I’m not much of a TV watcher (I prefer to rot my brain online) but the other people in my house are. While the WryGuy tends to watch stuff like the History Channel and Discovery and such, both my daughter and my brother watch a fair bit of reality TV - more stuff like Miami Ink and the Dog the Bounty Hunter show than Wifeswap or the like, but it’s still reality TV. And it is driving me OUT OF MY BLEEPING MIND, because there’s apparently a huge amount of profanity in these shows… and it’s not the profanity per se that bothers me, but the near-constant bleeping of the profanity!
There seems to be whole entire paragraphs of bleeped-out profanity in these shows. How the bleep can anyone even follow a conversation that sounds like this:
“I’m all like bleep you, you bleepbleep! Where the bleepbleep does he bleep his bleep? I don’t know, I bleep told bleepbleepbleep and then bleep”
Holy bleep! If there’s so much profanity that this amount of bleeping is required to broadcast the show, has it ever occured to anyone that maybe there’s just too much profanity for it to air??
(I am amused, though, by this odd bleeping phenomenon: “You are an assbleep. bleepdamn you.” How come “hole” and “god” get bleeped when “ass” and “damn” don’t???)
I agree about the excess bleeping. Does the show air on any other channels, maybe, where the profanity is permitted? That would explain why they keep it in the show but bleep it out. But yeah, when every second word is bleeped, it’s really hard to follow the show.
Besides that, can someone explain to me how a show about a tattoo shop gets a spot on the learning channel?
'Cause it’s the whole expression that gives the FCC the flying shits. “Ass” and “damn” are standard fare now. “Hole” is more descriptive of the body part that they don’t want you to know you have, and thus it’s deleted. Using “god” pejoratively in any way will light up the switchboards, so it’s bleeped out.
I think it’s more of a case where the idea is this is “reality tv” and real tattoo artists and bounty hunters and head chefs (I’m thinking of Hell’s Kitchen which was on a broadcast network–like Fox a few years back) swear, so allowing them to interact naturally and profanely and then bleeping it makes sense. Except that reality tv is so contrived and edited for the camera, that one does sometimes think–hey, why don’t you just have them run through that conversation again, minus the profanity.
I don’t watch a lot of that kind of stuff, but I’ll admit, little as I like actual profane language, sometimes bleeping is worse. And sometimes, just cutting the sound entirely is even worse yet. (I watched something, in my usual laidback motel room tv on for company, but I’m reading a book or packing or something, where everytime it got quiet because someone swore I’d look up at the screen. I found it very annoying.)
Yes, exactly. I’m not a nun, my own language is more-frequently-than-is-necessary punctuated by profanity, but endless streams of sentences that are nothing BUT profanity is “real-life”? OK, even if I buy that, the bleeping is FAR more annoying than the swearing would be.
I’m often here in the dining room on the computer while someone else is watching TV in the next room. Generally, the volume is low enough that I can’t hear the TV except for the bleeps. I could understand if, as Antigen suggested, if a show was made for Showtime or HBO and was being re-broadcast on a network, but shows made FOR the Learning Channel or Fox or whatever??
I’ve got an idea for a product that would deal with this. A context sensitive swearword inserter. It would parse the dialog for beeps and insert an appropriate fuck, damn, hell, or shit. The real trick would be getting the gender, tone, and timbre correct.
I’ve got an even better idea: Why can’t they use the SAP (Secondary Audio Program) channel (it’s hardly ever used; most of the channels I generally watch have no SAP content) to carry the unedited version of the audio. SAP is off by default, so people who don’t want their kids learning those words (don’t get me started on how stupid that is) don’t have to do anything special, but those who want the raw dialog can switch on the SAP.
Failing that, I wish they’d stop using BLEEP and just blank out the objectionable words; it would be much less annoying. Bleeping sons of bleeps.
We (a bunch of friends of mine) were all watching Jerry Springer one afternoon (WHAT? It was on at the bar!) and watched as another “bleep” filled conversation was broadcast - they were “bleeping” words that weren’t even profanity - just for shock (or is it schlock?) value. Cracked us the hell up.
Yeah, and while they’re at it, I’d like to know why a bunch of dudes playing poker is all I ever see on the Travel Channel…geez, I thought they had jumped the shark back when they started doing all those “Top 10 Destinations In Which To Engage In Shallow Materialism/Sexism/Whateverism”…
The Breakfast Club - “Forget you!”
“No, forget YOU!”
We caught our first ever episode of “Hell’s Kitchen” late one Friday night, and no bleeping in sight! Holy moleys, that’s a whole lotta “fuck,” there! We caught our second episode yesterday in prime time, and it was bleeped to heck. I’m torn about the bleeping, actually. I’m not all that offended by the occasional swear word, but a whole show of nothing but swearing (or bleeping) does get old. As Will Smith said, “Easy on the swears.”
No bleeping kidding. Every other bleeping word out of their bleeping mouths is a bleeping swear word. If you plan on bleeping out the entire bleeping dialogue you are going to have a bleeping dull show.
Some movies should not be on regular cable or TV with the language censored because it distracts the viewer from the experience. Full Metal Jacket loses something when they censor the basic training tirades. I really commend ABC for putting Saving Private Ryan on with the full language and violence. Same with Comedy Central for South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut even if they had to show it after midnight.
Other shows go over the top with the language (most reality shows and the “confrontational” talk shows like Springer or Povitch) but you have to look at the kinds of people that participate in them.
I’m no prude and I heard every swear word possible when I was in the Army, working in construction, working in warehouses and working with truckers. But I don’t think the obscenities need to be that prevalent. The VW ads where the people get into an accident ends with a passenger saying, “Holy…” and then it cuts them off. Same thing for a Comcast internet ad.
What is the penetration of TVs with the V-chip now? They’ve been mandatory in virtually all TVs for over six years now. Why won’t cable channels just rate their programs honestly and show uncut programming, then let the viewer control what the TV will show by blocking ratings they find offensive? Is bleep! * really less offensive than fuck!* if you can read their lips?
It’s not a TV show (you’d think :)), but a friend and I had a joke for a while where we envisioned Eminem playing the Superbowl, and all that we’d get would be: “Buh-bleep. Bleep. Bleep-bleep. Bleep bleep bleeeep.”
No bleeping kidding. Every other bleeping word out of their bleeping mouths is a bleeping swear word. If you plan on bleeping out the entire bleeping dialogue you are going to have a bleeping dull show.
Some movies should not be on regular cable or TV with the language censored because it distracts the viewer from the experience. Full Metal Jacket loses something when they censor the basic training tirades. I really commend ABC for putting Saving Private Ryan on with the full language and violence. Same with Comedy Central for South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut even if they had to show it after midnight.
Other shows go over the top with the language (most reality shows and the “confrontational” talk shows like Springer or Povitch) but you have to look at the kinds of people that participate in them.
I’m no prude and I heard every swear word possible when I was in the Army, working in construction, working in warehouses and working with truckers. But I don’t think the obscenities need to be that prevalent. The VW ads where the people get into an accident ends with a passenger saying, “Holy…” and then it cuts them off. Same thing for a Comcast internet ad.
