(muffled chuckling) He said "excretion"

I like "bad" words. A lot. Watching a parent get visibly bent when their child overhears "fuck" is (I think undeniably) top-notch entertainment. Michael J. Copps, FCC stooge, entertain us:

"I am shocked by such an anti-family decision coming out of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. Sadly, the court focused its energies on the purported chilling effect our indecency policy has on broadcasters of indecent programming, and no time focusing on the chilling effect today's decision will have on the ability of American parents to safeguard the interests of their children."

Anti-family? Did the court rule we're all going to be living communally like the traditional Chukchi people of Siberia? Like one big family. No? Oh, it's about curse words on tee vee? Okay.

The Court's ruling is not a sweeping change to the FCC's puritanical rules. Here's the deal. Apparently, when pseudo-celebs get in front of a microphone during awards shows, they use it as an opportunity to show how racy and hip they are. An easy way to do that: say a bad word when you're not supposed to. Networks would get hit with fines if they didn't bleep out the intruder, which I suppose isn't easy to do during a live broadcast. They found:

By prohibiting all 'patently offensive' references to sex, sexual organs, and excretion without giving adequate guidance as to what 'patently offensive' means, the FCC effectively chills speech, because broadcasters have no way of knowing what the FCC will find offensive. To place any discussion of these vast topics at the broadcaster's peril has the effect of promoting wide self-censorship of valuable material which should be completely protected under the First Amendment.

What does patently offensive mean? Not. A. Fucking. Thing. It's inherently stupid. The audience is heterogeneous. Placating to the whines of the easily offended is not mentioned in the First Amendment, I don't think.

Getting back to our hero, Michael J. Copps (that's his actual name, I didn't make that up) is concerned that the court spent no time (how he would know? I don't know) "focusing on the chilling effect today's decision will have on the ability of American parents to safeguard the interests of their children." Yeah, yeah, that's obviously bullshit and sure I'm picking the low hanging fruit on this one. But, what I like about his indignation is that it illustrates what I've seen to be a common phenomenon: it's not necessarily the idea that the words represent that causes the moral trouble, but — rather hilariously — it's the actual words themselves.

Perfectly exemplified by a rollicking scene in Robert Siegel's Big Fan (you know, Patton Oswalt, football fan gets beaten up by football hero, hilarity ensues). Oswalt's title character is riding in the car with his decorous mother. Mom is getting on Oswalt's case — normal mom to single son still living at home advice — son, you need a woman. She cites his brother as a good example. Oswalt loses his shit for a minute. His brother!? His jackass lawyer of a brother left his wife to fuck and marry his big fake boobied secretary. Mom takes offense, "don't say that." Oswalt asks, "what's worse, that Jeff actually left his wife to fuck his secretary, or that I said it?"

Good question.

postscript consideration: Copps appears to be more than stuffy moralism — as far as I could judge such a thing, that is.