Indecent Words and Advertising
Introduction
Comments by Herb Rotfeld
INTEREST CATEGORY: MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
POSTING TYPE: Dialog
Author: Herbert Jack Rotfeld
No FCC-banned words are in this comment. While talking about words or illustrations that would cause student complaints if used by faculty in the classroom, none of those words are used. All statements herein would be acceptable at the most restrictive of commercial supported television networks such as CBS or NBC, as are the linked video segments at the end of this message and the article in Marketing News.
With the new George Carlins American Dream documentary, radio and TV journalists are dusting off old interviews with the late comedian. And as they did at his passing in 2008, they invariably note his now-famous routine that lead to a Supreme Court case confirming the FCCs power to regulate indecent language in the broadcast media. While Carlins seven words you cant say on television described Federal Communications Commission rules for U.S. broadcasters, educators can expect administrator reactions if they speak those words in classes, even if the course topic is advertising regulation or communications law discussing the case. Audience members might not know the specific list, but they know the words, as do their children. After all, they are all in common usage. Since they are still considered indecent, reporters always play an out-of-context sound bite of Carlins routine, using a series of seven generic sounds or bleeps to replace the words. In video reports, they also blur his mouth to avoid offending any lip readers in the audience. No one can doubt that the reports compel people of all ages do a web search for Seven Dirty Words where they immediately appear in the first paragraph. Wikipedia even has a page with that name.
Advertising professionals have always found ways around media companies restrictions on acceptable words or images that forbid common words that directly describe what a product is or does. Youd think that broadcasters would have found a way to directly identify the seven words without using the actual words themselves. For more complete reporting, they could say:
None of the seven words are profane in the sense of blasphemous to any faith. They are five four-letter words and two compound words, indicating feces, urine, sex, lady parts, male gratification oral sex, a mothers sex partner, and breasts. All seven are often used as singular outbursts or in contexts unrelated to their literal meaning. The compound words are pejoratives that would never be used to reference a husband or wife, as their literal meaning should include.
Other alternatives for the four-letter words are maybe-less-used of defecation, micturition, coitus, vagina and mammary.
Journalists should say this if they want their audiences to be informed. If they just use the bleeps, they are just trying to be salacious in their own way. Reporters entire discussion of Carlins legal legacy from this routine never even asks his question of why these words, without context, are indecent. For people on a university campus, inquiring minds should want it discussed.
On October 4, 1961, comedian Lenny Bruce was arrested on obscenity charges in San Francisco for using the ten-letter compound word in his nightclub act. As he reported on the trial in a subsequent performance & recorded in a comedy album, Bruce substituted blah-blah-blah.
Prosecutor: Your Honor, he said blah-blah-blah.
Judge: He said blah-blah-blah? I dont believe it.
Prosecutor: He said blah-blah-blah. I wouldnt lie to you.
Judge: He really said blah-blah-blah.
Prosecutor: He said blah-blah-blah. Right there on stage.
As the comedian noted, at some point you realize that the judge and lawyers enjoyed saying [blah-blah-blah]. In 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court Miller v. California broadened First Amendment protection for material like Lenny Bruces, based on an argument of the materials underlying literary, artistic, and social value. However, in the 21st century, U.S. broadcast regulations are still permitted to restrict any use of words marked as indecent.
For further entertainment, see:
—泭On The Late Show with Steven Colbert, a program on the broadcast network CBS, the host described insider details of what art is allowed by the shows censors, also known as their Office of Standards and Practices.
—泭On a different program, Colbert spent five minutes on what CBS blurred from the illustrations he used when he humorously discussed a scientific study of frog sex. Heres the original segment of beast reality (his title) from a week earlier where the prude-protecting blurring of frogs is very weird, especially since frogs dont have external genitalia.
—泭 but please remember that the authors dont write the headlines in news magazines.