Watch a clip about the Wests Tigers Rugby players giving interviews to some on-field reporter. Apparently they’ve just won some kind of tournament. The players used the word “Fucking” and it seemed to set the reporter back a little but it wasn’t like the interview was terminated. In the US, that wouldn’t go over well at all. Would/was this censored in any way? Or is “Fuck” just not that big of a deal? Not entirely sure what country it was in either, Australia?
Actually, the FCC in the US recently ruled that this particular use of “fucking” was allowed as long as it was live, and used as an intenifier instead of a description of sexual intercourse. Sting evidently used the word in some live awards show, but no one was fined.
It was Bono, and while the FCC originally said it was OK, they reversed themselves, saying that any fucking use of the word was obscene.
Yes that would be Sydney, Australia. It would be censored out during family viewing times but later at night it would probably get to air.
Many US TV shows drop the F bomb pretty regularly without being censored on TV over here. Most notably The Sopranos, and Oz.
That’s pretty much right I’d say. I’ve certainly heard the f word on several occasions later in the evening.
It’s quite prevalent nowadays. I know people who litter it throughout their general conversation. As a result I think it has lost some (though not all) of its stigma.
Tyler Palko, quarterback for the University of Pittsburgh, said “I’m fucking proud of my team!” when a sideline reporter approached him right after he beat Notre Dame. The sports desk guys had to do a little CYA after he said that (“ohh, it’s the heat of the moment”) and eventually the university as well as Palko had to apologize.
Personally, I think he got off light…he should have been suspended for the West Virginia game for that comment 
That was Wests Tigers after their Sunday night Grand Final win in the National Rugby League a few weeks ago.
A better one several years ago featured Sam Backo (Canberra, Brisbane), a big unsophisticated forward, who after a game gave an interview overflowing with boyish enthusiasm, excitement and a torrent of swearing. What made it even funnier was that he had done the same thing on at least one previous occassion.
Recently I saw the more famous event included in a “Greatest Moments of Footbal Broadcasting” compilation.
If you care to pay attention to the sounds in many televised games of league, you hear the players swearing through the referee’s mikes. Sometimes a ref will point this out to a player who is going off.
The game was shown during prime time, but was live so the fu*k word was not bleeped out. They fellas who were interviewed were only young and were very excited about winning, so I suppose they forgot to control their language.
It was no big deal, however media training lessons were soon booked.
And reiterating: Wests Tigers beat the Cowboys in Sydney, Australia on 2 Oct 2005 in the sport called NRL (rugby league). Profanities probably aired about 9-9:30pm.
An even better one was Mal Menninga, then captain of Queensland and Australia giving a profanity laced psych-up speech to the players on an open mike before kick offf of a State Of Origin game while the national anthem was playing!
Another good un was when Steve Foulkes, coach of those wonderful models of public probity and the good image of the game, The Canterbury Bulldogs, was asked on ABC radio what went wrong after a loss. “We played shithouse” was his terse and final answer, leaving the interviewer gasping for a follow up.
What I constantly notice is how much better AFL players are prepared to deal with the media than their rugby league counterparts - while Rugby League continues to hobble from scandal to scandal and the AFL seems to brush things over with a much better and slicker media presentation.
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That this stuff offends so many people is pathetic enough. That it would actually require an apology from the player and the university is the height of ridiculousness.
They don’t get censored over here, either. They’re both produced by HBO, a cable network unregulated by the FCC. Only over-the-air broadcast stations and networks are subject to FCC regs.
The difference is that in Australia these shows air on free-to-air, network television; the equivalent of NBC, CBS, etc.
I got into trouble when visiting my friend’s junior high class in Maine - someone asked me what kind of TV shows we had in NZ and I explained that we had lots of British, Australian, NZ and American shows - even South Park, then I said “you know, you’re a dick, no you’re a dick, no you’re a dick”. The kids all laughed their heads off, I thought - ‘good, but not that good!’ - turns out ‘dick’ is on the banned list! Never happend here.