A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

"Must See TV," indeed

Way to go, Janet:

WASHINGTON - The House overwhelmingly passed legislation Thursday substantially increasing the maximum fine for radio and TV indecency.

The vote was 391-22. Similar legislation is pending in the Senate.

"I am tired of hearing parents tell me how they have to cover their children's ears," Rep. Joseph Pitts, R-Pa., said during debate on the measure. "Today, we're saying enough is enough."

What an interesting way of saying, "I am tired of hearing 'parents' piss and moan about how difficult it is nowadays to plop their kids in front of the TV and ignore them for extended periods of time without the little bastards repeating the word 'autofellatio' in front of our pastor."

The bill would raise the maximum fine for a broadcast license-holder from $27,500 to $500,000. The fine for a performer would jump from $11,000 to $500,000.

Here's my recommendation for the networks: bite the bullet and go hog wild. Your need to win back viewers who have all but abandoned you for cable and satellite. Start by taking away the blurry boxes when Jerry Springer has a special on strippers, or start pumping out naked versions of hit reality shows. Playmate Fear Factor was huge, how about All-Nude Barely Legal Lesbian Fear Factor? And don't forget your regular programming. You thought ratings were impressive when Ross and Rachel got together, how big would they be if they really "got together?"

[And don't tell me nobody's going to want to see David Schwimmer's hairy ass, people have been renting movies with Ron "The Hedgehog" Jeremy in them for over twenty years.]

What's that you say, Courteney Cox-Arquette is balking at a little DVDA? Tack another $2 million onto her salary. Matthew Perry would do it for 1/100 of that (plus endless Vicodin refills). The fines will stack up with alarming speed, but think of the ratings! A 100 share!

Sure, the advertisers you'll end up getting might be a little on the...prurient side, but who cares when those revenues are rolling in? Kids will watch less TV, which is better for them anyway, and parents can spend more time with their children, which is more of a "family value" than whining that the government needs to make it easier for them to be neglectful crybabies.

My hat is now in the political ring, as Bill Hicks would say.

UPDATE: Mac brings up something I'd been toying with yesterday but didn't really have time to expand upon (no, not Donna Pescow): namely, the pr0n tax.

Alcohol and cigarette manufacturers have been able to stave off more punitive taxes thanks to massive amounts of money and an impressive array of lobbyists. We all know the lengths to which tobacco companies have gone in order to to keep selling their product while convincing you that they care about your health, but when do you see advertisements for porno except within the material itself, or on certain late-night commercials? The sex industry is the true success story of the American economy, yet few seem willing to discuss it. These companies depend on being low-key - skating under mainstream radar so that Mr. and Mrs. Middle America can pretend things like scat-munching don't exist. Never mind that Mr. Middle America dusts off his old copies of Shaved Orientals after mommy has gone to sleep. Or that Mrs. Middle America, who's been getting a little bored around the house lately, has taken to checking out some of the swinger web sites. Seriously, if some guy sees fit to blow 30% or more of his disposable income on Virtual Sex DVDs and the like, why should he be allowed to coast by while your garden variety alcoholic pisses over a dollar a six-pack down the drain to Uncle Sam?

As Eric Schlosser pointed out (in what used to be a free article), much of porn's profits are being earned by long-distance phone companies (Americans spent between $750 million and $1 billion on phone sex in 1996), cable outfits, and hotel chains ($175 million on pay-per-view porn, also in '96). Surely no one would argue that the telecom lobby is anything but formidable, yet does AT&T really want the messy details of their convoluted offshore phone sex program made public? Does Hyatt blanch at the thought of losing their Promise Keeper contingent thanks to the open-airing of their porno profits? Maybe, but my bet is that any large corporation trying to maintain its wholesome family image might balk at a magazine spread juxtaposing their logo with Sylvia Saint in a three-way.

The "adult entertainment industry" made more than $8 billion in 1996. More than mainstream Hollywood or the music industry. Rather than try to act like this is an embarrassing aspect of a country that goes to Defcon 1 when a breast is bared on network TV and won't let radio personalities say "fuck," the government should milk this baby for all its worth.

Granted, there are already excise taxes for this sort of thing, which is why I propose an "excess tax," which would be a somewhat harsher version of the former. Take advantage of this irrational national mindset and stick it to those smut merchants, who in turn can get the money by passing the cost on to consumers. 500% forced government mark-up for Homemade Hot Shots? All the publisher needs to do is tack a few bucks on to the cost of advertising and he's still ahead. A full-page spread (no pun intended) for advertising in Hustler costs $15,000, and a cursory glance at any of these publications shows you that easily 2/3 of page space is taken up with ads of this variety. Do the math. Government coffers are filled, the deficit is reduced, and Bush can counter ciriticism of the taxes by claiming he's making the filth peddlers give something back to society for once.

Is anybody going to complain? And before you answer that, think about how many petitions submitted from sundry adult video stores will have to be discounted due to the prevalence of "John Smiths." No senator or congressperson who values their career over political suicide will dare speak out against the taxes. The producers and distributors will complain, but there won't be much sympathy to ba had, and Eugene and Rusty will have to shell out a little more for their weekly fix. Everybody wins.

And it'd be a hell of a lot easier than legalizing/taxing drugs.