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From: mcb@styx.UUCP (Michael C. Berch)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Possible Ban on Pornography / Media manipulation
Message-ID: <12401@styx.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 14-Sep-85 01:37:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: styx.12401
Posted: Sat Sep 14 01:37:29 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 19-Sep-85 00:42:18 EDT
References: <369@scirtp.UUCP> <-1988585@sysvis> <11617@rochester.UUCP>
Organization: Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, Livermore, CA
Lines: 52

In article <11617@rochester.UUCP> ray@rochester.UUCP (Ray Frank) writes:
> What makes YOOOUUUU the spokes person for what people want and don't want.
> Who asked you to determine what is good or bad for us.   . . .

Precisely. And who asked you to determine what is good or bad for US?
That is the nature of a pluralistic, free society. No one is asking
you to LIKE pornography. But, as Americans, we are OBLIGATED to defend
the right to a free marketplace of ideas, WHETHER OR NOT THOSE IDEAS
ARE REPUGNANT TO YOU. That's the difference between this country and
places where freedom of expression and association are subject to a
double standard.

> . . .  What you read and watch in the media is
> already being manipulated by a handful of people.  They ARE determining what
> is good for us.  Wake up for crying out loud and look about you.  There is
> more of a lack of freedom in the media now than ever before, especially on
> the boob tube.  Strange isn't it that Little House On The Prairie type 
> programming is virtually gone and replaced by what would be banned some years
> ago as decadent.  . . .

This is simply preposterous. At no other time in history have
Americans had access to more information and entertainment sources.
Take TV for an example.  Fifteen years ago we had the three networks,
plus PBS and a handful of independents, mostly UHF, in each market.
Today we have all of that, PLUS Turner Broadcasting/CNN (with a decidedly
conservative, traditional-family bent), the Christian Broadcast
Network/CBN (ditto), Home Theater Network (ditto) and about a
five-fold increase in fulminating fundamentalists for Ray to listen to.
PLUS a couple of dozen sports/entertainment channels and whatnot. PLUS the 
Playboy Channel and all that. NOT EVEN TO MENTION the increase in the
number of movies of all persuasions in the last fifteen years.

In short, if Ray wants to sit and watch "Little House" type shows all
day, that's entirely possible. The "handful" of people who may have
run the entertainment media fifteen years ago has increased by an
order of magnitude; perhaps more.

> . . .  Again the very sad thing about this is you think you have control
> of what you watch and read, but you don't.  They do.  If people like me have
> recognized all along what was happening and want to do something about it or
> at least talk about it, you unknowingly take the side of the very people who
> have done the most to discredit freedom of expression in this country.  They
> are powerful, rich, and not without tremendous influence and seem somehow
> unchecked by any value system currently in vogue, but especially they are
> unchecked by an apathetic public.

Can you say "paranoia" . . ."conspiracy theory" . . .I knew you could.

---
Michael C. Berch
mcb@lll-tis-b.ARPA
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