FCC Regulation of Broadcast Media Content.

In my last argument, I intentionally made the distinction between corporations and the government. You seem shocked at the idea that corporations have more power than the government, but if you actually think about it, this seems to be the case. Governments are directly reprehensible for their actions. If a government passes an unjust law or persecutes someone unfairly, they never get away with it (note that it is corporate media who always exposes government corruption). Yet you never see the government do anything to the media - and the reason should be fairly obvious. Large media corporations control the information of the majority of Americans. Research shows that even as of now, more Americans get their news information from television than from the Internet. As a result, any information you see on television is carefully filtered down to represent the views of the corporation. Yet no one ever talks about the power of the media. The power of the government to enforce itself is obvious - policing forces make themselves apparent to society. The media's power, however, is invisible - and this is exactly why it is so powerful. No one ever questions the media; it is nowhere near as transparent as the government is. As a result, the media is inherently so much more powerful than the government at controlling what Americans think that it's actually somewhat scary. This is why I made the argument that the government is actually a check on the power of corporate media. If you refer back to when I mentioned the example of monopolies and other problems in industry in the late 19th century and early 20th century, you'll notice that had no one stepped in, companies like the oil giants would still have unparalleled power - but when the government stepped in and passed the Sherman Antitrust Act, reform actually happened. I find it quite evident that the government is society's only check against the power of corporations. It is naive to think that it is "society vs. the government" - it more often seems to be society vs. itself. Now, on the topic of debate, Logos is essentially conceding the point I am making on the distinction between the principle of regulation of free speech and the action of it. He claims that the government should not be able to regulate free speech; but then concedes that, "I do not think the government should be able to restrict free speech, except in cases where the speech is a direct, actionable threat (i.e. "I am going to kill you.")" This concession is crucial. Once you legitimize any regulation of freedom of speech, then the only question is to what extent free speech should be regulated, not whether it should be regulated in the first place. You cannot have it both ways - either the government never regulates, or it can regulate. You cannot wholeheartedly support freedom of speech in all instances, and then say, "Oh, but it's okay in that situation right there." That is contradictory to the point you would be making. In response to this, my opponent continues to make the argument that there is no correlation between the case of Schenck vs. United States, and this scenario. However, there absolutely is, and it is this argument itself. The only difference between Schenck and this situation is what specifically is being restricted - at stake is not the issue of freedom of speech itself. This means that the only thing we have to debate about is whether restricting the freedom of speech, in this case, is a desirable thing. To conclude my justifications and this debate, I will reiterate my two main points that illustrate why restricting freedom of speech, in this case, is a good idea. Logos makes the argument that this is the government "imposing its will" upon society. However, this is simply not the case. He claims that the FCC, being unelected, does not represent the majority of society. However, this is false for two reasons; first is that the FCC is regulated by Congress, which is directly elected by the people. If my opponent questioned the authority of every government organization that wasn't directly elected by the people, he would essentially be saying that the FBI locking people who commit murder up wouldn't represent what the majority of society want - clearly, not the case. The second reason is that the FCC is made of American citizens themselves, and as you can see, they obviously are implementing the standards most Americans want. Ask any responsible American parent whether they would prefer their children to be exposed to things like drugs, swearing, sexual content, and the like, and they obviously say no. Obviously Hollywood does a good enough job exposing our children to it, something I'll refer to in my second argument, but this is not a reason to not do this. If you read through my opponent's arguments, you will notice that he never gives very many specific reasons why not to do this, only passive defensive reasons why it's a bad idea. For instance, he makes an ambiguous Nazi reference, but let's be reasonable here. First, my opponent already conceded that some regulation of speech is justified - if this is a Nazi principle, might as well just bring him to Nuremberg now. More importantly, obviously there won't be any slippery slope where the government starts regulating free speech left and right. This is simply instigating talk that is unjustified - my opponent never gives an example of where the government has previously abused such a power, and cannot, since there is no reasonable expectation that this would lead to the abridgment of civil rights. All we are doing is attempting to protect the nation's children. These are good intentions, so we would be all right. As an 18-year-old, even now I am surprised, and slightly horrified, to see the differences between people my age and people 5 to 10 years younger. When I was in elementary school, swearing was certainly taboo, something one would do to challenge authority and to look cool. Now, a lot of elementary school and middle school children swear out of habit. Movies have not gotten any worse since then, but the nature of television shows has certainly changed dramatically in the last decade, where more raunchy, suggestive content is allowed now than has ever been. This is one indication that regulation of content is a good thing. It is the view of any reasonable parent that their children should not be exposed to these things in elementary school, and rightly so. However, with more parents working longer and longer hours to support their children, it's impossible for even responsible parents to fully regulate the information their children see. This action would fully be in support of making sure our children grow up in a healthy manner, and at negligible cost otherwise. But 9- and 10-year olds are impressionable enough that this is necessary. The second point, which I brought up at the beginning of this argument, is that often, corporate points of view are far different from those of society. This is why corporations can lay off thousands of low- to middle-class workers, and no one fights back. Corporations are not representative of American society - they are representative of the shareholders and the people who are paying the money. For this reasons, corporations put on shows like South Park with almost wanton disregard for the well-being of our children; they put these shows on because they know it makes them money. For this reason, the government is much more representative of society's interests than corporations are. We at least get to elect members of Congress, whereas corporations do whatever they want - I illustrated how and why earlier in this argument. For this reason, combating the power of corporations, who regulate our speech more than the government ever could, as well as protecting the well-being of our children, I must firmly recommend that we regulate broadcast media content.