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Name: Canadian Broadcast Standards Council
Age: 21
Occupation: broadcast regulators
Last Seen: Canada
Bee-otched For: getting their Money For Nothing and their chicks for free
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Several months ago, I was watching the CBC while I was in the Detroit area on cable. Lo-and-behold, they played Kill Bill Vol. 2 complete with violence and profanities intact. The sole editing made to the movie was to make way for commercials.
Several years previous, I was watching the CTV affiliate in Sault Ste. Marie, ON on an e-skip at my mother's house in rural Antrim County, MI. They were airing a documentary on sex, complete with a brief close-up shot of a woman's vagina as she masturbated. Of course, they aired this program at Midnight, complete with a parental advisory warning.
You might think that hearing and reading all this that Canada's a no-man's land when it comes to censorship. Well, you're wrong.
Remember several years ago when Howard Stern's affiliate in Toronto got slammed with a warning from their equivalent of our FCC? It was for the word "retard". According to the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council, you cannot call a minority any words that might be sensitive to them. Because of the CBSC's antics - plus the fact that Q107 was eventually bought out by a family-friendly company, Corus - Stern disappeared from the Toronto airwaves.
But now, the CBSC's at it again. Last week, the organization ruled that Dire Straits' 1985 #1 pop and rock hit (in both U.S. and Canada mind you) "Money For Nothing" can no longer be played in its entirety, even though it's been played millions of times in the past 26 years. The reason: the song's use of the F-word.
Nope, not the F-dash-dash-dash word that got little Ralphie in trouble in A Christmas Story, but the F-dash-dash-dash-dash-dash word that rhymes with "maggot" and is used to rudely describe gay men.
But since this website is intended to be R-rated and is protected under the First Amendment, we'll say it anyway: "faggot".
The CBSC claimed that "Money For Nothing" breached its code of ethics and that "like other racially driven words in the English language, 'faggot' is one that, even if entirely or marginally acceptable in earlier days, is no longer so." The song mentions the word thrice in the second verse:
"The little faggot with the earring and the makeup
Yeah buddy, that's his own hair
That little faggot got his own jet airplane
That little faggot he's a millionaire."
Yeah buddy, that's his own hair
That little faggot got his own jet airplane
That little faggot he's a millionaire."
The ban came when a listener of rock station CHOZ/Oz FM St. Johns, Newfoundland and Labrador complained to the CBSC claiming that it was too homophobic to air. However, as soon as the ruling was made, two rock stations in Halifax and Edmonton protested by playing the full version of the song for one hour straight.
Bear in mind that Canada does have some strange broadcast laws, like the CanCon rule that radio stations must play 40% Canadian content. While the CBSC does rule on what's acceptable or not, it's still not the CRTC, which is the real FCC of Canada. What the CBSC is doing is similar to the National Association of Broadcasters here in America, which has their own standards of broadcasting.
It's also worth noting that Dire Straits' lead singer Mark Knopfler wrote the song while visiting an electronics store and seeing one of their working class employees bickering about the artists playing on MTV. The "little faggot" reference referred to Motley Crue, surprise, surprise.
Look, I understand that this is 2011 and that 1985 was a generation ago. People back then pushed to abolish offending terms like "faggot" and "nigger" because they hurt. But guess what? GAYS AND BLACKS USE THOSE WORDS, TOO! I understand that Canada probably doesn't have the free speech laws we have here in the states, so who are we REALLY protecting?
Thanks, but it makes me happier that I own an MP3 player and a Sirius. It'll come in handy when I see some pink on CTV.
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Bee-otch of the Day is a production of Chuck69.com, Grand Rapids' site for Stern, politics and more!
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