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The Daily Stern

15 comments on The Daily Stern

The Daily Stern

: CHAIRMAN POWELL’S CULTURAL REVOLUTION: Paul Frankenstein sends us a story from the South China Post (no link) about content regulations for TV that sound like they’re coming out of the FCC:

NO HAIR DYE, NO SPITTING, AND NO FOREIGN ELEMENTS…

Mainland television presenters have been told to tone down their already

tame performances or they will be taken off the air.

Appearing on television with dyed hair, dropping English words into

sentences and imitating expressions used by Hong Kong and Taiwanese

presenters are examples of going too far, according to the State

Administration of Radio, Film and Television.

As part of a new drive to “clean up the screen”, the administration has

issued a 30-clause circular that greatly limits what presenters can look

like and how they can say things while on air. Officials say they are

concerned about the influence the presenters might have on the nation’s

youth, and want to “help them form proper ideology and ethics.”

15 responses to “The Daily Stern”

  1. rossi Avatar
    rossi

    now thats scary
    honey i dont think there is anyone in american TV
    who would not be dumped under those standards
    scary shit

  2. rossi Avatar
    rossi

    by the way jeff
    how the hell are you
    havent chatted you up in ages

  3. submandave Avatar
    submandave

    To draw a moral equivalence between the FCC levying fines for anal sex jokes and potty language and the PRC’s efforts to keep their youth isolated from foreign influence by “greatly limit[ing] what presenters can look like and how they can say things” is little different than Sen. Kennedy’s statement that Saddam’s tortue chambers have been reopened under new management.
    To offer one equivalence while declaiming the other is blind at best and disingenuously self serving at worst.

  4. shark Avatar
    shark

    Even though we disagree on this Stern thing Jeff, you’re better than this.

  5. tony Avatar
    tony

    theres nothing better than defending the freedom of speech during a tyranical, hysterical, ultra-political age of censorship.
    bravo, jeff, for keeping this on the front burner of consciousness.
    shark, you should be ashamed of yourself.

  6. Frankenstein Avatar
    Frankenstein

    I think that the point is that the only difference between what the FCC is doing and what the doddering old coots in Beijing are doing is a matter of degree.
    It is, perhaps, a big degree, but the principles behind the two are essentially the same.

  7. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    I see hysterical people. The thing is, they don’t know they are hysterical… (Yes, I am looking at you, tony, and Jeff, and Frankenstein.)

  8. Frankenstein Avatar
    Frankenstein

    Hysterical as in funny or hysterical as in panicky?
    And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

  9. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    Both, Frankenstein. Of course, I’m not laughing with you, I’m laughing at you.
    Seriously, though, of course one must be ever-vigilant in the guardianship of freedom, this hysterical (as in panicky, yes) reaction to the slightest attempt to get grown human beings to act like it instead of like toddlers with their hands in their full diapers — which hysteria can be seen in the example Jarvis has so kindly provided here, comparing the feeble attempts of the FCC to enforce long-established mild codes to the tyrannical and nationalistic practices bordering on open racism of another country — does your cause no good. The more Jarvis and co. jump up and down screeching at the slightest feather to disturb Saint Howard’s brow, the more other people are driven to think, “Well, if that’s what free speech is all about, bring on the restrictions!” They may be wrong, but none of you have been very persuasive about why. Instead you have reacted the way preteen boys react to mother throwing away all your dirty magazines.
    There are, as a multitude of commenters have attempted to explain, much more egregious misuses of censorship and speech-restrictions than the ostentatious Howard and the FCC Show. The Stern brouhaha isn’t a case of “first they came for the deejays.” If anything, Stern is just another example of the fact that lack of self-restraint eventually brings on restrictions from outside. The whole idea of “freedom of speech” is predicated on the notion that adult human beings would be able to exercise a modicum of self-control. When you say that we should have to put up with foul-mouthed screaming idiots to stay true to the idea of freedom of speech, you have just displayed your ignorance of the very underpinnings of civilization.

  10. Frankenstein Avatar
    Frankenstein

    Andrea, there’s a saying about if you should find yourself in a hole, it might be a good idea to stop digging.
    The concept that “‘freedom of speech’ is predicated on the notion that adult human beings would be able to exercise a modicum of self-control” is both absurd and laughable, and five minutes with a constitutional lawyer would disabuse you of this notion. If that were, in fact, the case, then the first amendment would have read:
    Congress shall make no law […] abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, except those parties and individuals who cannot exercise their self-control; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble …
    Of course, it says no such thing.
    I would suggest doing some real research on the basis of “freedom of expression”: this link from findlaw.com seems like a good place to start. I think you will find “a modicum of self-control” to be an idea absent from the discussion.

  11. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    Oh, I see. I am attempting to communicate with a fool. Sorry, I thought I was talking to someone who could think.

  12. Shark Avatar
    Shark

    Excuse me Tony, you don’t get to have an opinion about anything pertaining to Stern anymore. You claim to listen to the guy and you don’t even know he says he voted for Gore?
    YEAH, RIIIIIIGHT……did you lie about being a real listener, or about who Stern said he voted for?
    Which is it Tony, and either way, isn’t your credibility shot?

  13. Frankenstein Avatar
    Frankenstein

    So the fact that I not only disagree with you but can also back up what I say makes me a fool? Curious way to try to win people over. And be not angry with me for spotlighting the absurdity of one of your arguments; what ever happened to agreeing to disagree?
    I mean, the substantive part of your argument seems to be 1) You’re hysterical, 2) many worse things have happened, and 3) you’re a fool.
    Your claim that “[t]he whole idea of ‘freedom of speech’ is predicated on the notion that adult human beings would be able to exercise a modicum of self-control” is, again, simply untrue. That statement logically implies that freedom of speech should only apply to adults who can exercise self-control, which is clearly absurd. The whole idea behind ‘freedom of speech’ is that it’s content-blind (with some notable exceptions) and is origin-blind. But more importantly, the First Amendment is about regulating the powers of the government, not about regulating the speech or expression of the people.

  14. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    Why you are a fool: I wasn’t talking about laws and regulations, I was talking about the philosophy behind the whole idea of people having the right to say what they want to say. I was talking about the philosophy and customs underpinning society as a whole — and you send me to lawyers and babble to me about paper. I tell you that if you do not believe that there is some overarching truth/way/moral system/whatever that laws are based upon then your pieces of paper, no matter how much revered, will mean nothing. From what I have seen here neither you nor anyone else so much as understands this idea, so I am probably pissing in the wind, but I might as well go on:
    The Founding Fathers believed that they were backed up in their philosophy by the idea that all human beings had natural rights that were endowed by their Creator, whatever that might be (this was not necessarily an entirely Christian idea, as many of the Founders were not all that Christian). But along with those natural rights came responsibilities. Leaving aside the fact that our ways of dress and discourse — and technology — would shock Jefferson et all out of their stockings, do you really think that any of them would go for the notion that all speech — even the dribblings of an idiot, or causeless obscenities — is morally equivalent, and that there should not be some restrictions that society should place on itself in order that the country not devolve into an anarchic mess? Do you think that the Constitution is a magic paper, the mere convocation of which is supposed to ward off all evil? It takes hard work to build and maintain a society, a lot of it not much fun, and none of you strike me as entirely serious about doing anything that interferes with any of your pleasures.
    I have no power as such, I can only fulminate. But if enough people get disgusted, they will come to a conclusion that there have been too many restrictions lifted, and then there will be changes made. I don’t say that this is a right outcome, but I say that you don’t take it seriously enough. You are playing with fire. Too much license is just a much of a threat to a civilization (especially a democracy) as too little. See Rome: the people became disgusted, turned inward, refused to fight, and let the barbarians in. But I guess you don’t care if the new Dark Ages come to your descendants, as long as you have all your toys.

  15. Andrea Harris Avatar
    Andrea Harris

    PS: that was meant to be “Jefferson et al.” Please excuse that or any other misspelling.