Dammit! Who woke up the censors?
(That’s a Craig Ferguson shout-out there.)
It can be hilarious in sitcoms. I loved it when they did that on Arrested Development, the show in which Tobias wanted George Michael to refer to him as Uncle T-Bag.
*Any *chance it’s intentional, for the fun of it?
Plus there’s an awesome stretch of bleeped-out swearing (which may not all be swearing at all) in the first episode of South Park, where Kyle goes apeshit on the aliens after they’ve refused to be moved by his “I’ve realized I love my little brother, please give him back” speech. I was laughing so hard I had trouble breathing. I think the string that sounded like “and bleep-k and bleep-k and…” was what really killed me. I was trying to picture if he’d run out of profanity to spew and resorted to “and fuck and fuck and…”
Son of a Rich: Even better, he needs to invite Rick Santorum on the show for that. I’m not sure whether it’d be funnier to try to bleep it live or not let Santorum know ahead of broadcast at all.
This wasn’t a news show,it was a talkshow. Bill Maher has said much worse things on network-based late night shows that nade it through uncensored,some which even I was surprised with. So I doubt it’s a FCC-related violation,which leads me to believe that somebody at Letterman or CBS got their feelings hurt by the name calling and intervined,which is bullsh**
Maybe 1st amendment isn’t the right term,but something here seems very off. Why not just edit the discussion out if they didn’t want to air it?
Hell, they bleeped Letterman saying the word “ass”. Things aren’t like they used to be.
I’ll speak my opinions on free speech freely! Allow me to instruct you, spoutless one. The topic was censorship of the term “Teabagger” on CBS, a corporation. I argued that the existence of the First Amendment meant we should look askance at corporate censorship as well as government censorship, as both tend to limit free speech. It’s directly relevant to the discussion.
Or Semprini.
In my humble opinion, hell yeah. They have no right to be offended if they made up the goddamn name in the first place.
Regardless, when I hear the term “teabagger”, I just think of the tea party doofuses. I don’t even think of the sex act. But that might because the sex act is much less obscene than those tools.
Bill Maher is an asshole douchebag and should be censored at any and all opportunities.
Well, you’ve poisoned the well a tad. To me Tea Party and teabagger could not be more unrelated. And the whole concept of teabagging, homo or hetero, is just fucking gross! Its like filthy sanchez etc. Bleep away, please!
But you’re wrong. Free speech not only applies to the right to say things, it applies to the right not to. If you are insisting that we should look askance at a corporation for refusing to air something, then you are also saying that we should look askance at a person for refusing to say something. Demanding that an individual or group say something instead of keeping silent is infringing on their rights.
Heck, this message board software even automatically censors kn*ckers.
An oddity, if only to me, is that there are words you can’t (or that they won’t) say on TV anymore that you could in the 1980s (at least within some contexts): fag/faggot, nigger, most racial epithets that Archie Bunker would have used (wop, Chink, Hebe, etc.). Almost all of the new self-censorship is about political correctness. They bleeped “raghead” in a rerun of Three Kings that was on cable not long ago.
On the other hand there are words you can say on primetime network television that they couldn’t or wouldn’t say in the 1980s: ass/asshole, bitch, goddamned, blow (in the sexual sense), douche (I know, Buck Henry, but that wasn’t primetime and it wasn’t an insult at the time), and several others, all of which are generic rather than targeted at a specific group.
Strange the sensibilities.
Actually, I believe the person who wanted the act performed would be the teabaggee. The person actually dropping the teabag is the teabagger.
The exercise of applying this to the Tea Party is best left to the reader, I think.
Ah, but if what is said on CBS impacts the individual listener’s purchasing decisions in a way that that directly or indirectly impacts interstate commerce? E.g., perhaps Maher’s use of the word “teabag” would have dissuaded people from purchasing tea, and their inaction would have negatively influenced the market for the beverage and placed a burden on those good people across the nation who produce and consume tea. Where is your First Amendment now? :dubious:
Tea Party, now. Who’s next the Lemon Party?
(bolding mine)
You misspelled rabbit-punched.
That’s one.
“knackers”?
I would censor Lillian Gish’s knickers.
A private entity that is using a limited, publicly controlled resource, namely the broadcast airwaves.
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer]
That would be tantamount to declaring that the First Amendment doesn’t apply to them, since you’d be mandating what they had to say.
[/QUOTE]
Certainly it doesn’t as far as “bleeping” words, since the government does that all the time with broadcast stations.