The continued reference to Mary Cheney by the Dems

Nice try Soz. You've now reverted back to: It's different because I'm right.

Bible thumpers can match that argument exactly... and have centuries of tradition to add weight to their claim that homosexuality is a sin. Bottom line remains the same. You want to push your agenda, they want to push theirs. You continue to pretend there is some difference between the two... because "you're right". That's not logic dear. It's denial.

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Oooh, I just thought of a great way to give out a message that homosexuality is a sin -- make sure an episode of a kid's show that says it's OK is pulled off the airwaves.

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That'll work.

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But I just thought of a great way to affirm parents as the best judge of what is appropriate and inappropriate for their children. Don't force a discussion about something before the parent is ready to have that discussion with his/her child.

See? There's always two points of view. It doesn't have to be either/or or if it is this way then we are precluding that way. Tolerance in my view whether it be for different colors of skin, different religions or belief systems, food choices, or sexual preferences is best achieved and demonstrated by tolerance in all matters that should be the business of the one making the decision. That would include a parent's choice or a producer's choice about appropriateness of introducing various subjects to children.

Other than that, I agree with Nimh that harm or damage is not going to occur due to exposure to an utterance from a Barbie doll or a depiction of two women heading a household. As I have said, I don't know whether I would agree that the Sugartime episode was appropriate for young children. Chances are, I would see it as harmless but my opinion is not the one that counts here. The larger issue is parental preference and the right of the person in charge to make a determination about appropriateness.

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OCCOM BILL wrote:

Nice try Soz. You've now reverted back to: It's different because I'm right.

No, it's what it's been all along -- that teaching that some kids have two moms and that's OK is right. The only way that it makes sense to single out this defacto endorsement out of the millions of defacto endorsements on TV -- defacto endorsements of heterosexual couples, sharing, having a dog, having a goldfish, living in a house, living in an apartment, going to school, being homeschooled, playing soccer, reading books, having friends of various races, being vegetarian, being omnivorous, having blonde hair, having brown skin, being tall, being short, driving, walking, taking subways, wearing makeup, singing, being good at math, being bad at math, being rich, being poor, being young, being old -- is if there is something wrong with this particular defacto endorsement.

Where logic comes in is you need to show me whether there is, empirically, something wrong with this particular defacto endorsement. So far you have said, well, public morality is more against it than for it. As a line of reasoning, that has holes, as shown by blatham when when he took it to a logical extreme and as shown by the fact that you abandon that logic when it comes to Sesame Street and their integrated cast back when public morality was still distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of a whole bunch of people of various races living on the same street (not to mention being on the same set -- the first integrated cast.)

(Edit: mixed up the for/ against)

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Foxfyre wrote:

Other than that, I agree with Nimh that harm or damage is not going to occur due to exposure to an utterance from a Barbie doll or a depiction of two women heading a household. As I have said, I don't know whether I would agree that the Sugartime episode was appropriate for young children. Chances are, I would see it as harmless but my opinion is not the one that counts here. The larger issue is parental preference and the right of the person in charge to make a determination about appropriateness.

No particular disagreement there. I would prefer that all kids have a chance to see it -- but if a parent refuses to let their kid watch the show, so be it.

And again, I've said this a few times but I really think it's pertinent, exposure to diverse lifestyles is the whole point of the show. A parent would have lots of opportunities to decide this show is not one they'd like their children to see well before the (utterly thematic) maple sugaring episode came along.

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For example, from what Bill has said, he would have already decided the show was not for his kids by the Mormon episode. (Not to mention the Islam episode, the Pentecostal Christian episode, the Orthodox Jew episode...)

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One of the funniest things about this "rights" stuff is that there was no threat to parental rights.

As Soz has said repeatedly, each of these shows flags content several times before the show is shown, allowing all parents to intervene if the content concerns them in some way. (Given that it seems most folk want their kids to see the show because it educates about diversity, it is moot as to whether it would have bothered most of them, but still - they are given ample opportunity to not allow any particular show.)

A little difficult to maintain the righteous "you is taking my RIGHTS away!" stuff in the face of this, would have thought?

Nemmind.

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OCCOM BILL wrote:

sozobe wrote:
OK, that's semantics.

Bill, which did you mean? In context it seems pretty clear that while you would prefer that PBS wouldn't have developed the episode at all (?) you're saying you don't think outside forces should impel PBS to pull the "Sugartime!" episode.
I don't see it as a legal issue is all. Like you, I'll write a station and complain if I see something I don't like... and if enough people do so and they alter their programming that's not censorship. I fully expect you to continue lobbying for such programming, but find it ridiculous the way some (like Blatham just did) find it necessary to demonize the opposition who are doing the exact same thing.

sozobe wrote:
Meanwhile, by that reasoning, I should have been firing off angry letters to PBS demanding that they not show the Mormon episode of "Buster." Religion is another sensitive subject, as you and Bill have brought up in "what would you do if...?" questions in the course of this discussion. If I'm the oversensitive one here, I would be extremely upset that the control over talking about religion -- particularly for us, since we're not religious and don't usually talk about it -- was taken away from me. I'd demand that PBS be more respectful of the prevailing public morality -- which is NOT a majority of Mormons -- and refrain from showing something so controversial.
You would have had every right to fire off those letters. I assure you, yours would not have been the only one. Feedback isn't tantamount to censorship. I sent a letter of complaint to HBO- and received and apology- when they replaced Dennis Miller with Bill Maher (I thought there was room for both). Does that mean I'm a Hyper-PC Humor Nazi? Or does it simply mean that I was using my voice in an attempt to secure television programming that suits me?

I think the problem here is that ONE very powerful government official wrote - and basically, at least for a time, managed to censor the thing for everyone - except for a few stations which allowed parents to decide for themselves, not have an official decide for them.

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"The bottom line is you're convinced your desire to eradicate prejudice trumps the importance of the oppositions desire to keep children out of the sea of fire. To separate the issue, you rely on "ya but, I'm right". So do they. "

Once again - any parent can simply turn the TV off. They are given ample information about what the shows will contain.

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It's up to "a couple dozen" according to the NYT, I'm really curious about mine! Columbus, blue city in a red state, dunno...

I'll let you guys know. And will take copious notes if I do get to see it!

By the way if it wasn't clear my paragraph above -- last page? -- written by the fictitious former Clinton administration Education Secretary was really what Spelling wrote, with only "Sugartime!" replaced by "Mormons!" Actual paragraph, part of Margaret Spelling's letter to PBS:

Quote:

You should know that two years ago the Senate Appropriations Committee raised questions about the accountability of funds appropriated for Ready-To-Learn programs. We believe the 'Sugartime!' episode does not come within these purposes or within the intent of Congress and would undermine the overall objective of the Ready-To-Learn program -- to produce programming that reaches as many children and families as possible.

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Foxfyre wrote:

But I just thought of a great way to affirm parents as the best judge of what is appropriate and inappropriate for their children. Don't force a discussion about something before the parent is ready to have that discussion with his/her child.

See? There's always two points of view. It doesn't have to be either/or or if it is this way then we are precluding that way. Tolerance in my view whether it be for different colors of skin, different religions or belief systems, food choices, or sexual preferences is best achieved and demonstrated by tolerance in all matters that should be the business of the one making the decision. That would include a parent's choice or a producer's choice about appropriateness of introducing various subjects to children.

Other than that, I agree with Nimh that harm or damage is not going to occur due to exposure to an utterance from a Barbie doll or a depiction of two women heading a household. As I have said, I don't know whether I would agree that the Sugartime episode was appropriate for young children. Chances are, I would see it as harmless but my opinion is not the one that counts here. The larger issue is parental preference and the right of the person in charge to make a determination about appropriateness.

Nobody is denying that there are two (prolly many more than that) points of view, Fox.

We are simply arguing about which is the better.

In the event, the interference by the powerful official meant that only one could be acted upon - NOT allowing one's child to watch the show.

The choice of parents was, in fact, removed by the right. Hmmmmmmmm.......

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There is also the principle of the one paying for the product having the right to determine what product will be paid for. Continuing in case this is an edit. . .

Actually the American taxpayers are subsidizing PBS with enormous sums. We elect leaders to spend our money with hopes they will be sensitive to the values we send them to Washington to protect. The Education Secretary is a member of an administration elected mostly by the more conservative Americans. That she determined the program to be unsuitable for young children, based on parental preference, was sufficient and perfectly legal.

I haven't checked, but I would almost lay odds that Bill Clinton's Education secretary also had her finger on the pulse of funding for various arts and media offerings and probably pulled some serious strings to be sure the values of that administration were reflected.

If it would be appropriate for the education secretary to say that no public funding would be provided for a program that seemed to denigrate same sex couples--I would hope no funding would be provided for that purpose--it is only reasonable that no funding would be provided either for a program that seemed to promote same sex couples when a majority of parents were not ready to have that discussion with their children.

It isn't censorship at all. There was no mandate that the program could not be shown by anybody ever. It was just that the Education Dept. did not wish to pay for it.

Tolerance has many faces in a case like this. And again I think we encourage and further tolerance when we don't demand that our way is the only correct way to look at something and everybody else is (insert any uncomplimentary adjective or adjectives here.)

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Foxfyre wrote:

There is also the principle of the one paying for the product having the right to determine what product will be paid for.

When the paying party is the government and the product in question is media programming, that gets a bit tricky tho. The government has the right to determine the contents of public television? Does that extent to, say, news reporting?

Wholly different can of worms again..

(Edit: worms, nimh. Worms. A can of beans doesnt need to be a problem for anyone ... unless its your husband who had it as dinner, or something.)

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Paying in part, anyway. Public TV has a lot of funding sources. I could get into another analogy of whether it would be OK if the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation issued an edict saying that the Orthdox Jew episode could stay but the Mormon, Islam, and Pentecostal Christian episodes had to go, but we've got analogies up the wazoo. :-)

We're not necessarily saying Spelling didn't have the right to write the letter she did -- we're questioning her motivations and especially questioning whether she was correct in doing so.

I really don't think we're so far away from each other on that, Foxfyre, I've agreed with what you've said about the likely harmlessness of the episode.

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Oh boy - there's an interesting one.

Most governments - of good intent - which sponsor public broadcasting - have a whole system of distancing themselves from direct control - because the huge problems of the kind of interference you are talking about, Fox, are clearly recognised even by conservative governments - at least in other places.

The BBC and Oz's ABC have their own charters and the government is not supposed to intervene - except by the normal channels by which anyone can do so.

Of course, some governments - like our current conservative one - breach this principle in a thousand different ways - but at least they do it secretly, (irony) because they recognize that the smallest understanding of the ethics of public broadcasting require that the government of the day not have direct control.

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And good point, nimh.

I'm gonna start saying "can of beans", though. :-) Maybe "can of mexican jumping beans"? They're more likely to get out, worm-style...

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That is cos they CONTAIN worms, Soz!!!!!

Having said which, I was SOOOOOO out of this damned tarbaby of a thread!!!!

Grrrrrrr - I am an eeejit.

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I added on to my post about the funding up there. It was my understanding that most of the Sugartimes funding does come from public rather than private funding; i.e. the federal government.

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I thought it was little buggy things.

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The continued reference to Mary Cheney by the Dems

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