Whither the V-Chip?
Jeff Jarvis has been getting his knickers in a knot the last couple of weeks over the continued annoyance that is the Federal Communications Commission, and I’m starting agree with him. His latest missive highlights how the threat of FCC fines for indecency has caused television stations to decide not to run “Saving Private Ryan“. I couldn’t put my finger on what bothered me most about this continuing saga until last night, just as I was going to sleep, it hit me: what happened to the V-Chip?
Oh, you don’t remember the V-Chip? Allow me to refresh your memory…
In 1995, I was an Engineering Science student at Simon Fraser University. One of my lab professors at the time, Tim Collings, had been tinkering on a system for blocking TV content based on a ratings signal embedded in a cable TV transmission. Central to Tim’s motivation was the desire to protect his children from indecent content.
It was neat technology, but ultimately I didn’t think it would ever take off. I mean, really, who would need a device to block television? Hadn’t they heard of the off switch and parental supervision? Besides, the infrastructure changes to provide the requisite rating signal would be immense! Nothing short of a Presidential declaration would force cable companies to make those kinds of changes.
And then in January of 1996, my housemates and I watched President Clinton’s State of the Union Address in disbelief as he made the following impassioned plea to Congress:
To the media, I say you should create movies and CDs and television shows you’d want your own children and grandchildren to enjoy. (Applause.)
I call on Congress to pass the requirement for a V chip in TV sets so that parents can screen out programs they believe are inappropriate for their children. (Applause.) When parents control what their young children see, that is not censorship; that is enabling parents to assume more personal responsibility for their children’s upbringing. And I urge them to do it. The V chip requirement is part of the important telecommunications bill now pending in this Congress. It has bipartisan support, and I urge you to pass it now. (Applause.)
To make the V chip work, I challenge the broadcast industry to do what movies have done — to identify your program in ways that help parents to protect their children. And I invite the leaders of major media corporations in the entertainment industry to come to the White House next month to work with us in a positive way on concrete ways to improve what our children see on television. I am ready to work with you. (Applause.)
Today, every new TV over 33″ contains a V-Chip. Problem solved, right? Children safe? Decency restored? And I can go back to disabling it so I can watch whatever the hell I want, when I want, unbridled by the attempts of government to tell me what I can and can’t watch, right?
Oops! Wrong!
The battle to save the tender eyes and ears of children should have ended with the V-Chip, but it didn’t. No, now even the adults have to be protected from offense. I mean, what goes through these people’s minds?
Television Announcer: Tonight, Saving Private Ryan, a gripping wartime drama movie blah blah blah, blah blah death blah harsh reality of war.
Viewer’s Brain: Hmm. War movie? I don’t know what that means. I know I’m in the mood for fluffy bunnies and mild moral-sounding platitudes dished out by anorexic pop stars. But I can’t quite figure out if this show will fit the bill…hmm, oh well, I guess I’ll just keep watching!
Five minutes later, a boatload of GIs get brutally massacred in the time between leaving their boat and hitting the sand.
Viewer (aloud): My God! This is violent! Well, that simply won’t do! I guess I’ll have to write an outraged letter to the FCC! After all, it’s not like I have the power to switch the channel or anything…
The way things are going, CSPAN’s going to end up getting itself fined! Especially if Cheney speaks his mind towards his opponents again and it’s caught on tape this time.
While I may agree that parents controlling what their children see is not censorship, having the FCC restrict what I see certainly qualifies as censorship. It’s only made more annoying by the fact that the FCC’s efforts to regulate what we see and hear are ill-conceived at best and downright idiotic at worst. Who in their right mind believes that the word “God” on TV is OK, and the word “damn” on TV is OK, but if you put the two together then you’ve gone outside the bounds of decency? Or that 10pm marks a time at which everyone magically becomes incrementally more tolerant of “indecent” material? I don’t know about you, but half the time I’d rather be in bed asleep by 10pm.
The sheer insanity of the FCC system of regulation was never more apparent to me than when I saw an episode of the Graham Norton Effect a couple months ago. In the show, Graham Norton had solicited male members of the audience to make candles. From their genitals. I am not creative enough to be making this up. Janet Jackson’s boob? Indecent! Guys’ schlongs rendered in wax and placed atop a birthday cake? Decent!
The continued interference of the FCC in the viewing decisions of the American people only underlines the failure of the V-Chip. And therein lies the lesson: the V-Chip failed because it was incapable of reflecting the diverse tastes of viewers and their individual interpretations of what constitutes “decent” or “indecent” material. Just like the FCC. But there is an upside – as the FCC continues to meddle, content producers will move to unregulated channels of distribution and consumers, driven by frustration at the FCC’s lack of respect for their right to choose to be offended, will follow them.
It’s only a matter of time before the FCC is relegated to the dustbin of history.
mmmm schlongs. i mean cake… brendon, i’m impressed with your research and inspired by your outrage. while i wouldn’t waste my televison freedom watching the graham norton effect, i’m sure that televison, radio, and internet content will break all regulation barriers. as you said, it will find a way. and we can all sit happily watching porn.
Maybe that’s the real agenda of the FCC. They, like Dennis Miller, realize that if content were totally unregulated, it would end up that everything would be pornography. They have to make up these weird, non-sensical rules to keep everyone distracted and the GDP’s growth non-negative.
“FOX transformed into a hardcore porn channel so gradually I didn’t even notice!” – Marge Simpson
I’m just babbling here, but is there a difference in the way the FCC enforces stuff on the transmitted channels vs. the cable channels? So ABC and its affiliates, who broadcast over the airwaves in certain jurisdictions, are held to a more stringent standard than Comedy Central, which exists only on cable?
I think it has something to do with the airwaves being public property licensed to private companies, whereas cable is more or less a privately owned network of copper.
Look at HBO, suckas get their asses shot off all the time there.
It’s probably also worth pointing out that setting content restrictions for TV channels is only one of the FCC’s many important functions. Keeping the airwaves more or less orderly and making sure everybody plays by the same rules are crucial to ensuring that any kind of low-EM-transmission based technology (radios, cell phones, tv, 802.11) can function.
Critics are right to point out that many of the FCC’s rulings favour well-lobbied corporate interests over the little guy… for instance, in a perfect world a portion of the FM band would be set aside for micropower unlicensed transmissions, to let “pirate” stations have room to play. But without the FCC there wouldn’t be any FM band at all.