(no subject)

[theweaselking]

Playboy Magazine does photo spread with amputee. No pictures of her currently available online for comparison.

Playboy Magazine does "Girls of McDonald's" photo spread. McDonald's does not approve.

Non-Playboy news:

Man living in porta-potty assaulted by teenager who really, really needed to go.

News Of The Stupid:

Fire caused by woman leaving her three children alone while she went to buy beer. The children are 2, 4, and 6, and she left them playing with A BUTANE TORCH and THE FUEL FOR HER MODEL ROCKETS. Nobody was hurt in the fire.

Right-wing lunatics organise protest against the horrible, child-affecting violence of broadcasting "Saving Private Ryan" on Rememberance Day. John McCain introduced the ABC production, saying angrily "the film is nowhere near indecent." 1/3 of ABC affiliates refuse to air the broadcast, for fear of FCC fines.

"Another indication of the red culture scare is the action of one of the US’s newly elected politicians, Tom Coburn, a senator from Oklahoma, says Rich. As a state-elected politician, he attacked NBC in 1997 for encouraging 'irresponsible sexual behaviour' and for taking 'network TV to an all-time low with full-frontal nudity, violence and profanity'. His anger was prompted by the prime-time airing of another Spielberg film, 'Schindler’s List'."

'Cause, y'know, "Schindler's List" ALWAYS makes me want to go out and engage in irresponsible sexual behaviour!

Comments

[zenten.livejournal.com]

>>"Another indication of the red culture scare is the action of one of the US’s newly elected politicians, Tom Coburn, a senator from Oklahoma, says Rich. As a state-elected politician, he attacked NBC in 1997 for encouraging 'irresponsible sexual behaviour' and for taking 'network TV to an all-time low with full-frontal nudity, violence and profanity'. His anger was prompted by the prime-time airing of another Spielberg film, 'Schindler’s List'."<<

I think he didn't like how it portrayed a negative light of his idols.

[jl-williams.livejournal.com]

Ha! Nice.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

John Thomas, editor of the Web site, said in an interview that despite the chilly corporate reactions, Playboy.com will continue to search for other unorthodox companies for upcoming spreads.

Heh. Playboy's web editor is named John Thomas. Oh the irony...

Hm.

[torrain.livejournal.com]

First point on news of the stupid: playing with a butane torch and the fuel for her boyfriend's model rockets. No, it doesn't change anything. If she didn't know it was there, cool, but if she didn't know it was there she left preschoolers in a strange place that she didn't know very well and that wasn't child-proofed, and the butane torch thing is still beyond creepy.

On the SPR note: I would agree that the film is not indecent--it didn't strike me as either pandering or pornographic in its depiction of violence (and, after all, I am a product of a society which apparently views bared bodies as indecent but bared muscles, bones, intestines, etc., as nothing of the sort).

AFAICT the child-affecting violence bit is in your summary, not the article itself, but in a brief flash of cynicism I'm going to believe that some idiot out there is using the phrase "We're doing it for the children!" to justify this, and it's really annoying. I do take the point about graphic violence--I walked out of the theatre feeling liked I'd been clubbed and while I hear I'm somewhat naive I don't think me-at-twenty is that much less inured to graphic depictions of violence than some kid--but nonetheless:

Jesus fucking Christ, people, the TV is not your babysitter and you do not get to piss and moan because it isn't keeping your kids busy in some way that is guaranteed to have them not being inconvenient afterwards. If you want to keep them out of your hair, give them a butane torch in the room with model rocket fuel and go out for beer.

(Oh, wait, that sometimes doesn't work.)

Just wanted to get that out of my system.

Now, back on topic: Yes, I appreciate that some stations might not want to break the FCC guidelines (arguably), but the increase in the number of stations who refused to show it (especially given the promise of paid fines), is depressing.

I think references back to complaints in 1997 are stretching it a bit much--there'll always be someone complaining about something on TV. Not citing an evil politician incident that's a little more recent does give me hope that perhaps they aren't that common, or at least that the current actively unhappy environment is a relatively new thing.

...I'm now feeling this horrible horrible desire to get my hands on a copy of Ilsa: She-Wolf of the SS, relabel it Schindler's List, and mail it to Mr. Coburn. Not that he'll watch it. Not that he'd necessarily think any worse of Schindler's List if he did. Not that it would ever accomplish anything.

But what the hell, everybody should have a chance to get their worldview reaffirmed now and again.

Re: Hm.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

> get their worldview reaffirmed

You appear to have added extra, unnecessary letters to "reamed".

Re: Hm.

[torrain.livejournal.com]

Dude, if Schindler's List prompts him to rant about irresponsible sexual behaviour, then conveying the impression it's porn will only reaffirm his worldview.

(Related note: I am so fucking tired of people who believe that because a course of action or a point of view is depicted in a work of fiction it means that the creator endorses it. What the fuck was he thinking, that because one Nazi's depicted as behaving in a way entirely too creepy towards his maid that Spielberg's endorsing it? When the hell did "Monkey see, monkey do" become a description of a valid moral course of action instead of an observation about a really stupid habit? And does nobody think anymore?)

(And Alan Moore is not anti-left, goddammit.)