What is art: The ‘social crime’ of censorship

Being an adult, I find it personally acceptable and most often entertaining to see violence, drunkenness and subtle portrayals of sexual innuendo in TV commercials. I’ve never felt a serious urge to kill someone, I know what it’s like to consume alcohol and I consider myself fairly intelligent on the subject of human mating rituals. Therefore, I find it entirely reasonable that I might be entertained by comical depictions of such situations in 30-second vignettes.\nThis being the case, I was thoroughly disappointed Sunday night. Since I have the memory capacity of a carp, the actual Super Bowl game is somewhat hard for me to follow, but I do have a strong penchant for halftime shows, libations, the company of friends, queso dip and, most importantly, commercials. Having spent a ridiculous amount of money for 30-second slots, large companies typically design miniature films, if you will, to sell their respective products. They usually entail some sort of story that is flipped within the last five seconds before uproarious laughter ensues.\nHowever, thanks to Janet Jackson’s jewel-encrusted nipple, we have all been made to suffer at the hands of America’s version of Big Brother, the Federal Communications Commission. With the exception of the idea of giant pigeons attacking a city, the Super Bowl ads sucked this year because a nipple, from which about 95 percent of us received sustenance as infants, happened to slip the censor on national television in 2004.\nFour years and a Democratic Party-run Congress later, we are still suffering from the horrible backlash of the FCC. The average FCC fine for a broadcast “incident” such as a “swear word” ranges from $268,000 to $375,000. Money that could be spent on quality broadcasting is being snatched up by the FCC for incidents that probably slipped our minds as we watched. This may sound a little extreme, but when art suffers, we all suffer. How are we supposed to relate to what we see on television if depictions of life are censored? How much comedy remains in a story that doesn’t include elements of distastefulness?\nThere is truth in the argument that children should not be subjected to violence and sex, but did the word “fuck” ever hurt anybody? I remember hearing it on the playground as a child, and I’d say I turned out fine.\nIt is arrogant to be offended by a word someone told you is bad. It is pointless to cover up something on a woman that is the exact same on a man except for mammary glands. The problem in American society is immaturity toward sexual and violent depictions. It isn’t that there are too many of these images, but that Americans don’t know how to handle them without making them taboo. Maybe the problem lies in an administration supported by your tax dollars that controls the social crime of censorship.