The Supreme Court was busy today, granting review in a bunch of new cases, including a couple of interesting criminal cases. But the one that will gain the most attention is FCC v. Fox Television Stations, et. al, or what will become known as the fleeting expletive case. In 2006, the FCC ruled that Fox stations violated regulations on profanity when Cher and Nicole Richie, those paragons of modern culture, said "fuck" and "shit," respectively, during some meaningless award shows. No fine was imposed, but the FCC ruled that even a fleeting one-time-only use of the F or S bombs violated decency standards.
Fox appealed:
No fines were imposed. But Fox challenged the decision in court, arguing that the government's decency standard was unclear, violated free-speech protections and that the rulings had contradicted earlier findings.The FCC petitioned the Supremes to review the case. It will be the first time in 30 years that the Supremes have addressed the issue of broadcast indecency, dating back to the Pacifica case and George Carlin's seven dirty words. Boy, that cries out for a YouTube embed, don't you think?
The appeals court sided with Fox, saying the FCC had 'failed to articulate a reasoned basis' for its 'fleeting' indecency standard and expressed skepticism about whether the courts would find it constitutional. It sent the matter back to the agency for further consideration.
Of course, it doesn't really stop with those seven (can't embed this one). Hopefully the Supremes will sort it all out for us.
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