Obscenity

 

The Federal Communications Commission is rankled over ABC’s opening video for MondayNightFootball last week. Described as "steamy" the intro shows a naked actress -- from the back, above the waist -- jumping into the arms of a football player. Said FCC chief Semi-Colin Powell, the networks keep pushing the indecency envelope, "in order to get financial gains and the free advertising it provides." Well, yeah, and ABC apologized for offending people, all the way to the bank.

The scandalous event occurred a week after a third of ABC’s affiliates refused to air the award-winning film, "Saving Private Ryan," as something of a protest of the FCC morality play. In this case, use of the f-word. It should be noted that the movie had run before and on neither occasion generated significant objection. Considering the squalid nature of so much of television, people swearing and dying hardly seems a big deal.

The fact is that the networks have no scruples. They air what they can get away with. They court the limits of what is allowed, which lies many miles beyond anything resembling the worst taste. They’re about sales, sales, sales. Their view of their charter to serve the public is how much they can charge for what they serve up to as many of the opiated messes as possible.

That’s the real obscenity. That the networks produce and distribute this mindless tripe, numbing the people to the reality of their world. If the networks were doing their job, they would be focusing on the Republicans changing the House rules to protect Tom DeLay’s leadership position in the event he’s indicted in Texas. They would put Margaret Hassan’s photo up at the top of every newscast until the American people finally got what a disaster is Iraq. They would hold a mirror up to their and our hypocrisy and demand more of us all.

And that’s SetonnoteS...I’m Tony Seton.

 

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