In the Matter of Enforcement of Prohibitions Against Broadcast Indecency ,GC Docket No. 92-223
Entercom Kansas City License, LLC, Entercom Wichita License, LLC
Entercom Kansas City License, LLC, and Entercom Wichita
License, LLC (collectively ``Entercom''),2 licensees of
Stations KQRC-FM, Leavenworth, Kansas, and KFH(AM), Wichita,
Kansas, respectively, apparently violated 18 U.S.C. § 1464
and 47 C.F.R. § 73.3999, by willfully and repeatedly airing
indecent material during the April 4, April 29, May 2, and
May 3, 2002, broadcasts of the ``Dare and Murphy Show.''($220,000)
Married By America was a "reality-based" television
program in which several single adults agreed to be engaged to
and potentially marry each other, even though they had never
previously met. The April 7, 2003 episode of the program focused
on the Las Vegas bachelor and bachelorette parties for the
remaining two couples. These parties featured strippers and
various sexual situations. Following that broadcast, the
Commission received 159 complaints alleging that the ?Married By
America? episode contained indecent material.
[W]e find that the licensees of the CBS Network Stations, as defined
herein, aired program material on February 1, 2004, at
approximately 8:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, during the
halftime entertainment show of the National Football
League's Super Bowl XXXVIII, that apparently violates the
federal restrictions regarding the broadcast of indecent
material.
The Commission received numerous complaints from
individuals associated with PTC alleging that the licensees
named on the complaints broadcast the ``Golden Globe
Awards'' program, during which the performer Bono uttered a
phrase allegedly in violation of the FCC's rules restricting
the broadcast of indecent material.
Agape Broadcasting Foundation, Inc. (graphic explicit sexual language)
Mr. Steve Bridges, (call-in radio)
BROADCAST OF INDECENT MATERIAL DURING THE HOWARD STERN SHOW
In re: KRTH(FM) (Infinity Bdcting), (License renewal)
Rich Communications Corporation (pandering)
In the Matter of Petition for Declaratory Ruling Concerning Section 312(a)(7) of the Communications Act (Abortion Political Ads)
Southern Nevada Radio (graphic explicit sexual language)
Mr. Peter Branton, LETTER OPINION (Gotti case)
Agape Broadcasting Foundation, Inc. Licensee, KNON(FM), 9 FCC Rcd 1679;1994 FCC LEXIS 1278 (1994) [Texas radio station broadcast song "I Want To Be A Homosexual," which contains graphic explicit sexual language at 3:55 p.m.]
Mr. Steve Bridges, Vice President Flambo Broadcasting, Inc. Licensee of Radio Station KFMH-FM, Muscatine, Iowa 3218,
9 FCC Rcd 1681; 1994 FCC LEXIS 1279 (1994) [Radio station "pre-screened" callers in call-in contest but then broadcast two calls containing explicit sexual references within eight minutes of each other. "[T]he context of the subject broadcast rendered clear and inescapable the import of the material aired as a patently offensive reference to sexual contact with a female infant."
BROADCAST OF INDECENT MATERIAL DURING THE HOWARD STERN SHOW, Report No. MM-796, 1994 FCC LEXIS 472 (1994)
The Commission today issued Notices of Apparent Liability (NAL) to Infinity Broadcasting Corporation and its subsidiaries, licensees of WJFK(AM), Baltimore, MD; WXRK(FM), New York, NY; WYSP(FM), Philadelphia, PA; and WJFK(FM), Manassas, VA, in the aggregate amount of $ 400,000 for broadcasting apparently indecent material during the Howard Stern Show on four separate days in August, September and October, 1993 between approximately 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m.
In re: KRTH(FM), Los Angeles, CA - Assignment of License, 1994 FCC LEXIS 526; 74 Rad. Reg. 2d (P & F) 743 (1994)
LETTER OPINION [FCC allows assignment of licensee to Infinity Broadcasting, saying that the aggregate fines levied against the corporation are a sufficient deterent to continued pattern of indecent program content and that pattern is not sufficient grounds to deny license transfer
Rich Communications Corporation, 1995 FCC LEXIS 3231 (1995) The subject excerpts are indecent in that they contain language that describes sexual activities in patently offensive terms. The pandering mannerof presentation, soliciting women callers to relate "the strangest intimate story" confided to them by a girlfriend, makes the repeated references to the "plunger lady" and "doing it with the plunger" unambiguously and graphically sexual. ... Because the material aired at times when there was a reasonable risk that children may have been in the audience, it is legally actionable.
In the Matter of Petition for Declaratory Ruling Concerning Section 312(a)(7) of the Communications Act, 9 FCC Rcd 7638; 1994 FCC LEXIS 5867; 76 Rad. Reg. 2d (P & F) 1062 (1994)
Broadcast of political advertisement containing the graphic depictions of aborted fetuses are not indecent... [M]any viewers find the images of aborted fetuses deeply disturbing and patently offensive, [but] that is not the test for indecency....We remain of this view notwithstanding that a district court in Georgia concluded that a videotape depicting "the actual surgical procedure for abortion" was indecent. Gillett Communications v. Becker, 807 F. Supp. 757, 763 (N.D. Ga. 1992), appeal dismissed mem., 5 F.3d 1500 (11th Cir. 1993). In ourview, however, the district court erroneously applied the indecency standard in that case....
Even if the material at issue in the Gastfreund ruling could be considered indecent under some meaning of that term, the images cannot be divorced from the context of a political campaign. ... The advertisement in Gastfreund that prompted this inquiry was presented in the context of a political campaign and it is beyond dispute that the issue of abortion is an important question in American politics. Accordingly, the context in which the advertisement at issue was presented provides further support for our conclusion that it was not indecent.
Southern Nevada Radio, Inc., D.I.P. Licensee, KKLZ(FM), 9 FCC Rcd 4454; 1994 FCC LEXIS 4190; 75 Rad. Reg. 2d (P & F) 1310 (1994).
We believe that the subject excerpts are indecent in that they contain language that describes sexual and excretory activities or organs in patently offensive terms. The March 2nd passage contains an explicit, unambiguous reference to anal sex and sexual sound effects which, in context, are pandering in nature. Taken together, these characteristics give the metaphoric language of the song an inescapable sexual meaning. ... The March 16th passage contains multiple explicit references to excretory and sexual functions in the context of a program segment -- "Men Are Pigs" -- that describes and emphasizes base conduct and contains gratuitous comment, including a discussion of whether a female caller had "squirted him [her ex-husband] with [her] . . . breast milk,"which contributed to a pandering manner of presentation.
Mr. Peter Branton, LETTER OPINION,1991 FCC LEXIS 3141, FCC 91-27 (38103), January 24, 1991
Your complaint alleged that a segment about John Gotti, a reputed organized crime figure, broadcast February 8, 1989, at 6:25 p.m. on the National Public Radio program "All Things Considered," was indecent. Specifically, the recording you supplied included, as part of a news segment about organized crime, a wiretap of a telephone conversation in which Gotti repeatedly used variations of the expletive "fuck" (transcript attached). ... When analyzing whether particular material meets this definition, the Commission looks first and foremost to the context in which the language was presented -- a review that encompasses a host of variables, including, among other things, an assessment of whether the language was used in a "shocking" or "vulgar" fashion or was without merit. ...
We recognize that the repetitious use of coarse words is objectionable to many persons, and understand that you personally may have been offended by the use of expletives during the Gotti segment. Nonetheless, we do not find the use of such words in a legitimate news report to have been gratuitous, pandering, titillating or otherwise "patently offensive," as that term is used in our indecency definition. In reaching this determination, we note that the program segment, when considered in context, was an integral part of a bona fide news story concerning organized crime, and that the material prompting your complaint was evidence used in a widely reported trial. See Infinity Broadcasting, 3 FCC Rcd at n.31. These surrounding circumstances persuade us that the use of expletives during the Gotti segment does not meet our definition of broadcast indecency. In reaching this conclusion, we note that we traditionally have been reluctant to intervene in the editorial judgments of broadcast licensees on how best to present serious public affairs programming to their listeners.
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Following the FCC's denial of the complaint, Brandon appealed to the D.C. Court of Appeals. The Court held that he had no standing to bring the appeal:
Branton v. FCC, 1993 U.S. App. LEXIS 12801; 72 Rad. Reg. 2d (P & F) 1259 (D.C. Cir., 1993)
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