This has brought us to our second and most important point against censorship, and that is of Freedom. This point seems to be taken up from the producer’s point of view. Freedom is perhaps the most dominant theme of Liberalism; censorship in relation to this is obviously heavily criticized. Freedom of expression, and freedom of speech is the stance taken up by many producers, authors, web administrators, and newspapers. The obvious reason to this being that everyone is entitled to their opinion whether that opinion may include vulgarity or not. A Liberal will therefore say something of the sort: If a man can preach on television about the goodness of God, then a man can surely preach on the f*ing a*holes that rule their sh*hole of a country!
Broadly saying that if person A can say I love you, then person B may righteously say f*ck you!
Having mention freedoms, we can interrelate this with another liberal theme of toleration and diversity. Therefore the use of vulgarity in society, or mainly on T.V, Radio and the World Wide Web, should either be tolerated due to the diversity of the nature of people, or ommited by the individual itself.
In concluding the stance of Liberals in relation to censorship we can say that:
The individual is rational and reasonable in what he does; by making use of this reason he has the choice, either to witness or take part in vulgarity which exists on the television, or turn a blind eye. In doing so the individual therefore has the right to listen to peoples opinion, whether they are portrayed in vulgar fashion or not; furthermore, the individual also has the right to express himself (producer’s view) in a manner which he deems fit, again whether it is in a vulgar fashion or not. The liberal is ensured that his rights are not violated, and with the use of Justice the individual can be sure that the use of vulgar words will not harm him, because if it does then his rights have been violated.
HOWEVER, as the famous phrase goes there is always two sides to a coin, and this side happens to be taken on by the Conservatives.
Broadly, conservatives believe that censorship is not a bad word. They believe that the use of censorship, either to a great scale or a minor one, can be effective in eliminating many of societies mishaps. In Britain the case of Censorship has been seen by the Conservative Thatcher government which banned books such as Spycatcher in 1986.
The conservative view of censorship is one which is usually approached with great caution, as it seems to spark off many liberal thinkers. In Britain alone there are more than 30 Pressure Groups which oppose censorship, some even oppose government secret documents and so on.
Conservatives hold tradition as a core theme to their ideology, or as they would call it, their “state of mind”. It is therefore obvious that for tradition to exist, vulgar words such as the f-word should not be portrayed as an everyday term such as goodmorning. If an institution has stood the test of time then it is worth keeping, and up to now this institution may be called the church, the goodwill of people, etc. However the growing demand of vulgar words in movies, and comedy series is becoming an everyday issue. A true conservative will simply rage with anger as the use of vulgar words seem to harm society as a whole. Unlike Liberals, Conservatives see society as an organism rather than a series of independent machinery. Therefore the use of vulgar words and obscenities come as a harm to society as a whole.
This bring us to another core theme of conservatism, that of the family and organic society. Humans are insecure and need to live in a society where they feel secure and dependant. If this security is therefore breached by the use of vulgarity, then society as a whole will diminish.
The most important stance of the conservatives is perhaps the existence of hierarchy and order. To the conservative eyes inequality naturally exists, and the state plays the role of a father albeit doing what is good for you; this is often refered to as Paternalistic Conservatism. This must not be mistaken however, as it does not take a conservative to implement ideas such as these. On television one can see proof of this with the parental control option, or the bleeping of certain vulgar words. The radio often cuts silent when the use of vulgar words come up, and on the world wide web there are many restrictions to the viewing of pornographic material by underage users; firms such as CyberNaNNy and CyberPatrol often do this.
The stance of censorship to a certain extent is something which no one believes to be too farfetched. A conservative MP quotes: So, for now, all I ask is that the next time you turn on your TV (especially if your kid is in the room) take a moment to ask yourself how much worse it might be without the c-word and remember your gratitude the next time you're tempted to rail against the evils of censorship.
The conservatives see children, or the young generation as a whole, as the future. Believing that youngsters should be prone to listening to c-words on television is not something they would like much; this is because conservatives believe that the youth are our future doctors, employers, businessmen, politicians, and presidents. Ensuring the upbringing of the youth is therefore a core aim at achieving the true conservative ideology.
At a realistic basis we can therefore conclude that the use of censorship to some extent is not all negative. For example certain articles and books should be banned if they threaten national security, it was on these grounds that Spycatcher was banned in 1986 in Britain. Furthermore conservatives see themselves in a paternalistic manner, meaning that their actions may not seem to be in the boundaries of freedoms, and rationality (as liberals say) but surely righteous in that they ensure that a six year old boy doesn’t learn the word c*nt!
In conclusion on a Pragmatic level ones opinions on censorship seem to be roughly even, whether liberal or conservative. I don’t believe that there is any true liberal who would say that his 6 year old son should watch Sex and the City with all the vulgarities it contains. Vulgarity unfortunately remains to be a disturbing issue in Britain and most of Europe. Statistics show that at the age of 13 a youth is familiar with 90% of swearwords used on the streets. Furthermore attempts to dismiss vulgar words on tv and on the radio seem to come at a gridlock when producers often hide behind the Freedom of Speech. Personally I have been amazed with the pornographic material which comes up with the simple search of Sally and the Girls on the internet. However it must be stated that to a certain extent the use of “censorship” has worked, for example porn protected websites (mentioned earlier) and the parental control option which is found on nearly all sattelite systems today. The problem still exists though where youngsters seem to find a greater liking to the f-word rather than the use of politeness.
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