Supreme Court damns expletives on the air, fleeting or repeated, once and for all, at least for now

[Dennis Baron]

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Supreme Court damns expletives on the air, fleeting or repeated, once  
and for all, at least for now

If you’re in front of a microphone and you feel a fleeting expletive  
coming on, the Supreme Court says stifle it. In a 5 - 4 decision in  
FCC v. Fox Television, the Supreme Court ruled that Federal  
Communication Commission procedures banning dirty words were perfectly  
appropriate.

Federal law states, “Whoever utters any obscene, indecent, or profane  
language by means of radio communication shall be fined … or  
imprisoned not more than two years, or both” (18 U.S.C. § 1464). In  
1978 the Supreme Court upheld the FCC’s prohibition of obscenity in  
the George Carlin “7 Dirty Words” case, barring “language that  
describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary  
community standards for the broadcast medium, sexual or excretory  
activities or organs, at times of the day when there is a reasonable  
risk that children may be in the audience.”



read the rest of this post on the latest Supreme Court opinion on the  
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____________________
Dennis Baron
Professor of English and Linguistics
Department of English
University of Illinois
608 S. Wright St.
Urbana, IL 61801

office: 217-244-0568
fax: 217-333-4321

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