#indecentvsobscene

One thing I was aware of, but not fully knowledgeable about was the Federal Communications Commission, also known as the FCC, is a governmental agency that enforces the “regulatory provisions that govern many media industries, particularly broadcast and cable television, telephony, and some aspects of the internet” (Havens and Lotz, 2017, pg. 251). The FCC holds a strong role in regulation of content for various shows that air on television especially talk shows, or any show that’s live for that matter. Another lesson I learned was that the FCC regulates content through two types of speech held through what’s called prior restraint and they include obscene and indecent. Obscene is “a type of speech that is not protected by the First Amendment” (Havens and Lotz, 2017, pg. 80). Indecency is “’language or material that depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium, sexual or excretory activities or organs’” which is legally allowed to air during the hours of 10pm and 6pm (Havens and Lotz, 2017, pg. 80). 

An example of obscene content is a talk show such as The Ellen Degeneres Show who is a comedian that has potential to be edgy, but self-regulates her limits to where she’s not labelled as indecency. The clip you’ll find above displays her comedic monologue that seems it could be edgy with the title “Does Ellen Smoke Weed?”, but Ellen plays it safe as usual. This daytime show is a source of family friendly entertainment where explicit content is practically never seen and also airs between 2 and 4pm depending on location. Yet, shows such as Modern Family or Scandal, tend to air around 8pm or 9pm which is pushing the limit towards the indecent content. However, they are still labelled as obscene since their shows have content regulations to meet and being a series where editing and cutting is present makes it more realistic to place them as obscene. Then there’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon or Saturday Night Live who tend to show very sensitive content that may be offensive and unreal in daytime television. Since these shows air after 10pm, the FCC realizes that most families, especially with children, are asleep. Thus, the audience they tend to target are adults who are looking to enjoy adult content. SNL came out with a recent skit called “Close Encounter” with Kate McKinnon, Ryan Gosling, and Cecily Strong. They act out a fictional story about being kidnapped by aliens and the sensitive content tends to derive Kate McKinnon’s language describing how her clothes fell off and the aliens were touching her in certain places and so on. Other skits from SNL as well as The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon tend to get political especially with relative current events and depending on whether one is liberal or conservative, this content will most likely be offensive. Yet, FCC regulates it through the indent speech and is legal to air. As long as live shows self-regulate their content and stay within their guidelines, these entertainers continue to be successful and produce some very laughable content.

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