1. The Parents Television Council filed 36 indecency complaints with the FCC alleging that popular television shows, including Friends and The Simpsons, contained indecent scenes that were either sexually explicit or used indecent or profane language. How would you vote on the following scenes?
a. In the Gilmore Girls, one character says to another, “You’re a dick.”
2. The Parents Television Council contacted sponsors of the April 6, 2005, episode of the television program The Shield to complain about a “graphic” scene in which a police captain was forced to perform fellatio on a gang member at gunpoint. Kia and Castrol were among those sponsors. What would you do if you were in charge of advertising for Kia or Castrol, and you received that complaint?
3. Cable television operators use signal scrambling to ensure that only paying customers have access to some programming. Congress was concerned that some sexually explicit cable programming, even though scrambled, might reach children via signal “bleeding.” Section 505 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 required cable operators to fully block sexually oriented channels or to “time channel”—that is, transmit only in hours when children are unlikely to be viewing. Most cable operators adopted the latter approach, with the result that for two-thirds of the day no viewers in the operators’ service areas could receive the sexually explicit programming. Section 504 of the Telecommunications Act required cable operators to block undesired channels at individual households on request. A supplier of sexually oriented programming challenged Section 505 on First Amendment grounds. Decide the case. Explain.