US Censorship News

The US TV censors of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have announced that they intends to fine a local TV station WDBJ7 $325,000 for airing sexually explicit material during a 6 o'clock newscast three years ago. The story aired about an adult film star who joined a local fire rescue squad.

The TV company obtained the troublesome video image online from the website of a distributor of the woman's adult films. The website, which was partially displayed along with the video image, is bordered on the right side by boxes showing video clips from other films that do not appear to show the woman who is the subject of the news report. One of these video clips, displayed in a box, contains the image of sexual activity involving manipulation of an erect penis. Although the box does not show the entire body or face of the apparently nude male depicted, the image shows a hand moving up and down the length of the shaft of the erect penis. WDBJ asserts that this image was displayed for less than three seconds.

The commission explained its arbitrary lynch mob justice:

Our action here sends a clear signal that there are severe consequences for TV stations that air sexually explicit images when children are likely to be watching.

WDBJ7's President and General Manager, Jeffrey Marks, issued a statement:

We are surprised and disappointed that the FCC has decided to propose to fine WDBJ7 for a fleeting image on the very edge of some television screens during a news broadcast. The story had gone through a review before it aired. Inclusion of the image was purely unintentional. The picture in question was small and outside the viewing area of the video editing screen. It was visible only on some televisions and for less than three seconds.

This year, WDBJ7 celebrates 60 years of broadcasting in the public interest, with news that is trusted and family friendly. We are sorry that this incident happened, of course, but we truly believe that the FCC failed to take into account the history of WDBJ7 and its six decades of outstanding broadcasting.

The enormous fine proposed by the FCC is also an extraordinary burden on protected speech. The FCC's largest base fine for other types of violations by broadcasters is $10,000. That is the fine for a misrepresentation to the FCC. A transfer of a license without authorization has a fine of only $8,000; use of a station to commit fraud results in a fine of $5,000; broadcast of an illegal lottery costs a station $4,000. As the FCC admits, its base forfeiture for a violation of the indecency rules is $7,000. This unprecedented proposed fine is more than 46 times higher than the FCC's own determination of the punishment for indecent speech.

As the FCC noted, Schurz Communications --- in its 60-plus year history of TV ownership -- has paid only one other FCC fine. That was for a minor and self-reported Children's Video issue.

WDBJ will oppose the FCC's proposed sanction.

Representative Candice Miller is a Republican pas proposed a restructuring of Immigration and Customs Enforcement away from its current department and set it up as an agency all on its own.

Miller's bill, HR 877, would also create the position of Director of United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement, who'd have the power to:

Investigate and, where appropriate, refer for prosecution, any criminal violation of Federal law relating to or involving ... (B) customs, trade, or import or export control, including the illicit possession, movement of, or trade in goods, services, property, contraband, arms, instruments of terrorism, items controlled or prohibited from export, pornography , intellectual property, or monetary instruments...

The bill is being referred to the Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security for consideration before being brought to a vote by the full House-

A memo from the NBC Universal-owned network Bravo channel recently leaked onto the internet explaining the really specific way strong language is bleeped out. The rules are:

• Asshole -- bleep "ass" and keep "hole
• Bullshit -- bleep "it" and keep "bullsh (we cannot hear any of the "it")
• Fag -- must bleep the entire word; no portion of the word can be audible
• Faggot -- must bleep the entire word; no portion of the word can be audible
• Fuck -- keep "f" & bleep "uck" (we cannot hear any of the "k")
• Fucking -- keep "f" & bleep "uck" (and okay to leave the ing) (again, we cannot hear any of the "k")
• Shit -- "keep "sh" & bleep "it" (we cannot hear any of the "t")
• Shitting -- keep "sh" & bleep "it" and okay to leaving the "ing" (again, we cannot hear any of the "t")
• Motherfucking -- keep "mother" & "ing" and bleep all of "fuck"
• Retard -- must bleep the entire word; no portion of the word can be audible
• Tranny -- keep the "tr", bleep the "anny"
• Beaner -- keep the "er", bleep the "bean"
• Jap -- keep the "J", bleep the "ap"
• Midget -- keep the "mi" , bleep the "dget"

There were also 2 words that even the memo writer couldn't even write:

• The N and C words must always be bleeped

Following an aggressive hack against Sony in the US, The Interview was released on over 200 UK screens on Friday. This is a full cinema release after fading credibility of the hacker threats that curtailed the US cinema release.

However in the US the film was made available to purchase via on-demand services and has already been rented or downloaded 4.3m times and has taken $40m from digital sales and over $6m from cinema takings. Sony have now claimed it is the No 1 online film of all time , and with the The Interview costing $44m to make, all production costs have already been recouped.

In fact, the whole saga has revealed to have come at barely any financial cost to Sony at all. Announcing their third quarter results on Thursday, Sony said the hack would cost just $15m in investigation and remediation costs and that it doesn't expect to suffer any long-term consequences, though several employees are believed to have filed lawsuits against the company for failing to protect their personal data.

Sony did play down the UK release a little. The studio has not put on any pre-screenings, or sent out any copies to UK critics. Similarly, no interview opportunities with the cast have been offered to the media, with both James Franco and Seth Rogan notably absent from the talk show circuit.

American Sniper is a 2014 USA action biography by Clint Eastwood.
Starring Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller and Kyle Gallner.

A Navy S.E.A.L. recounts his military career, which includes more than 150 confirmed kills.

A group calling itself the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) has written to director Clint Eastwood and star Bradley Cooper claiming an increase in threats against US muslims. The ADC said:

A majority of the violent threats we have seen over the past few days are result of how Arab and Muslims are depicted in American Sniper.

The group said it had collected hundreds of violent messages targeting Arab and Muslim Americans from movie-goers , mainly from Facebook and Twitter.

The letter asked Eastwood and Cooper to speak out against such messages in an effort to reduce the hateful rhetoric .

The ESRB has rated Creative Destruction's ultra-violent mass shooting spree game Hatred as Adults Only, with content descriptors for Intense Violence, Blood and Gore, and Strong Language.

And while an AO rating isn't considered a ban, it will likely keep it from ever seeing retail shelf space in places like Target, Best Buy, GameStop, or Walmart, because North American retailers won't carry AO games.

Valve's Steam digital distribution platform doesn't carry AO-rated games either, but the game has been greenlit by the community. Whether Valve will let the game be published on its platform after this rating remains to be seen.

The Daily Mail has discovered the controversy seeking game and writes:

Hatred game becomes second in history to get adults only rating as critics slam makers for sickest ever storyline.

It has been dubbed the sickest ever video game because players only have one aim - to massacre as many people as possible in a genocide crusade .

'Hatred' is the story of a lone wolf gunman who hates the world and acts out his fantasy of brutally murdering the public and police because no life is worth saving .

The hooded killer uses machine guns, knives and explosives to kill in the streets, in schools and public buildings because of his bitter hatred of human worms .