Is censorship on the increase ?

whitetrash · 01-08-2008 10:39AM

TV censorship will always submit to whoever complains the most. If 95% of the viewers don't mind nudity but 5% complain, it'll get investigated, channels get fined and self-censor in the future.

It's always the busy-bodies who dictate what the rest of us can watch

Cookie_Monster · 01-08-2008 12:26PM

whitetrash wrote: »

TV censorship will always submit to whoever complains the most. If 95% of the viewers don't mind nudity but 5% complain, it'll get investigated, channels get fined and self-censor in the future.

It's always the busy-bodies who dictate what the rest of us can watch

+1

It's quite simply really, if you dont like it then DON'T FCUKING WATCH IT!!

/rant over, goes to throw something at some busy bodies

seamus · 01-08-2008 01:03PM

Channel 4, E4, Sky, Paramount Comedy and loads of others often show syndicated versions of shows, most notably Friends, which have been edited to shorten the episode and to censor it for pre-watershed viewing. This allows them to fit in more advertising around the more popular shows. It is very rarely done to appease the more jittery elements of society - it's largely done to make the show more profitable.
If you can show a popular programme like Friends at 6 o'clock by censoring the word "Bastard", then you can make money through the sponsors/advertisers who are clamouring to get their ads in around it.

If you watch the shows on BBC or RTE (or Channel 6 if you have UPC), you will see the full things in their unedited glory.

I love watching an old Simpsons episode on BBC and seeing a scene which was never there before.

Mossy Monk · 01-08-2008 01:21PM

The BBC don't show the Simposns anymore.

faceman · 01-08-2008 01:25PM

Pre 9/11 there was an episode on Star Trek the next generation that was about freedom fighting terrorists. It was called "the high ground". In the episode there was a reference to the resolution of the troubles in Northern and there being a United Ireland.

It was cut on most UK station broadcasts although I know Sky showed it in full.

Prof.Badass · 01-08-2008 01:57PM

On paramount comedy 1 they censore out the words bitch and ass!

seriously "ass".... who finds that offensive??? Also BBC tends to beep out what i can only assume to be fcuk and the like, i think channel 4 does it sometimes too. I'm talking about shows like "QI" and "8 out of 10 cats" and the like. The weird thing is half of these shows don't have beeps, and half do. so it's not like they have to

We're lucky to be living in Ireland where words like fcuk and {unt appear regularly on rte2.

Also, we can show a close-up of a vagina in a non-surgical context (unlike the uk).......that is of course unless that hour-long tv3 "documentary" about vaginas (it was a few months back) was a complete breach of regulations.

Fighting Irish · 01-08-2008 02:00PM

pyure wrote: »

I was watching the simpsons on channel 4 the other day, the episode where apu meets his arranged bride mandula (sp?), I'm most people will know the one. Anyway, at the end of the episode homer dresses up as the hindu god to try and break up the ceremony. I've seen this episode many times on tv, but this time that particular sequence was cut out...wft is up with that ?
Is censorship beginning to creep into out tvs ? Has anyone else noticed instances of this sort of thing ?

Yes it is, and unless its stopped we will end up like america. You wouldn't believe the stuff you're not allowed say on the radio in the US :eek:

javaboy · 01-08-2008 02:12PM

vinylmesh wrote: »

On paramount comedy 1 they censore out the words bitch and ass!

I don't have a problem really with censoring "bitch" or "ass" in the likes of Scrubs on Paramount at midday but I wish they'd use a bleep instead of just silence. It's much more irritating than a beep.

Duggy747 · 01-08-2008 02:17PM

Fighting Irish wrote: »

Yes it is, and unless its stopped we will end up like america. You wouldn't believe the stuff you're not allowed say on the radio in the US :eek:

UTV are horrendous for chopping movies up. They used to cut Robocop to pieces to the point where the action scenes made no sense.

Channel 4 still cut scenes like in Under Siege where Seagal puts a guy under a mechanical saw and it goes through his shoulder (always loved that mindless bit

)

At least RTE and TG4 don't edit any shows or movies. Though I remember when TV3 where to air South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut and Natural Born Killers but due to complaints they had to pull them at the last minute and replace them with some drippy rom-coms.

I find rom-coms highly offensive, they're an insult to intelligence.

Prof.Badass · 01-08-2008 02:24PM

javaboy wrote: »

I don't have a problem really with censoring "bitch" or "ass" in the likes of Scrubs on Paramount at midday but I wish they'd use a bleep instead of just silence. It's much more irritating than a beep.

This is what i don't understand! they censor out mere words but they leave in bits where poeple talk about drinking and casual sex???

saying fuck on tv isn't going to have any effect on a kid whatsoever? they hear it all the time!

I don't see the logic in not allowing completely non-sexual nudity but allowing whole dialogues about casual sex.

If such censorship is really about protect children who are impressionable then surely they have their priorities mixed up.

I can tell you this much as a fact! the constant talk of casual sex that fills our tv screens is far, far more likely to have a negative impression on kids than a brief scene of someone in their natural form or hearing the word "fuck".

slipss · 01-08-2008 02:56PM

pyure wrote: »

I was watching the simpsons on channel 4 the other day, the episode where apu meets his arranged bride mandula (sp?), I'm most people will know the one. Anyway, at the end of the episode homer dresses up as the hindu god to try and break up the ceremony. I've seen this episode many times on tv, but this time that particular sequence was cut out...wft is up with that ?
Is censorship beginning to creep into out tvs ? Has anyone else noticed instances of this sort of thing ?

Channel 4 are the worst offenders for this, they do the same on e4 and more 4, skipping out words like bitch, sex, whore and porn. Removing entire scenes that have religious or sexual references which may be deemed offensive so that the whole story line of the particualar episode of the programme makes absalutely no sense. Kind of sad considering channel 4 was started with the intent of being an edgy controversial alternative to the mind numbing clean cut conservative censorship of the BBC. I'd say the original creaters are turning in thier graves (if they are dead).

pyure · 01-08-2008 03:58PM

forgot the best one - the scrubs episode with the light bulb lodged in the guys colon. saw it uncut once, and every time since every reference to it is removed...it's the central plot to the story ffs! the only parts left in are an xray in the background and everyone laughing at the end when they replace kelsos lightbulb with the dirty one. other than that nothing.

anyway the point is: as we become more multicultural is tv being softened to avoid offending the new groups in our society ?
are we heading the way of the americans where their idea of showing a movie uncut is dubbing 'bad' words with less offensive ones ?
I remember watching two movies on the tv when I was in the states - me myself irene where whole scenes were cut to the point where the movie made no sense, and the usual suspects (uncut as the station announced) which dubbed over the bad language.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar · 01-08-2008 04:01PM

i was watching the video for 'gay bar' by electric six on mtv years ago, and I remember they censored the words 'nuclear' 'war' and 'bomb'.

was nice. made me feel safe.

tbh · 01-08-2008 04:12PM

was watching American breakfast tv once and they had a bit on about breast cancer. They showed an anatomical picture of a woman without skin, and had her nipples (or the bit of meat where the nipple would be) blacked out. As in, they had stuck pieces of black masking tape to the picture.

Ponster · 01-08-2008 04:17PM

tbh wrote: »

(or the bit of meat where the nipple would be)

You sure know how to talk to a woman !

Prof.Badass · 01-08-2008 04:49PM

Princess Innocent Knickers wrote: »

i was watching the video for 'gay bar' by electric six on mtv years ago, and I remember they censored the words 'nuclear' 'war' and 'bomb'.

was nice. made me feel safe.

that reminds me! I was watching the video for nickelback "rockstar" i think it's called. Anyway they removed the word "drug dealer" from the line "everybody's got a drug dealer on speed dial" which is only a reference to the fact that a lot of rock stars do drugs.

But they leave in the line "we'll all stay skinny coz we just won't eat" which i see as actively encouraging anorexia. Which is worse?

DemocAnarchis · 01-08-2008 05:07PM

vinylmesh wrote: »

Which is worse?

Listening to Nickelback tbh

Prof.Badass · 01-08-2008 05:15PM

DemocAnarchis wrote: »

Listening to Nickelback tbh

lol

Is censorship on the increase ?

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