Policy Group: Congress Considers Indecent Assault on Free Speech

Congress should weigh costs and benefits before it passes any broadcast indecency law, according to the public policy group the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which says consumers face the threat of greater regulation of television and radio broadcasting from Congress and the FCC over allegedly indecent content. Many of the “solutions” to media indecency being proposed would violate the free expression guarantees of the First Amendment and make government – not consumers – the ultimate arbiter of programming content, it said.
“The prospect of the federal government getting deeper into the job of telling Americans what they are allowed to watch and listen to is deeply troubling,” said Braden Cox, Technology Counsel at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
“Parents of children have a powerful weapon of their own. It’s called the off button. Truly offensive content – as opposed to occasional crudeness or political incorrectness – will be met with vanishing audiences and no advertisers,” he said.