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| Version | User | Scope of changes |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 14 2007, 9:45 PM EDT (current) | daph27 | |
| Oct 14 2007, 9:44 PM EDT | daph27 | 2 words added, 3 words deleted |
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by Daphne Wester, posted 10-14-2007
Normally, morning-after Super Bowl water cooler fodder is peppered with laughter at a beer commercial’s punchline, but after Super Bowl XXXVIII on February 1, 2004 the talk of the nation that Monday morning was not of Budweiser or a fumbled field goal but rather of the “wardrobe malfunction" heard ‘round the world. The game’s halftime show featured a performance by pop stars Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake. For the finale of the MTV produced halftime show, the pair performed Timberlake’s hit "Rock Your Body," and as Timberlake sang the last line of his song--"Gonna have you naked by the end of this
song"--a breast was exposed, history was made, and a new phrase entered the American
lexicon. In the days following the Super Bowl, which was broadcast by CBS, the FCC began to launch an investigation into the incident after many viewers filed formal complaints about the indecency of the halftime show (www.fcc.gov/eb/ORDERS/2006/FCC-06-19A1.html). The FCC’s investigation efforts were championed by the PTC, the Parents Television Council, an organization founded by Brent Bozell, a not-so-clandestinely conservative media critic, as a source of information for parents about the content of TV and ultimately to provide a medium between the FCC and parents for complaints on content found offensive or indecent. Indeed the PTC’s role in the scandal of "Nipplegate" is in no way an insignificant one--the organization’s website generated a very user-friendly complaint form that with a click of the "Submit" button, concerned PTC members could have their voices heard, and over 65,000 of them did (www.parentstv.org/PTC/fcc/Complaints.asp).[It is important to note that the figure of 65,000 is the number of complaints filed by PTC members through their website. With over 540,000 complaints in all to the FCC regarding the Super Bowl incident, the exact numbers of nonmembers who filed complaints at the urging of the PTC, i.e. the extent of the PTC’s involvement in the number of complaints, is a source of contention, often over estimated. For all of the 1.1 millions complaints of 2004, the PTC is said to be responsible for 224,000, only about 20% (www.pushhamburger.com/fcc_accused.htm).]
Eventually the FCC did deem the halftime show broadcast indecent and fined CBS the maximum amount per station, $27,500, totaling $550,000 in all
(www.fcc.gov/eb/ORDERS/2004?FCC-04-209A1.html). For a multi-billion dollar corporation, that doesn’t seem like an intolerable amount to be asked to pay for the world’s first and most notorious wardrobe malfunction, but shortly after that, both houses of congress put forth legislation to drastically up the maximum fine per broadcast of indecent material, eventually coming to a monetary compromise in 2005 of $325,000 per incident with a $3 million cap per day (www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/06/15/politics/main171752.shtml?sources=search_story). Under these new fines, one expletive broadcast on a network and its affiliates would most definitely hit the daily cap and cost the network’s corporation 3 million big ones.
With such fines looming as a possibility, most networks have adopted voluntary time delays for live broadcast including sporting events but also for typically scandal-free awards shows. The most recent product of Nipplegate’s time delay legacy was the clunky, mish-mashed, altogether discombobulating effort in sound editing and cut-aways that was known as the 2007 Emmy Awards, broadcast on Fox in September. What can only be described as the cutting edge of editing technology, Fox employed an entirely new mechanism to preempt any indecencies before they were broadcast--the "censorball," an abrupt cut-away from the Emmy stage to an aerial view of the auditorium in which most of the shot is taken up by a very large and sophisticated disco-type-ball, generally accompanied by a total loss of audio. Ray Ramano and Katherine Heigl were both relatively innocent victims of the censorball, but the most disturbing use of the censorball, because there is no clear way of knowing exactly why it was employed, was Sally Field’s acceptance speech in which she used the mild expletive "goddamn" in a very tame reproach of the current war. Why was the censorball used there? For "goddamn" or was the network, under the guise of avoiding indecency fines, suppressing political speech because they didn’t want to stir up any controversy? Whatever the case, the clunky editing and muting stole the award-winner’s moment of glory and in general made for awkward television.
The legacy of Nipplegate doesn’t end with live broadcasts; it can be felt in all programming on network primetime. This climate of fear of fines seems to have started the practice of creative self-censoring and has writers and executives in charge of creative programming shying away from anything that might not be considered even necessarily indecent, but from content that could create any sort of Nipplegate-like controversy. Former CEO of the WB Jordan Levin talked about this "chilling effect" during the fall television season that directly followed Nipplegate: "Because indecency laws are so ill-defined, there’s a paranoia that has crept into the creative process about simply doing story lines that deal with sexuality or drug use or abortion," he says. "The creative talent fears that because they may question a conservative agenda, they may become punished as a result" (www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,672960,00.html).
Indeed, media critic Jeff Jarvis points out that in 2004, "FCC chairman (Michael) Powell urged (the National Association of Broadcasters)--under threat of gigantic fines--to adopt a voluntary code." Saying, "‘It would be in your interest to do so,’" meaning if they don’t the FCC will (www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?=20040517&s=jarvis). Yet for Bozell and the PTC, he insists that his organization’s "agenda" is only to make television safe for children. He says, "Parents shouldn’t have to stand over the TV set with a shotgun defending their families from it"(www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,672960,00.html). But Jarvis asks where to draw the line: should all broadcasts be free of objectionable content and made suitable for a child of, say, 5 years old (www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?=20040517&s=jarvis)? What about adults? When media executives feel obligated to make all television safe for children, what are adults, the American public, losing? If you ask Jodie Evans, a contributing writer to Alternet.org who was unnerved by Field’s censoring at the Emmy’s, the American public is "Missing the truth, which puts us in a place to be manipulated." She points out that Fox journalists have said "goddamn" unbleeped, leading to the possible conclusion that Field’s speech was muted for political reasons and, for Evans this type of interference "narrows who we are as human beings" as others decide what the public can handle and puts us in position to be "held in place by a conservative agenda."
Jarvis parrots this notion when he asserts that "the breast" (the Jackson scandal) was the tipping point on the fulcrum that gave an excuse to those with a conservative agenda to jump in and say what is appropriate for public consumption. He points to the subsequent removal of Howard Stern from CBS radio not long after Nipplegate as an example of this, as the elimination of an opposing voice in broadcasting (www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20040517&s=jarvis). Calling for a return of more diverse voices in the media, Evans sums this up when she asks, almost nostalgically, "Whatever happened to good old American debate?"
