FCC’s Tom Wheeler and commissioners come to unanimous vote on enforcement
Washington, D.C. (March 23, 2015) – Today, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) unanimously voted to enforce the federal broadcast indecency law after an eight-year hiatus. Today’s enforcement vote came against television station WDBJ, Roanoke Virginia, (parent company Schurz Communications) regarding a July 12, 2012, 6 p.m. broadcast news clip that featured a porn video clip.
“The FCC is the guardian of broadcast decency and it must enforce the law. We praise FCC Chairman, Tom Wheeler for initiating this enforcement action and for the message it will send to broadcasters everywhere,” stated Dawn Hawkins, Executive Director of National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCSE).
Hawkins added, “Indecency on TV sexualizes our children and prepares them to become participants in the pornified world that awaits them. This is exactly why the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCSE), formerly Morality in Media (MIM), has been a leader in the matter of TV indecency for more than 50 years.”
The federal indecency law, 18 U. S. C. 1464 and FCC rules prohibit indecent material on broadcast TV and radio between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m, though many networks and stations have ignored the law for years, Hawkins noted. The FCC defines broadcast indecency as “language or material that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium, sexual or excretory organs or activities.” NCSE leads a project to defend broadcast decency standards https://endsexualexploitation.org/fcc/ that includes instructions on how to file a complaint.
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