Blind justice smacks FCC down
Four Superbowls ago, singer Janet Jackson had a “wardrobe malfunction” that exposed one breast for a microsecond on national TV. The FCC, responding to an Internet-fed viral protest, levied a huge fine — the largest ever — on CBS to punish it for degrading the morals of American society.
An appellate court today reversed the $550,000 fine, effectively telling the FCC to cool its jets.
The Philadelphia court based its decision on two factors, apparently.
First, it ruled that Jackson and fellow performer Justin Timberlake (who had grabbed the part of her costume that “malfunctioned”) were “independent contractors” and not CBS employees. Thus, the court ruled, CBS could not be held responsible for their actions.
Second, it sided with CBS’ opinion that the number of actual viewers protesting the boob flash could not be accurately determined. The FCC said in its brief that there had a record-setting 542,000 protests against the halftime (strip)show. But CBS in its brief noted that 85% of the protests were actually copies of a form letter prepared by single-interest groups.
Or to put it more simply, most of those 542,000 protesters probably weren’t even watching the Superbowl, so Janet’s split-second exposure could not possibly have scarred their tender sensibilities.
Unlike cable and satellite TV outlets, broadcasters like CBS that use the airwaves have to follow strict FCC programming guidelines. The rationale is that cable and sat-TV subscribers choose their programming by paying for it, but broadcast viewers have little control over what they see or hear on the TV.
So, that means no nudity (although some programs have pushed that envelope with bare butts), no cussing (though this restriction has been loosened as some words have become more socially acceptable), no sex (well, there’s soap operas …), and so on.
Technically, then, it was against FCC regulations for Janet Jackson to have revealed a breast on air, even accidentally. There’s still some debate about how accidental the flash really was, but the exposure was so short that only the sharpest eye (or someone recording the game) could have caught it. Check it out in this clip courtesy of YouTube:
Dismayed by the “ebbing morality” on TV, there are several conservative media watchdog groups that obsessively monitor broadcasters for any minor infraction of their moral code. They jumped on Jackson’s boob-flash like a dog in heat, whipping their loyal followers into a froth by pointing out the number of children watching the football game.
Imagine the millions of kids scarred for life by (maybe) seeing Jackson’s breast …
So, these groups have form protest letters on their sites for loyal followers to fill out and send to the FCC, whether they saw the program or not. And in this case the already conservative FCC board of directors caved in to this overwhelming hue and cry, nailing CBS with an excessive fine — I suppose to make an example of it.
Only in America could a split-second exposure turn into a half-million-dollar regulatory fine.
Anyway, calmer and wiser appellate judges have seen through some of the bullshit resulting from this on-air gaffe, putting it in better perspective. Janet Jackson’s boobs are really not that earth-shaking.
