TV News

US TV censors of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have proposed to change their rules so as to treat internet TV companies the same as cable and satellite TV providers.

At the moment media companies are not required to offer their programming to Internet TV companies.  On the other hand rules requiring traditional cable and satellite TV to carry certain content, like broadcast TV, do not apply to internet TV companies.

Currently consumers without cable or satellite have been unable to get the same breadth of content from Internet-based TV services that they could get from a paid TV provider or in some cases over-the-air TV broadcasters.

It's this difference in regulatory classification that allowed network TV broadcasters, such as CBS, which owns CNET, to deny Aereo access to their programming, even after it offered to pay retransmission fees. Earlier this year, the US Supreme Court said that it was illegal for Aereo to retransmit broadcast TV over the Internet without paying broadcasters a retransmission fee.

Even though he didn't name Aereo outright, FFC head Tom Wheeler said that the existing rules are ultimately hurting consumers who are being denied access to content on alternative platforms. Wheele said in a statement:

Big company control over access to programming should not keep programs from being available on the Internet. Today, we propose to break that bottleneck.

Efforts by new entrants to develop new video services have faltered because they could not get access to programming content that was owned by cable networks or broadcasters.

Washington's football team can relax as, TV and radio stations can now say its name without fearing government PC censorship.

US TV censors of the Federal Communications Commission have rejected a petition that claimed the name Redskins violates broadcast indecency rules.

The author of the petition, George Washington law professor John Banzhaf III, claimed that the derogatory racial and ethnic slur is deeply offensive to American Indians. The word amounts to obscenity and profanity, which the FCC bans from the airwaves, Banzhaf said.

But in its ruling, the FCC's Media Bureau noted that it has traditionally banned only words that are sexual or excretory in nature. The agency also warned that banning the name could violate the free-speech rights of TV and radio stations.

Banzhaf's petition had asked the commission to reject the license renewal of WWXX-FM, a radio station owned by Redskins owner Daniel Snyder that had repeatedly said the team's name on the air. Instead, the FCC renewed the license, saying it found no serious violations.

Banzhaf said he plans to appeal the decision to the full commission and, if necessary, to the federal courts.

Turkey's TV censor has handed a record fine to a popular game show for a segment where husbands were filmed dancing with other women as their wives looked on.

The game show, I Don't Know, My Spouse Knows was fined 410,000 Turkish lira ($177,000, 145,000 euros) by the Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTUK). The censor claimed in its ruling that the episode was contrary to public morality and the Turkish family structure .

In the offending show the husbands were shown dancing with other women, said to be foreigners, while the horrified reactions of their wives was also shown in a split screen.

The four wives appeared aghast as they watched their husbands, who danced with little inhibition, with one asking a fellow contestant if the stunt was a joke. When it became clear it was not, their reactions were even more grave. One of the wives, Seval, said: I am going to kill him! When the husbands rejoined the main studio she wagged her finger and told her spouse: You are finished!

RTUK said the show, broadcast by the popular private channel Kanal D, had encouraged men to cheat on their wives and provided an environment to disturb the family peace. It added that women in the program had been reduced to sexual objects.

Pippi Longstocking, a rambunctious, joyful girl strong enough to lift horses, has become a touchstone for generations of children who have read her in 65 languages worldwide.

In Sweden, Pippi is something more: a national treasure and embodiment of the country's egalitarian spirit. So when the Swedish national broadcaster announced this fall that it would edit two scenes that it considered offensive in a 1969 television series about Pippi, including one in which she says her father is king of the Negroes, using a Swedish word now viewed as a racial slur, it hit a nerve.

The series was based on the Pippi Longstocking books by Astrid Lindgren, the first of which were published between 1945 and 1948. Defenders of the decision, including the heirs of Ms. Lindgren, who died in 2002, said the change respected the spirit of the author. Even in 1970, she had called the term outdated and said she had not meant to offend.

But many others, influential opinion columnists and tens of thousands of people who answered a Facebook poll, said they opposed the revision, some accusing the broadcaster, SVT, of politically correct censorship.

Nils Nyman, one of Ms. Lindgren's seven grandchildren and the chief executive of the family company that oversees the lucrative rights to her work, said he was a little bit surprised that the changes had generated so much fuss. He said the family had readily agreed to allow SVT to edit two brief scenes in the program, which will air on national television on Saturday and in a newly restored DVD. He said that not making the changes risked distracting from the books' broader message of girl power before it was known as such.

In one scene, the racial slur has been removed so that Pippi now says, My father is the king! In the second, Pippi no longer pulls her eyelids upward, pretending to be Asian, yet still sings a mock Chinese song.

Indian TV presenter and model Gauahar Khan was left audibly traumatised after a member of the audience at a TV competition she was presenting at got up and slapped her for wearing revealing clothes.

Akil Malik took 'offence' at Khan's cutaway outfit as she presented the grand finale of singing competition Raw Star at Film City in Mumbai. He then got up out of his seat to threaten and assault her live on air. He explained: Being a Muslim woman, she should not have worn such a short dress.

Malik was arrested and charged with molestation.

China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) have issued new censorship rules governing the use of language in China's television shows and advertisements. The new rules require all TV shows and ads to stick to standard Mandarin words and expressions, and forbid them from using internet slang terms.

The new regulations are aimed at stopping the use of internet slang that appropriates or imitates standard colloquial expressions, and particularly the Chinese language's four-character chengyu sayings. The internet has invented or adapted many new chengyu for its own uses, but SAPPRFT's new regulations ban the use of any of that creative language on television.

The regulations order China's television content producers to do a thorough self-investigation and to strengthen oversight and inspection efforts to assure that non-standard language and internet slang doesn't sneak its way into any future television programs.

And before you thinks this is another example of imaginative censorship peculiar to a repressive regimes, I seem to remember a more or less the same edict being issued in France not so long ago, whingeing that English language modern world jargon had become more popular than the French language equivalents.

Back in 2012 Comedy Central was banned for ten days for airing supposedly obscene and vulgar words and being derogatory to women. The offending programmes were Stand Up Club and Popcorn.

The order issued by Delhi High court claimed that the programme showed a stand up comedian mouthing supposedly vulgar words accompanied by obscene and suggestive gestures and gyration.

Jokes during his performance supposedly denigrated women, indecently and crudely referred to sex organs of men-and women and the sing-song rendition by the man sought to pornographically describe male lust, whilst depicting women as a commodity of sex.

The broadcaster appealed against the censorship and the result has just been announced.

The court found no merit in Comedy Central's appeal, and dismissed it. The court also imposed INR20,000 costs and ordered the remaining six days of the channel's original ten-day ban should begin at 12.01am on 26 November 2014.

 

A few easily offended Argentines got wound up by a joke during the filming a Top Gear special.

Locals took offence at the H982 FKL number plate on a Porsche driven by Jeremy Clarkson, believing it was a reference to the 1982 Falklands conflict.

Argentina's ambassador to the UK, Alicia Castro, complained about the joke but the complaint was turned down by the BBC. Now she has resumed her torade against the joke by writing to the BBC Trust expressing discontent with how the number plate fiasco was handled. She claimed Clarkson's behaviour fell well below BBC's editorial values and standards and called for a fresh investigation.

In an interview with the Radio Times Richard Hammond said:

In society as a whole, we love to be offended and have a scapegoat. But at Top Gear we're the first to put our hands up and say we pitched it wrong. We have apologised. We're not in the business of genuinely upsetting or offending anyone. We're in the business of entertainment, and if it fails to entertain, it's wrong. If the public says we stepped over the line, then we have.

The Parents Television Council is denouncing the FX network for airing the most sexually explicit content the PTC has ever documented on basic cable. The November 11th episode of Sons of Anarchy opened with approximately two and one-half minutes of graphically depicted sex among several couples. The explicit content, of the type previously available only on a la carte premium networks or pay-per-view, aired as early as 9 pm in half of the country.

Media Post described this scene like this :

This sequence ... featured seven couples in the act of intense lovemaking. ... For the record, this sequence left nothing to the imagination. It was probably the rawest sex I have ever seen depicted on TV outside of HBO and Showtime -- and that's saying a lot.

PTC President Tim Winter spouted:

Last week's episode of 'Sons of Anarchy' opened with the most sexually explicit content we've ever seen on basic cable, content normally found on premium subscription networks like HBO or Showtime.

Federal Communications Commissioner Ajit Pai said in a speech at an awards event that he disagrees with recent efforts to ban broadcasters from using the word Redskins when referring to the Washington, D.C. NFL team. He said:

If the FCC took these steps, we would be squelching public debate about an issue of public concern. We would be standing in the way of media outlets reporting the news. And we would be prohibiting speech simply because we disagree with the viewpoint that is being expressed.

Pai went on to say public officials shouldn't sound an uncertain trumpet when oft-offended opportunists urge us to undermine the First Amendment. He said he thinks the FCC should heed the words of Voltaire:

I may not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it, adding. Anyone who takes seriously the Constitution--scholar or layman--knows the petition is meritless. The FCC should dismiss it tout suite, as Voltaire might have said.

Propaganda channel, Russia Today, has launched a dedicated UK TV channel that broadcasts five hours of programmes a day made out of its new London studios.

But it hasn't taken before the UK TV censor Ofcom has got involved to investigate the channel for biased news.

The channel has already been threatened with statutory sanctions by Ofcom after the Kremlin-backed news channel breached broadcasting regulations on impartiality with its coverage of the Ukraine crisis.

Russia Today, or RT, was summoned to a meeting with Ofcom after it was found guilty of breaching the code governing UK broadcasters in a ruling published  this week.

The censor flagged up four separate reports, all broadcast in March this year, all dealing with the situation in Ukraine. Ofcom said it recognised that RT, which is funded by the Russian government and launched a UK version last month , would want to present the news from a Russian perspective . But it said all news must be presented with due impartiality ... in particular, when reporting on matters of major political controversy .

It follows three previous breaches of impartiality rules, and Ofcom called for a meeting with the broadcaster to discuss compliance with regard to its due impartiality . It said it had put the channel on notice that any future breaches of the due impartiality rules may result in further regulatory action, including consideration of a statutory sanction .

Russia Today (RT), a propaganda news channel bankrolled by Vladimir Putin, has launched a dedicated UK version. It is the first time an overseas news operator has launched a service specifically targeted at British viewers. Perhaps not surprising as the venture looks set to cost Putin £250m a year

These are the latest salvos in a propaganda onslaught in which RT, al-Jazeera, China's state-funded CCTV and the BBC World Service and its commercially-funded sister TV channel BBC World News, are among the most prominent players.

The international version of RT is already facing six separate investigations by TV censor Ofcom, including its coverage of the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. Richard Sambrook, former director of global news at the BBC and director of the Centre of Journalism at Cardiff University, said:

Editorially its line is clearly one that is being driven by the Kremlin agenda. It's a surprising move to focus resources on the UK. It's not a commercial proposition, therefore the main purpose must be to gain influence. It's about soft power for the Kremlin.

RT's UK channel will be made up of five hours of programmes a day broadcast from its new studios in Milbank, with the rest of the schedule filled by content from its international channel.

Meanwhile...

See  article from  globalresearch.ca

Not since Iraq have I seen BBC News working at propaganda strength like this. So glad I'm out of there

These are the words of the former economics editor of the BBC's Newsnight show, Paul Mason , relating to the BBC's coverage of the Scottish independence referendum. The London broadcaster's biased reporting on Scottish independence is not an isolated incident however, as the BBC has been blatantly warping, misrepresenting and omitting pertinent facts and narratives on numerous issues, from its coverage on Israel to its distortion on Ukraine.

The broadcaster has been widely criticised by many in Scotland and around the world for their propaganda campaign in the run up to the referendum in September, leading thousands of people to take to the streets in protest over the lack of journalistic integrity at the BBC. A major episode of this was when the BBC's political editor, Nick Robinson, censored Alex Salmond's lengthy response to a question regarding the rumours that the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) would move its headquarters to London if Scotland voted for independence. Despite Salmond's comprehensive response to the question which gave the BBC seven minutes of video footage to edit for their report, Robinson decided to deceive the public and falsely claim he didn't answer the question. This was part of a wider propaganda campaign of injecting fear and uncertainty into the idea of Scotland being an independent nation.

The BBC described its programme, This World: Rwanda's Untold Story:

Twenty years on from the Rwandan genocide, This World reveals evidence that challenges the accepted story of one of the most horrifying events of the late 20th century. The current president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, has long been portrayed as the man who brought an end to the killing and rescued his country from oblivion. Now there are increasing questions about the role of Kagame's Rwandan Patriotic Front forces in the dark days of 1994 and in the 20 years since.

The film investigates evidence of Kagame's role in the shooting down of the presidential plane that sparked the killings in 1994 and questions his claims to have ended the genocide. It also examines claims of war crimes committed by Kagame's forces and their allies in the wars in the Democratic Republic of Congo and allegations of human rights abuses in today's Rwanda.

Former close associates from within Kagame's inner circle and government speak out from hiding abroad. They present a very different portrait of a man who is often hailed as presiding over a model African state. Rwanda's economic miracle and apparent ethnic harmony has led to the country being one of the biggest recipients of aid from the UK. Former prime minister Tony Blair is an unpaid adviser to Kagame, but some now question the closeness of Mr Blair and other western leaders to Rwanda's president.

But it was all a bit too much for Rwanda. The government has suspended all BBC radio broadcasts in Rwanda's most common language to protest against the news organisation's recent documentary about the 1994 genocide in the country.

The Rwandan TV censor announced the suspension of the BBC's broadcasts in the local language, Kinyarwanda. The board said it took the action because it has received complaints of incitement, hatred, divisionism, genocide denial and revision from the public.

President Paul Kagame's government, members of parliament and genocide survivors have expressed their anger at the BBC over the recent documentary that suggested the country's president may have had a hand shooting down his predecessor's plane, a crash that triggered the mass killings.

Its hour-long documentary, Rwanda, The Untold Story, also quoted US researchers who suggested that many of the more than 800,000 Rwandans who died in the 1994 genocide may have been ethnic Hutus, and not ethnic Tutsis as the Rwandan government maintains.

Swedish Television has cut out suppsoedly offensive scenes from censored editions of the popular 1969 Pippi Longstocking series, sparking intense debate on social media over the extent to which old productions should be modified to suit what the politically correct consider socially acceptable today.

In the censored versions, set to be aired on a children's channel in December, the unconventional Pippi will describe her dad as a king instead of a negro king and won't play Chinese by stretching out the skin around her eyes.

The public broadcaster said those original scenes could be perceived as hurtful or offensive for children who watched it.

Paulette Rosas Hott, head of political correctness at Swedish Television, spouted:

We live in a multicultural society with children from many different countries. Those kids should feel comfortable when they're looking at this. And the parents should feel comfortable that their kids don't learn expressions that they don't support.

The moralist campaign group, Parents Television Council (PTC), has hyped the new CBS drama Stalker as torture porn and is warning parents about the show.

PTC takes particular issue with the premiere episode's opening scene, which the organization claims is a graphically violent scene featuring a woman being tortured and murdered.

The 1st episode will air with the rating TV-14 DSV, which denotes suggestive dialogue, sexual situations and violence.

PTC president Tim Winter said that, given the subject matter, Stalker should be rated TV-MA. He notes:

We are warning parents about this graphic scene, given that it will air at the beginning of the show and that it will presumably carry a very low TV-14 rating.. Since the episode contains graphic violence, the accurate rating for the program according to the industry's own standard is TV-MA. Rating this type of material as appropriate for a child would not only be wrong, it would be fraudulent.

Stalker stars Dylan McDermott and Maggie Q as detectives with the LAPD's Threat Assessment Unit who investigate stalking incidents such as voyeurism, cyber harassment and romantic fixation. It debuts Wednesday at 10 p.m. ET.

SpongeBob SquarePants, the Nickelodeon cartoon character who works as a fry cook at the bottom of the sea, corrupts the young minds of children and promotes hooligan behavior, according to Kazakhstan's education ministry.

 the New York Daily News reported that the country regards the character as a bully, who regularly inflicts violence on others in his community and seems to enjoy what he does,

Zabira Orazalieva responsible for children's rights at the Kazakh Education and Science Ministry, said:

SpongeBob beats up his neighbor, misbehaves and enjoys that. This hooligan behavior stays in the child's minds. They [see SpongeBob] as a role model and try to re-enact [his behavior] in real life.

She went on to blast cable channels like Nickelodeon and France's TiJi for running cartoons that promote a substandard educational message, as well as parents who let children watch the cartoons unsupervised.

With his penchant for mooning and blurting out risque spoonerisms, Crayon Shin-chan has delighted Japanese children, and infuriated their parents, for more than two decades.

But now the precocious five-year-old is being taken on by Indonesian TV censors, who have declared his antics as borderline pornography and warned broadcasters to censor images of his bare buttocks, scantily clad women and other indecorous scenes.

The Indonesian broadcasting commission has told TV channel RCTI to either cut supposedly  indecent parts of the programme or show it later when children aren't watching. A member of the commission claims:

The character fools around with his bare bottom exposed. He also noses around people [when they are] on dates. The show features a lot of female characters in seductive garments that emphasise their cleavage. It is essentially pornography.

A joint episode of The Simpsons and Family Guy is set to air on the Fox network in the US on Sunday. The trailer has revealed a joke featuring the politically correct no-no, the word 'rape'.  It has got America's moralists up in arms. The Parents Television Council have called for the joke to be cut.

The gag is about baby Stewie misunderstanding the nature of Bart's prank calls. First, Bart calls Moe's Tavern and asks if there's anyone there with the last name Keybum and the first name Lee -- causing the bartender to call out for a Leaky bum . Then an excited Stewie tries his version of the wind-up, and blurts out: Hello, Moe? Your sister's being raped.

The Parents Television Council have claim that the joke, playing on the different sense of humour between the family-friendly Simpsons and edgier Family Guy, is 'inappropriate'. President Tim Winter spouted:

Rape is never a laughing matter. Never. It is simply indefensible for a broadcaster to use the publicly-owned airwaves to make tasteless and senseless jokes about rape.

He also claimed that the joke could have a devastating impact... on countless past, present and future victims of sexual assault . The group says it will lobby advertisers on both shows to ask if rape jokes reflect their corporate values .

MacFarlane famously once said that getting Parents Television Council complaints were:

Like getting hate mail from Hitler. They're literally terrible human beings. I've read their newsletter, I've visited their website, and they're just rotten to the core. For an organisation that prides itself on Christian values -- I mean, I'm an atheist, so what do I know?--they spend their entire day hating people. They can all suck my dick as far as I'm concerned.

Ireland's TV censor has had a whinge at a slightly sexy dance performance on the talent show, The Voice of Ireland.

The performance accompanied contestant Danica Holland's rendition of Lady Gaga' s single Do What U Want on Sunday, March 23. Around 521,200 people watched the programme which aired at 6.30pm, of which about 12% were under 18s.

The complainant was appalled that RTE would sanction such a dance routine at the time in question, and stated that when one of the judges likened the routine to a scene from Basic Instinct , it reinforced her opinion of the programme.

The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) partially upheld a complaint from a woman who had been watching the programme with her young children. In its ruling, the BAI said both the dance routine and song:

Included clear sexual overtones and in particular there were significant sexualised elements dealing with adult themes such as sexual submission, both emotional and physical.

It considered these inappropriate for children and adolescents , some of whom it claimed  are not likely to have the maturity to assess and negotiate the boundaries of appropriate sexual behaviour , and added that the programme did not demonstrate due care .

The religious morality campaign group, One Million Moms spout:

USA's new program, Satisfaction , has a name that says it all. I suppose the name Unsatisfied didn't sound as attractive. Like a revamped soap opera, spouses get themselves tangled in a web of lies and hurt the ones they love. Satisfaction airs on Thursday evenings at 10:00 p.m. ET/9:00 p.m. CT.

The tagline for the program is: They have everything but are still not satisfied. The show focuses on attempts to find satisfaction by having an affair, paying for an escort or getting paid for sex. A show full of adultery, cheating, drugs and lies is the last influence our society needs. Even though the program airs a little later in the evening, it is not late enough since the bedroom scenes are soft porn and the previews are aired earlier in the day.

Satisfaction centers around a married couple who have no regrets and feel no remorse about committing adultery with someone else - or cheating on their own spouse. Infidelity is the new trend sold as normal by USA.

To put it on a scale, Satisfaction is more pornographic than the show Mistresses. This program consists of so much nudity and erotic sexual content that it probably is the worst show we have seen since Nip Tuck. Hollywood is continuing to push casual sex, sometimes with multiple partners, as acceptable.

This week, Egypt's first X Factor -style belly-dancing show titled al-Raqisa (The Dancer) was scrapped after just one episode, following demands from the country's religious authorities.

Egypt's Dar el-Ifta, a wing of the justice ministry that issues non-binding religious edicts, claimed al-Raqisa would destroy the moral structure of the country. Shortly after, producers of the show, hosted by Egypt's pre-eminent belly-dancing star, Dina, gave way to the pressure and cancelled the programme.

Egypt's government has waged a year-long crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood and seeks to stamp out religious extremism. But in reality officials have no wish to upset religious 'sensibilities' in a country where Islam is deeply entwined with public life.

Members of the dancing community nevertheless say that things are still slightly better than they were under the Brotherhood. Randa Kamel, a well-known Egyptian dancer, says that before the Brotherhood's fall, she was dancing just twice a week, as the economic crisis and increased conservatism that accompanied the Brotherhood's tenure prompted venues to curb their dancing expenses. Now Kamel is back to dancing every night, even if audiences still have not reached their pre-revolution peak.

A Game of Thrones actress has reportedly been banned from showing her breasts during filming on location. Producers of the hit US TV series have been prohibited from filming a pivotal topless scene at its planned location in the Croatian city of Dubrovnik, according to TMZ.

The magazine says the program's crew applied to the local film commission to shoot the scene in which Cersei Lannister, played by Lena Headey, undertakes a walk of penance through the streets of King's Landing.

But the request was reportedly rejected because the city's Church of St Nicholas has a hardline stance against public displays of sexuality. Advertisement

It's understood the iconic scene, will be shot elsewhere because of its importance to the storyline.

Update: Negotiated peace

3rd September 2014. See  article from  indiatvnews.com

The nude walk was in jeopardy as the Church of St. Nicholas, where the scene would be filmed, banned public nudity.

The film commissioners, however, have now changed their initial ruling, giving permission to filming on the streets of Dubrovnik as long as Lena Headey, who plays Cersei, doesn't film it at the church.

The show's producers, thus, have to compromise with the new term set by the film commissioners. Headey will now shoot the nude scene on a fake church set.

UK TV censor Ofcom has received six complaints following a lesbian kiss on Doctor Who, reports Gay Star News.

The complaints came after a scene in which Madame Vastra helps to keep her wife Jenny alive in response to a threat from droids that only move when they can sense breath.

A few worthless tweets were also dredged up.

Update: Ofcom will not investigate the whinges

28th August 2014. From strangethingsarehappening.com. Thanks to Nick

A spokesman for TV censor Ofcom has now responded to the complaints:

Ofcom can confirm it received six complaints about a kiss broadcast in an episode of Doctor Who on Saturday 23 August.

Having assessed the complaints, we can confirm that they do not raise issues warranting further investigation. Our rules do not discriminate between scenes involving opposite sex and same sex couples.

Update: Censored in Asia

31st August 2014. See  article from  dailymail.co.uk

The BBC cut a lesbian kiss scene from Doctor Who to avoid offending audiences (and TV censors) when it was screened in Asia.

The feature-length edition was broadcast to viewers in Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore last Monday. BBC insiders say the scene, which lasted just a couple of seconds, was cut to avoid falling foul of a broadcasting code in Singapore which says programmes should avoid any content that could justify homosexual and lesbian lifestyles.

George Dixon, BBC Worldwide's global editorial director, said:

When preparing shows for international transmission, we occasionally have to make edits to ensure we're not breaking any local broadcasting rules.

Gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell was not impressed. He said:

The BBC should not bow to censorship demands from other countries. If these countries are bigoted and are not willing to show same-sex love, they have no right to demand that the BBC conforms to their standards of prejudice.

Thailand's military dictators have allowed 12 banned satellite channels to resume broadcasting. The channels have been off the air since the May 22 coup. However the channels have been forced to sign a declaration to not air political news.

Some of the channels are well-known political-oriented satellite stations, such as the yellow-shirt ASTV, Democrat Party-backed Blue Sky and red-shirt Asia Update, said they were satisfied by the terms and conditions laid down by the junta.

Most of them even agreed to change their name in a move to end memories about previous political stances.

The channels allowed to start broadcasting also include MV5, DNN, UDD, P&P, 4 Channel, FMTV, Hot TV, Rescue TV and Student and People Network for Reforming Thailand Channel.

ASTV, which will now be known as News TV, still plans to focus intensely on news, albeit now censored.

The broadcasting committee of the National Broadcasting and Telecom-munications Commission announced conditions for the 12 satellite TV channels to apply for a new licence to resume broadcasting next week. The channels will need to apply for a new licence as Pay TV and comply with the NCPO's condition that they would broadcast no content that affects national security and the social divide by signing a memorandum of understand with the NBTC.

One Million Moms is a christian morality campaign. The group writes in a 'call to action':

The late night programming on the Cartoon Network, known as Adult Swim, plans to air the non-animated show Black Jesus portraying Jesus as a black guy living in the hood. The show depicts him living in Compton Gardens and makes a mockery of our Lord. The foul language used in the trailer, including using the Lord's name in vain, is disgusting. In addition, there is violence, gunfire and other inappropriate gestures which completely misrepresent Jesus. This is blasphemy!

Black Jesus is set to premiere on August 7 at 11:00 pm ET/ 10:00 pm CT, unless we intervene. Adult Swim plans to blaspheme Jesus on a weekly basis. This mockery will be similar to South Park and Family Guy , but much worse since the entire program will be based on lies about Christianity.

1MM will defend our Savior because He is Holy! Adult Swim is obviously not a family network, and this program is set to air later in the evening when children should be asleep, but that is no excuse. Adult Swim has crossed the line by belittling the Christian religion with foul jokes.

We need to send a loud and clear message to Adult Swim, its owner Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. (a Time Warner Company), and all potential advertisers of Black Jesus that this kind of programming is insulting and completely unacceptable. Adult Swim is not ridiculing any other religion currently and wouldn't dream of mocking Mohammed or Muslims.

If we speak with one voice now, we can keep this program from ever seeing the light of day. Christians must take a stand and not be silent. Networks like Adult Swim continue to mock Christianity, and we will not stand for it. Christians should no longer sit idly by and allow this blasphemy to continue without speaking up in protest. Black Jesus is another attempt to distort the truth about Christianity. There is power in numbers! Forward this to everyone you know in a fight to keep this show off the air.

Update: Even worse than feared

12th August 2014. From  onemillionmoms.com

Black Jesus was even worse than its promotions portrayed in the trailer leading up to the broadcast. In the 30-minute premiere, Jesus is recruited by his friend's mother to buy a block of "weed" for a party.  This first episode was entitled Smokin', Drinkin', and Chillin' and included:

• 88 profanities are used, including God's name in vain (MA-L rating).
• Jesus uses the f-word multiple times, uses God's name in vain.
• Jesus smokes marijuana and complains about having to share it.
• Jesus is arrested when a drug deal he is leading goes bad.

The Jesus character irreverently refers to God as "Pops," himself as "lord and savior," and is continually obsessed with alcohol and drugs.

The Parents Television Council is a US moralist campaign group. It writes in a press release:

The Parents Television Council has warned parents and advertisers about the premiere of VH1's Dating Naked series, a reality show with contestants who date each other in the nude, and which begins on Thursday, July 17 at 9/8 Central. Previews for the series show contestants naked on camera for the whole show, with the nudity being partially obscured through pixilation.  PTC President Tim Winter said:

The core of the TV show's premise -- people dating in the nude -- should be troubling for most parents, and it should absolutely land the show on any responsible advertisers' do-not-buy list. VH1 obviously thinks this is an 'edgy' show, perhaps even groundbreaking, but what's clear is that this is the kind of TV programming that is an affront to most families.

Because of the forced-bundling of cable network programming, every cable subscriber in the country must pay VH1 for this sordid material. Parents should not be required to underwrite this program with their subscription dollars, and advertisers should be mindful not to associate their hard-earned brand reputations by sponsoring it. Corporate sponsors should heed the market research showing how brands were perceived negatively when their ads appeared alongside explicit content.

The PTC is sending an urgent call of caution to parents. We will be holding publicly to account any companies and products that choose to advertise on the premiere of this program and on any subsequent episodes. And we will cite the actions of this Viacom-owned network in our comments supporting Cablevision's antitrust lawsuit challenging the legality of Viacom's network-bundling scheme.

The moralist campaign group writes:

The Parents Television Council is calling on its members and other concerned citizens to file indecency complaints to the FCC over a recent episode of CBS' Reckless that contained explicit sexual content.

The TV-14 (SLV)-rated episode aired on June 29, 2014, at 9 pm ET/PT and 8 pm CT/MT and included these scenes: The episode opened with a woman being pulled over by a police officer and handcuffed to a fence while the officer and the woman had sex. Another scene showed a male attorney watching a video of a woman who was purportedly drugged and then undressed and sexually assaulted by four men on the hood of a police car. In another scene, the same attorney and a female attorney watch the same video of the sexual assault together and subsequently talked about how it turned them on.

PTC President Tim Winter said:

We believe these sexually explicit scenes on CBS' 'Reckless' constitute a violation of the broadcast indecency law due to the patently offensive sexual content airing when children are likely to be in the audience. It is even more troubling that CBS chose to rate the episode as appropriate for 14-year-old children. This is just the latest example of the strained credibility of the TV content rating system.

CBS must be held accountable for using the publicly owned airwaves to beam to every home in the nation repeated graphic depictions of a woman ostensibly being sexually assaulted. As such, we are asking members and others concerned about how TV impacts children to file FCC indecency complaints over this episode.

Christian moralist group writes:

ABC Family Channel's new program Mystery Girls does not involve innocent detectives fighting crime as parents might hope, but instead is just another show primarily about sexual encounters.

The show airs during primetime when children are likely watching. The season premiere aired Wednesday evening at 8:30 p.m. ET/7:30 p.m. CT, and with a 14 DL rating it is not suitable for young viewers.

The majority of the content in this nonfamily channel program is adult oriented and includes sexual references and innuendos. The first episode centered on the search for a lost sex tape, which involves forgotten identity of the partner in the tape, not remembering all past sexual partners and a fake funeral.

Mystery Girls is not the Nancy Drew type detective program one might expect on a family network. This show is inappropriate for any network but especially for a family channel. This program is vulgar and vile and needs to be removed from the air immediately.

On the edition of The Graham Norton Show that aired last Friday, Samuel L. Jackson was a guest and he was asked specifically about when his films are re-dubbed for TV. He explained that as he almost always did the re-dubbing himself he would come up with the most ridiculous phrases possible to replace that specific expletive, including Maryland Farmer (I think the Americans pronounce it Marylyn), Money Feelers and Monkey Fighting . They showed the re-dubbed version of the famous clip from Snakes On A Plane, using the phrases Monkey Fighting and Monday To Friday in place of the two expletives.
 

Monkey Fighting Censors

19th June See  article from  sploid.gizmodo.com

The same interview seems to have inspired a further look at ridiculous overdubs on US TV.

I can understand bleeping offensive words but changing entire iconic lines from movies like The Departed, Scarface, The Usual Suspects, or Pulp Fiction into absolutely ridiculous stuff is offensively stupid.

...Read the full article

Captivated and Grossed Out: An Examination of Processing Core and Sociomoral Disgusts in Entertainment Media

By Bridget Rubenking ( University of Central Florida) and Annie Lang (Indiana University)

Abstract

While disgust repels and offends us, it has functionally evolved over time to compel our attention---both to core disgusts (i.e., blood, guts, body products) and sociomoral violations (i.e., injustices, brutality, racism)---making it a quality of many entertainment messages that may keep audiences engrossed and engaged. An experiment exposed participants to two types of core disgusts and sociomoral disgusts in TV/film messages and collected self-report emotional responses, psychophysiological indicators of dynamic emotional and cognitive processing, and recognition memory for content. Results demonstrate that no two disgusts are alike: Sociomoral disgusts captivate our attention and elicit a slower, more thoughtful response pattern than core disgusts, and the nature of the core disgust elicits different responses as well.

Irish state broadcaster RTE has censure for politically incorrect remarks by fashion designer Paul Costelloe. The radio and TV censors of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) claimed that the comments were offensive to women.

Costelloe caused 'outrage' during an interview on RTE Radio One's The Business show in February when he spoke of young Irishmen in London damaging English virgins. The designer, who lives in London, was speaking about the Irish in Britain. He said:

Certainly the Irish are never short of chatting up and, you know, we have that skill and I'm sure these young guys are doing great and damaging a lot of young English virgins, so there you are, and good luck to them.

The BAI upheld a single complaint, saying:

The manner in which sexual relationships were described by the guest would cause undue offence.

When Irish comic David McSavage made a sketch depicting nuns lusting over the muscular body of Jesus dragging a cross, he might have expected some controversy.

And true enough, state broadcaster RTE declined to air the scene, ruling that it could cause undue offence .

However McSavage has now branded the decision dictatorial and said the censorship was typical of an attitude that led to the best and the brightest leaving the country in their droves .

The Wild Nuns sketch is a parody of the Diet Coke advert, which first aired 20 years ago, when female office workers eyed up a half-naked window cleaner. In McSavage's version, made for the Savage Eye series, it is nuns in an orchard swooning over Jesus:

Since the ban, McSavage released the sketch online himself to show what we're up against. He told the Irish Times: These things are important. Ultimately you are talking about freedom of speech and who says where the line is.

Geo TV, Pakistan's leading TV news station which dared to criticise the country's feared spy agency has been ordered off air.

Pakistan's TV censor suspended Geo News's operating licence for 15 days and fined it £60,000 for news reports that did not please the head of the military's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI), General Zaheer-ul-Islam.

The channel's president, Imran Aslam, condemned the decision, saying the forces of might have prevailed . It seems that justice has bowed down to forces that are above the law, Aslam said.

Amnesty International said it was a serious attack on vestiges of press freedom in the country:

It is the latest act in an organised campaign of harassment and intimidation targeting the network on account of its perceived bias against the military.

The row began on 19 April when Geo's coverage of an attempt to kill Hamid Mir, the channel's best-known journalist, enraged the military. Geo gave prominence to claims by Mir's brother that the ISI was behind the gun attack, which left the journalist seriously wounded. He claimed the hit had been ordered by Zaheer-ul-Islam, and the channel aired photographs and video of the otherwise little-seen spy chief.

Moralists from the religious campaign group call for followers to write to advertisers of the TV drama, Mistresses:

Mistresses season premiere aired on ABC this week and the name says it all. I suppose the name Living in Sin didn't sound as appealing. This unoriginal show is strikingly similar to Desperate Housewives, with four friends who get themselves tangled in a web of lies and hurt the ones they love. Mistresses airs on Monday evenings at 10:00 p.m. ET/9:00 CT.

The program Mistresses includes inappropriate content such as adultery, cheating, lies and deceit in explicit and sensually graphic scenes. Our society doesn't need more negative influences than it already has on broadcast airwaves. Even though the program airs a little later in the evening, it is not late enough since the bedroom scenes are soft p*rn and are included in some previews which air earlier in the evening when children are likely watching. (An asterisk is used to ensure our emails get through to those who have signed up to receive our alerts. Otherwise referencing specific words would cause our emails to be blocked by some Internet filters.)

Mistresses centers around a group of four women who have no regrets and feel little or no remorse about committing adultery with someone else's husband - or cheating on their own.

Hollywood is continuing to push casual s*x between unmarried couples, some with multiple partners, as acceptable when clearly it is morally wrong.

The brave comedian Bassem Youssef has decided to call it quits on his TV show, claiming it is no longer safe to satirise Egyptian politics.

The television satirist seen as the barometer for free speech in post-revolutionary Egypt , Bassem Youssef , has ended his show because he feels it is no longer safe to satirise Egyptian politics. He told repoerters:

The present climate in Egypt is not suitable for a political satire program. I'm tired of struggling and worrying about my safety and that of my family.

Youssef's announcement followed a decision by his host channel, MBC-Misr, to suspend his show during Egypt's recent presidential election campaign, in what was perceived as an attempt to stop him mocking Egypt's incoming head of state, field marshal Abdel Fatah al-Sisi .

A Pakistani court has ordered police to register a case against Geo TV, actress Veena Malik, her husband Asad Khatak over a programme that supposedly contained blasphemous content. The court ordered that a case also be registered against Geo media group owner Mir Shakilur Rehman, anchor Shaistan Lodhi. Malik and her husband were guests on the programme.

The court issued the order on a complaint that Lodhi, in her programme Utho Jago Pakistan on Geo entertainment, had allegedly insulted the family members of the religious character Muhammad.

The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) said it had received over 5,000 complaints against the programme. It has already served a show-cause notice on Geo Entertainment network for airing supposedly objectionable content and sought immediate explanation from the channel.

Religious parties, including Jammat-ud-Dawah, held demonstrations in various parts of the country on Friday and Saturday and demanded that the accused be tried under the blasphemy laws.

Meanwhile, both Ms. Lodhi and Ms. Malik have gone underground fearing violence from extremists.

Update: Reasons

24th May 2014. See  article from  theguardian.com

Clerics across Pakistan condemned GEO for broadcasting a staged wedding of two celebrities on its morning show.

The problem was not the involvement of Veena Malik -- an actor who once scandalised the country by appearing nude on the cover Indian FHM magazine with ISI written on her arm. Instead offence was taken at the performance of a Sufi song about the marriage of Muhammad's daughter -- a popular element to many ordinary weddings in Pakistan -- and that a comparison was being drawn with Malik.

Many fundamentalist Islamic sects take a dim view of Sufi culture, which often revolves around singing, poetry and visiting the shrines of holy men.

One Million Moms have another whinge about US TV. The religious campaigners write:

CBS's newest program, Bad Teacher, is exactly what the title suggests; a show about a bad teacher, in more than one sense. What could be misleading is the main character not only lacks teaching skills, experience and education, but also is lying about who she is just to try to snag a rich, divorced father. Of course, with a TV-14 DL rating you can be assured this will not be for family viewing. However, the name of the show and the school ground setting along with elementary age cast members will attract young viewers. The content in this program (and even in its commercials) is inappropriate for children and teens and will send the wrong message to America's youth. New episodes air on Thursday evenings at 9:30 p.m. ET/8:30 CT.

Unacceptable content in the program includes: sexual innuendos, one night stands, sleeping around, smoking weed, alcohol at school, greed, lying, deception and plans to go away for romantic weekends with different divorced, rich dads whom the teacher just met.

CBS's newest show is irresponsible and an insult to all good teachers. It is appalling that CBS is airing a show that features immoral behaviour in a positive light while attempting to draw in young viewers with the title and adolescent setting of the program.

Censors in China have banned online video sites from showing popular American TV shows as repressive censorship rules are extended to streaming services.

The Big Bang Theory, The Good Wife, NCIS and The Practice have all been removed from sites including Youku.com and letv.com.

A spokeswoman for Youku said that the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) did not give a reason for the censorship.

Broadcasters in China have had repressive rules about showing Western content, but until recently the rules were not as strict for online streaming sites.

The Parents TV Council writes:

The Parents Television Council is calling on Fox Broadcasting to immediately remove the explicit video, Easter Bunny's Coming, from its YouTube Channel for its Animation Domination High-Def (ADHD) programming block.

The video short, which is produced and copyrighted by Fox Broadcasting Network, contains graphic cartoon images of fornicating rabbits, multiple unbleeped f-words, harsh references to male sexual anatomy and vulgar slang for ejaculation.

PTC President Tim Winter said:

Nine months ago we issued an urgent warning to parents, as well as a harsh condemnation to Fox Broadcasting and potential sponsors, regarding the network's new 'ADHD' programming block. Fox has now validated our concerns by creating the most explicit material we've ever seen produced by a broadcast television network. Though still being distributed by Fox only via the Internet, the network is using its weekly broadcast to promote the website, and children are clearly in the cross hairs. And the recently tarnished retailer, Target, appears to be underwriting explicit material on the 'ADHD' website.

We thought we had seen the worst of 'ADHD' when Fox aired a segment several months ago with high school characters gleefully taking cell phone pictures of their genitals and texting the photos to other students. That content pales in comparison to the material in this new video.

The animated Easter Bunny clip, which runs 2 minutes and 19 seconds in duration, features over a dozen unbleeped 'f-words;' depictions of dozens of fornicating rabbits; more than a dozen instances of a vulgar slang term for ejaculation; a depiction of a male character eating rabbit feces; and music lyrics that are grotesquely sexualizing and misogynistic. An overt reference to Christians and Jews only adds to the offensive nature of a video being promoted during Holy Week and Passover.

The 'ADHD' Easter Bunny segment isn't some random Internet video, it's easily X-rated material that directly targets, and appeals to, children. The content is produced and copyrighted by one of the major commercial broadcast television networks and they're using the publicly-owned airwaves as a promotional vehicle to drive traffic to the 'ADHD' website. The suits at Fox will need to explain how such a use of their broadcast licenses fulfills their statutory public interest obligation.

Update: A day later, the nutters win

20th April 2014. See  article from  w2.parentstv.org

The Parents Television Council welcomed the news that Fox Broadcasting has decided to cancel its Animation Domination High-Def (ADHD) programming block, and praised the efforts of parents and families across the country for raising their voices.

According to Broadcasting & Cable: Some [Fox affiliates] had tired of fielding calls from upset viewers.

PTC President Tim Winter said:

Parents and families across the country rose up and called on their local Fox affiliates not to air 'ADHD' because of the violent and sexually explicit content, which routinely used familiar and beloved children's characters as tropes. We congratulate our members on their activism which has led Fox Broadcasting to make this wise decision.

Religious morality campaigners, One Million Moms, praise the CBS TV comedy Mom :

CBS is Still Making Moms Look Awful

If possible, try to imagine the worst possible characteristics a mother could have. Then multiply that by ten, and you have the entire theme of the television program Mom. The characters of the mom and her mother both set terrible examples and are the farthest from positive role models for women today. Children will also see this program - which airs entirely too early considering the content presented - and they will be affected negatively by this broken television family.

CBS's newest program, Mom , could mislead parents with this title, but with a TV-14 DL rating, you can be assured this will not be for family viewing. The name of the show along with the age of the child cast members will attract young viewers. The content in this program and in its commercials is inappropriate and will send the wrong message to America's youth.

Offensive content in the program includes: teen pregnancies, affairs, sexual innuendos, drug use, alcohol abuse, crude language and mocking Christianity.

New episodes air on Monday evenings at 9:30 p.m. ET/8:30 CT.

Saudi Arabia's senior clerics have banned muslims from watching the Islam-inspired TV cartoon series, The 99 .

The television series based on a superhero comic book is being aired by Saudi-owned satellite channel MBC3, based in the United Arab Emirates.

But in a fatwa published on Saudi websites claims the series to be blasphemous because the superheroes of its title are based on the 99 attributes ascribed to the religious character Allah in the Koran. The clerics, led by the kingdom's mufti, Abdulaziz al-Sheikh, said:

The 99 is a work of the devil that should be condemned and forbidden in respect to Allah's names and attributes.

The original comic strip version has been sold around the world and has also spawned a merchandise range and a theme park in Kuwait as well as the Arabic-language television series.

Industry insiders have disclosed some of the hidden censorship rules that restrict TV dramas and movies in China.

Taboo topics involving ghosts and home-wreckers are avoided in accordance to China's film censorship system, a recent NetEase report has revealed . China's administrative provisions on TV content restrict dramas from publicizing heresy or superstition [ie religion], a policy that industries have long struggled with, as stories involving spirits and immortals are deeply embedded in Chinese myths.

Another rule forbids plot lines that threaten social morality, for example, people who break up marriages in TV shows must never be glorified and should always end up in misery.

TV shows with plots involving children born out of wedlock are not allowed, as China's family planning policy looks down on the idea of illegitimate children. Young love and campus violence is also a big no-no, as such topics are believed to have an impact on the psychological health of minors, according to the report.

 The Parents Television Council is calling on its members to file indecency complaints over an episode of Fox Broadcasting's Dads , which featured an implied depiction of and references to semen, and references to masturbation. The episode was rated TV-14 and aired at 8 pm Eastern/7:00 pm Central on January 14.

The following are the sexual scenes that were featured in this episode:

• Veronica: You don't have a caring bone in your body.
  Eli: Yes, I do. My bone cared for her twice last night. And a bendy third time.
   
• Warner uses a UV light to disinfect Veronica's desk.
  Warner: These things are amazing. It even lights up semen.
  Warner's dad enters, waving "Hi" to everyone. The UV light picks up traces of semen, presumably, on his hand.
   
• Camila tries to watch television with David and Crawford nearby.
  Camila: What about that show "Girls"?
  David: Hey, I'm trying to get erections, not lose them.

PTC President Tim Winter said:

We are urging members of the public to file a formal FCC indecency complaint over this episode of 'Dads.

Parents who have been told repeatedly by the entertainment industry to rely on the TV content ratings system have been fooled once again given this episode's very low TV-14 rating. How is a semen scene appropriate for 14-year-old children?

If parents can't rely on the television ratings system to give them accurate and consistent information about the programs their families might be watching, then the system is worthless -- serving only to give the networks cover as they continue to push the limits of what is deemed acceptable for the broadcast medium.

We urge the FCC to investigate this 'Dads' episode on behalf of families across the nation.

A Russian television station that made its name covering massive street protests against President Vladimir Putin has been taken off the air by three television providers in a move the channel's chief said was censorship.

Dozhd (TV Rain), an independent-minded television station with a strong online presence, has aired aggressive reporting critical of Russian authorities and even-handed broadcasts on Ukraine's anti-government protests.

General Director Natalia Sindeyeva said three providers had dropped the channel in and around Moscow. The station was still available on two major providers in the Moscow area.

The Dozhd has been under pressure since it ran exposes on expensive property owned by high-ranking Kremlin officials. And more recently Dozhd has faced criticism after poking old wounds by asking if Leningrad, now St Petersburg, should have been given to Nazi Germany to save lives during a 872-day blockade during World War Two.

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian agency Interfax that the survey was beyond what was acceptable from the moral and ethical point of view of our people .

The christian moralist campaign group, One Million Moms has called for sponsors to withdraw from the Disney Channel show, Good Luck Charlie . The group spews:

Alerting all parents! If Good Luck Charlie goes through with introducing LGBT content, then the floodgates will be opened for all programs on the Disney Channel - a trend that will be almost impossible to stop.

Disney Channel has very few sponsors and advertisers on its network. Care.com was the only Disney Channel sponsor that was promoted during the January 19, 2014, newest episode of Good Luck Charlie. Care.com often sponsors programs on the Disney network.

An upcoming episode in this last season of Good Luck Charlie will feature a family with two moms, a first for Disney Channel. Because Good Luck Charlie is coming to a close, the characters are only expected to appear in one episode. However, one episode is enough, especially since the network repeatedly airs reruns of all its programs.

One Million Moms launched an email campaign in 2013 that urged Disney officials to abandon their plans to corrupt the children's network with LGBT content. However, Disney officials have not responded to the thousands of emails protesting their plans. Disney has decided to be politically correct instead of providing family-friendly programming. Disney should stick to entertaining, not pushing an agenda.

The Indian government has decreed that the international movie channel, WB (Warner Brothers) will have to shut down for 1 day as punishment for nota applying 31 cuts to the PG-13 rated US comedy, It's a Boy Girl Thing .

The film is rated as UA in India which is a parental guidance rating. The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) had stipulated 15 voluntary cuts and l6 compulsory cuts in the film for TV broadcast, but these were not implemented.

The film channel had apologised and said that the broadcast was a mistake but the state censors had got very heavy with the film channel claiming:

The Visuals shown are very offensive and obscene as the private parts of male and female are focused upon. The portrayal of the sex change is in bad taste and is indecent. The visuals are not fit to be viewed by children and also not suitable for unrestricted public exhibition. These visuals also denigrate women.

The winter season premiere of The Fosters aired this past Monday on ABC Family Channel. The 14-D (the D is for suggestive dialogue) rated show is packed full of inappropriate content for what is supposed to be a family program.

The controversial plot includes a lesbian couple raising children together, but that is only the beginning of the not family-friendly content in this program. But because family is a misleading part of the network's name, we thought another warning was needed for anyone who continues to watch the channel.

ABC Family's show The Fosters is about two women attempting to redefine marriage while also raising foster, adopted and biological children. New episodes will continue to air on Monday evenings at 9:00pm ET/8:00pm CT. In addition, frequent promos are airing for this series during primetime and during G rated programs on multiple channels. These promos include the two women nude in bed together while hugging and kissing, teen with a bloody face and teen bashing in a car windshield with a baseball bat.

Unacceptable content in the season premiere included:

• Lesbians on their honeymoon lying naked in bed together while hugging and kissing
• Grandmother admits to staying with a past boyfriend she did not really like only because she loved his bed
• Engaging in casual conversation with prostitutes and asking for their help
• Female teen shares a bed with a guy at a hotel
• Teen steals with the goal of getting arrested
• Runaway teen
• Teen breaks probation

The US TV show, 2 Broke Girls, is known for its bawdy comedy; it has plenty of sex jokes and racial stereotypes worked into episodes, and those jokes aren't sitting that well with a handful of easily offended viewers.

According to GovernmentAttic.org, 91 viewer complaints regarding the popular CBS sitcom have been filed with the Federal Communications Commission over the last two years.

Complaints have included instances of vulgar language and inappropriate sexual references, charges of the show being soft porn and overuse of the word vagina.

From constant comments about sexual positions and ejaculation in every orifice to menstrual cycles in much more vulgar terms...Two Broke Girls is unrelenting, wrote one viewer from Texas, adding that while he found many CBS shows funny, the network should be more responsible about what it airs. I don't know when TV censorship died in this country but we need it back.