an interesting couple of statements.
BTW, Jim, when you play this game where you compare the FCC to the Taliban or Judeo-Christians to the Ku Klux Klan, it makes hollow your protest when someone compares gay rights groups to NAMBLA.
It's disturbing that someone who doesn't support decency standards for public airwaves is representing the community on the MCPS CAC.
"Wow. That's an interesting couple of statements."
Wow. That's a dull comment.
Not sure how many Anonymi I'm dealing with here. One thing at a time.
... play this game where you compare the FCC to the Taliban or Judeo-Christians to the Ku Klux Klan, it makes hollow your protest when someone compares gay rights groups to NAMBLA.
Here's an interesting phenomenon where I cannot leave your comment standing, yet if I respond to it I am drawn into arguing from within your bizarre frame.
Comparing the Bush administration and the radical right to the Taliban is not a stretch, and I didn't make it up. Fundamentalism is the same across religions, and I have no interest in pretending that what we've got in our leadership is anything other than that. The beliefs are the same, the methods are the same, the results are the same.
I don't think you will find that I have ever used the word "Judeo-Christians" here or anywhere else; it is not a meaningful concept to me. The KKK describe themselves as Christians, that may be perhaps what you mean. The other day you, or some other person afraid to use their name, asserted that I/we had compared "family groups" to the KKK and Nazis, which is also not true. At least I couldn't find anything in searching back through the archives, and neither could you/they. I have reported where the Nazis supported certain groups involved in our sex-ed controversy here in Montgomery County, but that was a careful reporting of facts that needed to be on the record.
And as for comparing gay groups to NAMBLA, they are simply two different things, that's why I don't think they should be compared.
The rule in this case: same thing, OK to compare; different things, not OK to compare.
Finally ... I don't think the FCC needs to go back over tapes of sporting events to see if anyone in the crowd used a bad word. Readers will appreciate your misconstrual that I don't "support decency standards for public airwaves."
Now, I gotta say, there are times that I enjoy writing on this blog and discussing things with people who hold views that differ from mine. And there are times that I find the task offensive and demeaning.
JimK
Jim writes,
I am sure that the Founding Fathers never intended for their great government to spend its time and budget enforcing petty linguistic taboos.
You are certain of that..."sure"? LOL...wow, that is amazing.
I wish I had the time to reply, but alas I have a "honey do" list, and I do not think the Mrs. will be pleased with me if I spend time I should be accomplishing chores in intellectual parlor games.
I did check the Montgomery County Libraries to see if they had a couple of titles on this subject, and alas, they did not. So, here's the deal Jim: I have two titles to recommend to you (and really anyone else that cares) and a deal just for YOU! I will order and ship either of the two books to you for you to read, and it is my treat. Now, I don't know about you, but I find the offer of a free book a hard one to pass up (I just recently requested a review copy of hard left-wing book and it was sent to me, compliments of the author's book agent).
The first book,
_No Liberty for License: The Forgotten Logic of the First Amendment_, by David Lowenthal.
The second book,
_Freedom of Expression: Purpose as Limit_, by Fr. Francis Canavan
Provide me a mailing address, and I will order it...you know how to contact me.
Jim writes,
Now, I gotta say, there are times that I enjoy writing on this blog and discussing things with people who hold views that differ from mine. And there are times that I find the task offensive and demeaning.
I am sorry you feel that way...I don't. I take it as a given that my views are not popular or not adequately understood, so I enter the marketplace of ideas with a clear understanding that I must make the best case I can for the ideas I advocate. I regret that I am not always up to the task...
Orin, it's no problem disagreeing with you. Most of the time you express yourself clearly, not-sarcastically, there are actual intellectual issues that we need to face as a country and you're pretty good about representing a point of view respectfully. Sometimes lately I have noted that you've slipped, and I think you know what I mean -- I have noticed others pointing out the same thing when you lapse into Anonisms.
There are some times here when someone is commenting and I just don't feel that I am conversing with an adult human being. I don't mind being provocative, obviously, I throw some red meat out there for the rightwingers and expect them to bloody the waters, it's not that people express extreme opinions or disagree with me. It's just, I don't know, whatever...
JimK
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