Big Iron: What IS the “Fish Cheer”?
The “Fish Cheer” occurred most famously at Woodstock. When Country Joe and the Fish came on stage, before playing their protest song “The I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag”, Country Joe called out “Gimme an F!” The crowd responded “F!”. But Country did not go on to spell “fish”. He spelled a different 4 letter word, one that would get a college rock station dj suspended. The Woodstock album records the momentary glory of hearing a million unbathed boomers yelling that one famed cussword in united voices, over and over again. Ah solidarity!
Peace and love. I guess.
Your Quadell
I heartily agree that the uptight nature of the FCC is silly and some good old fashioned sex and nudiy on TV ain’t gonna hurt no one, not that without it there I saw any less porn in my formitive years. I say show whatever you want, and let the veiwers decide. The last thing I want is this “you show blood and guts and murder and rape, but no sex or nudity” arguement to backfire (which it seems to be in congress) and then they censor the violence instead of opening up the nudity. Censorship is bad period.
Now for a unsubstantiated guess of why things are the way they are. Violence on TV, simply is not real. It’s all props, and special effects. The FCC believes everyone understands this and has no problem seeing realistic special effects. Nudity however is always real. I suspect that nude cartoons (neglecting the obvious allure to kids) and plastic blow up dolls and manequins who are naked won’t upset to many censors.
I also am happy to see that educational programming can be seen uncut in all types of TV formats. We all recall the Schindler’s List broadcast on NBC, totally uncut and uninterupted. There should be more of these sexually informative shows like you describe, and they should be promoted, and parents should encourage their kids to watch them. I persoanlly am angered by the complete inadequacy of the SEx Ed programs in most schools. Some good supplemental home/cable sex ed. is a great thing.