Lying on television

[Greyphilosophy]

I think we need laws to regulate lying on television. Granted comedians and people whose comments people reasonably should not take as truth should be excluded, but people who pose as experts or news reporters should be held accountable. Does anyone else feel this way? What kind of penalty would be sufficient to divert this behavior if any?

[outmywindow]

Television is far too regulated as it is, and our culture should cultivate a higher standard of healthy skepticism. The last thing the people of the US need is for the FCC to hold their hands a little tighter.

[kuranes]

I think we need laws to regulate lying on television. Granted comedians and people whose comments people reasonably should not take as truth should be excluded, but people who pose as experts or news reporters should be held accountable. Does anyone else feel this way? What kind of penalty would be sufficient to divert this behavior if any?I know what you mean. I think the worst are not even so much "liars" per se, as the people who try to guilt older people into calling up a telemarketer center to cover "final expenses" and other things.

There are other ads that show lab equipment and people in white coats etc. in some frames, as though to say that something has been scientifically evaluated, or was created by scientists. Next they'll be implying that something has the coveted INTPc good housekeeping seal of approval !!! How dare they !! How dare they ?


Television is far too regulated as it is, and our culture should cultivate a higher standard of healthy skepticism. The last thing the people of the US need is for the FCC to hold their hands a little tighter.You're obviously in league with Garak's* old hero Ron Popeil !

* Mackstann

[fduniho]

I think we need laws to regulate lying on television. Granted comedians and people whose comments people reasonably should not take as truth should be excluded, but people who pose as experts or news reporters should be held accountable. Does anyone else feel this way? What kind of penalty would be sufficient to divert this behavior if any?

Yes, it would be nice if people didn't lie on TV with some obvious exceptions. But regulation of lying could be more dangerous than it is helpful. For example, where do you draw the line between lying and stating controversial opinions? What if the majority, or even just a powerful minority, decided that certain claims were lies and banned them from being said on television? Also, we could never enforce a ban on lying perfectly, and anyone who thought we could would have a false sense of trust in what he heard on television, which would be worse than how things are now. There were awfully good reasons for the 1st amendment, and I believe freedom of speech, even if it allows people to lie, is a cornerstone of a free society.

It is probably more helpful in the end to have watchdogs, such as John Stewart (of the Daily Show) or Penn & Teller (of Bullshit!), who spot and report on the lies others are saying, and to educate people to spot questionable claims, figure out for themselves what is true, and have a healthy skepticism toward things said on television.

[barrylevon]

I think we need laws to regulate lying on television. Granted comedians and people whose comments people reasonably should not take as truth should be excluded, but people who pose as experts or news reporters should be held accountable. Does anyone else feel this way? What kind of penalty would be sufficient to divert this behavior if any?

I agree, but it sure as hell shouldn't be anything the government does. The way I see it, it's the viewers that need to start holding people (experts, journalists), and networks accountable. Just turn the channel, or turn off the tv. Also, people need to stop demanding entertainment from a program that should be giving you "just the facts". If we start taking matters into our own hands, and stop expecting outside forces to do it for us, in time things will change.

[teleforce]

i wouldn't feel safe with the government assuring people that they can trust what they hear on TV now.

[outmywindow]

You're obviously in league with Garak's* old hero Ron Popeil !

* Mackstann
It's true that under the right conditions and with the right interpretation, "Set it and forget it!" could become a positive philosophical movement. Unfortunately, "But wait, there's more!" seems to be the ideal to which most people prefer to subscribe.

For only 12 easy payments of $29.95, you too can live a guilt-free life of entitlement and intellectual stagnation!

[kendoiwan]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-june-29-2010/blame

:popcorn:

[ACow]

As has been said in the second post, surely the problem that needs attacking is not the lying, but people believing them...

[kali]

You are not content with it being regulated by social laws, as it is now?

[Will2009]

I think we need laws to regulate lying on television. Granted comedians and people whose comments people reasonably should not take as truth should be excluded, but people who pose as experts or news reporters should be held accountable. Does anyone else feel this way? What kind of penalty would be sufficient to divert this behavior if any?

Why do you hate liberty? :grin:

No.

I don't give a shit about lying on television, the radio, the internet, or in newspapers or magazines or books. I'm pretty Goddamn committed to enjoying my First Amendment rights to freedom of expression and freedom of the press. Why the fuck would you want to beg the government to encroach even more on those essential First Amendment rights than it already does?

Put another way, why do you prefer the government be the arbiter of what is true in the press? Why shouldn't you be allowed to decide for yourself?

The founders didn't trust government. They were acutely sensitive to tyranny. They wisely put freedom of speech and freedom of the press right up front in the First Amendment. It is a good demonstration of where their priorities were. The understood the importance of a free press and the right of the individual to express his or her opinions without fear of official sanction as checks and balances on the power inherent in government. In other words, it's the press that tends to keep the government honest, not the other way around.

Your suggestion has it exactly backwards.

[NoahFence]

They wisely put freedom of speech and freedom of the press right up front in the First Amendment.

If it were so important, why'd they forget until the original was done? It's the first ammendment...this implies a scene with Jefferson and Franklin smacking their foreheads, saying "OH CRAP! RIGHTS!" :p

But seriously, I think lying on TV is just fine. However, I think there should be a kindergarten class devoted to exposing them.

See, if everyone were clever enough to recognize a steaming pound of horseshit when it hits them full in the face, THE CORPORATIONS WOULDN'T LIE because they'd know it would make them look like douchebags. Sort of like how Mexico wouldn't smuggle drugs into the US if we weren't so eager to smoke that shit.

[Greyphilosophy]

When a group calls themselves "--- News" and portends their opinion to be fact, it isn't surprising that a large number of people believe they are being presented with truth. These "news" agencies are profiting from misinforming the public. I believe the public has the right to discourage this behavior.

I agree in principle that teaching people to be better able to determine BS when they see it would solve the problem, but so many people out there are not capable and I don't have faith that they ever will be. Couldn't we require the journalists to tell us when they are sprouting opinion instead of observation?

I don't think the FCC can regulate cable news stations anyway. More likely competing stations would snitch on each other to a law enforcement agency which would then issue fines that could be appealed in court.

[Limey]

Although I cherish a lot of freedom, I'm inclined to agree.
I think that TV evangelism should be illegal, to even infer that your life will improve if you make a "pledge" to send some loudmouth and his ilk your hard earned money, in the name of Jesus, would be considered fraud in many countries.

Richard Dawkins even references Oral Roberts of Tulsa, OK, who told people that god told him he'd be taken away if he didn't get the money to complete his fundamentalist campus.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVS4kvQbZrs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTqx1BTUT34

[barrylevon]

I like your idea Greyphilosophy. However, instead of saying it they could just use a sign in the bottom left, or right depending on the political views being expressed, corner of the screen. That way they don't have to stop talking and make it feel unnatural. Something like this would work:


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TI8gu1_Ih9U/SNj-IhUWvII/AAAAAAAAAIE/RVkXx3wYs4M/s200/bullshit6gf.jpg



Seriously though, that's not a bad idea.

[Chunes]

I agree with the OP as well as the post afterward.

[Will2009]

When a group calls themselves "--- News" and portends their opinion to be fact, it isn't surprising that a large number of people believe they are being presented with truth. These "news" agencies are profiting from misinforming the public. I believe the public has the right to discourage this behavior.


I'm astonished at how you and some of the other posters agreeing with you seem to lack an appreciation of how free speech and a free press work. At whom do you think the First Amendment is directed? It is deliberately aimed directly at restraining the government, not the press.

Why? Because the founders of our nation recognized that without such protection the press could and would easily be subverted by the ruling government for its own use and abuse. In fact, that's one of the very first things any totalitarian regime does -- seize control over the press and impose severe restrictions on speech, particularly any speech critical of government.

What you are proposing -- voluntarily no less, which is even more insidious that the government's taking it by force -- is nothing less than asking for government controlled content and only government controlled content. You want censorship of content, and only content broadcast, printed, or distributed electronically that is government approved, in effect. After all, that is the only way to enforce "speechcrime," which is essentially what you are proposing.

I urge you to re-read 1984. That's precisely what you are proposing. You want the government to be the arbiter of what is expressible and what is not. Shame on you and everyone who even mildly agrees with you. You fail basic civics. Hard.



I agree in principle that teaching people to be better able to determine BS when they see it would solve the problem, but so many people out there are not capable and I don't have faith that they ever will be. Couldn't we require the journalists to tell us when they are sprouting opinion instead of observation?


You imply that you have more faith in government bureaucrats to determine what you should and shouldn't hear than you do in market forces to make those same determinations. Wow. That's incredibly undemocratic and fascist.



I don't think the FCC can regulate cable news stations anyway. More likely competing stations would snitch on each other to a law enforcement agency which would then issue fines that could be appealed in court.

Jesus. This might even be worse. Your suggestion boils down to everyone spy and snitch on everyone else. We might as well ask the former Stasi from East Germany to come regulate speech in the US. They were extremely effective at fomenting distrust of everyone as a potential government spy and in using extortion to get people to rat on each other (largely because a very sizable number of the country's ordinary residents eventually actually were at some time or other spying on their neighbors). Residents of the former East Germany were some of the most miserable people on earth during that time.

Your posts in this thread and those agreeing with your position make me sad. You apparently don't appreciate that the freedom to speak your mind necessarily entails the freedom to offend someone else, and even the freedom to lie or express offensive opinions masquerading as facts. Otherwise, you aren't free to speak up. You have to self-censor for fear that someone will snitch on you and you will be prosecuted and possibly convicted and imprisoned merely for expressing words.

I believe there are more than a few dead former Soviet gulag inmates who might serve as examples of how frightening your suggestion is. Alexandr Solzhenitsyn immediately comes to mind.

You should seriously rethink your position. Government is the last body you should trust to inform you of the truth, or to be allowed to determine what "truth" is. Send me your address and I'll send you a copy of 1984 to re-read.

[Limey]

I just saw another lie example on TV
Freecreditreport.com
As if these ads weren't annoying enough, experian, the owners of this offshoot have been sued over the misleading ads.
It's a stretch to call this free speech.

It is already law that consumers have a legal right to a free credit report per year from all three main providers. What is actually being sold in these ads (and a quick blurb at the end that used to be just small text) is a $90 per year subscription based credit monitoring service.

AT&T are another culprit, repeatedly stating like a mantra that they have the fastest 3g network - try using it in New York city, where it's practically on its knees, overloaded every day.

[outmywindow]

There's a huge difference between regulating the public advertisement of legally defined fraud, and wanting the FCC to determine for the viewer what is and is not good for them to see or hear. The OP seems to want to use the latter in order to achieve the former, which is the equivalent to leveling an entire city block because one of the buildings is structurally unsound.

The first step to people not being taken in by ridiculous and clearly fraudulent schemes is to cultivate an environment in which they learn to think for themselves -- and really, just to think -- about whether or not a piece of information is worth valuing. Increasing blanket restrictions is not the way for this to happen (although really, like it's going to happen anyway).

[Will2009]

There's a huge difference between regulating the public advertisement of legally defined fraud, and wanting the FCC to determine for the viewer what is and is not good for them to see or hear. The OP seems to want to use the latter in order to achieve the former, which is the equivalent to leveling an entire city block because one of the buildings is structurally unsound.

The first step to people not being taken in by ridiculous and clearly fraudulent schemes is to cultivate an environment in which they learn to think for themselves -- and really, just to think -- about whether or not a piece of information is worth valuing. Increasing blanket restrictions is not the way for this to happen (although really, like it's going to happen anyway).

Precisely. The OP seems to want the government to do his thinking for him. Well, fuck that.

The OP is saying he's too lazy to think for himself so he prefers a nanny state to think for him and decide what's good for him to see or hear or read and what's not. That's actually a very charitable interpretation, because if history is any guide, we already know that what really happens when you cede control of the press to government is that you get pro-government propaganda, and everything critical of government and its policies gets censored.

I mean, seriously? Can the OP not see that even radical and offensive views presented as "fair and balanced" by private persons working for a giant conglomerate are vastly preferable to an official state sanctioned set of views, with unapproved views prosecuted as crimes? What is true and what isn't? Who decides? What is opinion and what is fact? Again, who decides?

The antidote to "bad" information is never to suppress it. The antidote to "bad" information is more information. Counter "bad" information with "good" information and let the marketplace of ideas sort it out. Good, well presented and supported arguments usually triumph over bad ones. Despite lowest common denominator trash being popular on TV when it comes to entertainment (*cough cough* American Idol), the public in general is pretty good at sorting out good arguments from bad, on the whole, and at separating fact from opinion. That's the whole basis of any democratic/republican form of government. I would never trust the government itself to do that sorting for the people. Never.

[ACow]

The antidote to "bad" information is never to suppress it. The antidote to "bad" information is more information. Counter "bad" information with "good" information and let the marketplace of ideas sort it out. Good, well presented and supported arguments usually triumph over bad ones.

I don't share the hard-on for the market,nor do i believe good well supported arguments triumph over bad ones, but as long as information is relatively free, than I as a nice rational learned individual am free to go about and investigate and form my own opinion, and speak my own opinion, and find others with whom to speak. I don't believe the market will fix things or lead to a necessarily good outcome in the end for most people, but as long as the information is free, I can say fuck everyone else and come to a better outcome in the end for me and others like me.

When you start legislating however, you're not going to make my search for truth any easier. In all liklihood, you're going to make it harder, because any time information is deemed "untruthful" by the government, they now has legislative powers to come against the publishers or speakers of that information and attempt to forcably shut them up. whether they're selling anything or participating in fraud or not. Self censorship sets in. Forceful censorship sets in. People cannot speak not because they do not believe what they say is the truth, but because they are fearful of the repurcussions.

Laws are already bad enough that people have to worry about being SLAPPed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation), and people already self censor thanks to libel and reputation laws amongst many others...don't make things even worse...

[Will2009]

Laws are already bad enough that people have to worry about being SLAPPed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation), and people already self censor thanks to libel and reputation laws amongst many others...don't make things even worse...

:rolleyes:

You might as well worry about Bigfoot attacks. Hey, let's introduce a bill in the legislature to outlaw Bigfoot. Yeah.

(there's really no such thing as SLAPP in practice -- it's a bullshit term some academics made up to label lawsuits they don't like; there is such a thing as vexatious litigation, but we already have rules and sanctions to combat it, so anti-SLAPP legislation is just so much unnecessary and knee-jerk reaction to bullshit that gets press and creates political pressure to do something about it)

[kuranes]

the public in general is pretty good at sorting out good arguments from bad, on the whole, and at separating fact from opinion. "No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people." H.L. Mencken

A bit of bombast there, but a lot of truth to it as well, as Pat Robertson and the "700 Club" organizers etc. count on.

[MoneyJungle]

Falsehoods should be restricted to print, radio and relationships.

[Spartan26]

Precisely. The OP seems to want the government to do his thinking for him. Well, fuck that.

The OP is saying he's too lazy to think for himself so he prefers a nanny state to think for him and decide what's good for him to see or hear or read and what's not. That's actually a very charitable interpretation, because if history is any guide, we already know that what really happens when you cede control of the press to government is that you get pro-government propaganda, and everything critical of government and its policies gets censored.Is that really was the OP was calling for? I can't speak for this person but I got the sense it was calling for action against lying the same why someone would be held accountable for lying to a police officer or grand jury. Or something along those lines.

I can't say I wouldn't mind seeing something happen when people like ARod or Paris Hilton have their big PR machines to get them splattered across all forms of media in an effort to sway or create an image of themselves that is not only misleading but factually not true. Get on TV say one thing. Six months to a couple of years later it comes out the person was lying through his teeth. Then what happens? Nothing. Maybe some some network gives the person a six-digit payout to be on for an "exclusive" interview. Then never really admits to the lie, just woeisme for being under the pressure and this time you can completely trust me...It's bullsh#t.

In theory there are some agencies that do have the ability to discipline liars under their jurisdiction. Like the SEC for corp officers who go on business shows. The ABA can go after lawyers. Board of regents can deal w/educators. Does it happen as much as it could or should? Not even close. But what can be done?

Maybe that's part of the problem is public apathy over lying or how people may be too quick to rationalize or make exceptions. Another and maybe bigger part of it is the logistics. How can you define, enforce, regulate, or especially sanction? It would be nice to hear of some politician or commentator having to pay out a nice hefty fine to the FCC for blathering on w/lies on end just like one would for swearing on air. But the days for that happening equitably are generations of social repairing away.

What can be done is for people to go after the hosts (programs, networks, etc) who give the liars a platform. Hard, sure, to do much as an individual but keep voicing displeasure and it may get traction through other means. Solutions can be had outside of the traditional legal systems.

[Greyphilosophy]

I'm astonished at how you and some of the other posters agreeing with you seem to lack an appreciation of how free speech and a free press work. At whom do you think the First Amendment is directed? It is deliberately aimed directly at restraining the government, not the press.

I agree that we should have freedom of speech. I don't believe that extends to yelling fire in a crowded theater. I also don't believe it should include libel and slander. When someone lies about your character you have the right to sue. The problem is it is very difficult to determine what sort of penalty/restitution is reasonable in these cases. If this lie occurs on television the penalty should be greater than if it occurs on less distributed media because the damage in terms of people exposed to the defamation of your character is greater. Lies always hurt someone, even if those people aren't standing up for themselves.

The enforcement I would like to see wouldn't come from the government, but rather from competitive market behavior. If you give them the mechanism they will use it.



Why? Because the founders of our nation recognized that without such protection the press could and would easily be subverted by the ruling government for its own use and abuse. In fact, that's one of the very first things any totalitarian regime does -- seize control over the press and impose severe restrictions on speech, particularly any speech critical of government.

What you are proposing -- voluntarily no less, which is even more insidious that the government's taking it by force -- is nothing less than asking for government controlled content and only government controlled content. You want censorship of content, and only content broadcast, printed, or distributed electronically that is government approved, in effect. After all, that is the only way to enforce "speechcrime," which is essentially what you are proposing.

I urge you to re-read 1984. That's precisely what you are proposing. You want the government to be the arbiter of what is expressible and what is not. Shame on you and everyone who even mildly agrees with you. You fail basic civics. Hard.


You're ignoring the fact that both our government and our press are heavily influenced by corporate interests. Some might go as far as to say they are owned by corporate interests. You own the slippery slope argument though, congratulations.



You imply that you have more faith in government bureaucrats to determine what you should and shouldn't hear than you do in market forces to make those same determinations. Wow. That's incredibly undemocratic and fascist.


You shouldn't use the term "market forces" until you understand what it means. The law is the greatest "market force" we have. The market unbridled will lead to the most severe abuses of human rights possible. And our current laws are not sufficient to protect us. I believe it is wrong to allow corporations to hire psychologists to figure out how best to sell unhealthy products to children. Think of a cartoon character that sells sugar to children and calls it breakfast. Also Joe Camel did not arise out of a vacuum. Your vision of free speech would give corporations the power to make our most vulnerable people believe anything the corporations want.

And thanks for adding an ad hominem to your list of fallacies.



Jesus. This might even be worse. Your suggestion boils down to everyone spy and snitch on everyone else. We might as well ask the former Stasi from East Germany to come regulate speech in the US. They were extremely effective at fomenting distrust of everyone as a potential government spy and in using extortion to get people to rat on each other (largely because a very sizable number of the country's ordinary residents eventually actually were at some time or other spying on their neighbors). Residents of the former East Germany were some of the most miserable people on earth during that time.


This is called a straw man argument. It's also a fallacy.



Your posts in this thread and those agreeing with your position make me sad. You apparently don't appreciate that the freedom to speak your mind necessarily entails the freedom to offend someone else, and even the freedom to lie or express offensive opinions masquerading as facts. Otherwise, you aren't free to speak up. You have to self-censor for fear that someone will snitch on you and you will be prosecuted and possibly convicted and imprisoned merely for expressing words.


I self-censor all the time. I think people who speak every little thing in their mind and lace profanity in every other word are not worth of the same respect and those who think before they speak. I do grant them the right however. I also believe though that libel and slander are crimes and restrictions on one form of speech is not the same as restrictions on all. I think you've made a hasty generalization.



I believe there are more than a few dead former Soviet gulag inmates who might serve as examples of how frightening your suggestion is. Alexandr Solzhenitsyn immediately comes to mind.

You should seriously rethink your position. Government is the last body you should trust to inform you of the truth, or to be allowed to determine what "truth" is. Send me your address and I'll send you a copy of 1984 to re-read.

Come on now, Alexandr Solzhenitsyn/Ivan Denisovich said it wasn't a bad day, and not unlike the others he had spent. Sarcasm aside I take it you would advocate for punishment far below imprisonment and in that regard we agree.

Consider that "Big Brother" could have been a corporate CEO that owned everything. Who did the proles work for after all? We know that when one company forms a monopoly it becomes in their best interest to create artificial scarcity in order to keep prices high. Same deal with the victory cigarettes and razor blades.

I don't trust the government to inform me of the truth, but I trust the courts to be able to determine what truth is, and they're not the same thing.

[Greyphilosophy]

There's a huge difference between regulating the public advertisement of legally defined fraud, and wanting the FCC to determine for the viewer what is and is not good for them to see or hear. The OP seems to want to use the latter in order to achieve the former, which is the equivalent to leveling an entire city block because one of the buildings is structurally unsound.

I agree with your first sentence and totally disagree with your second. Can you explain how I am wanting the FCC to determine what is and is not good for the viewers to see? Or even how you extrapolated that from my posts?

[Gchrist]

An easier solution that could sidestep all of the potential pitfalls of government-controlled truth-telling (which you have argued could possibly be corporate-controlled truth) is to have people be encouraged to not believe everything that they see on TV and to check facts for themselves.

A public that is both more aware and educated about what is really happening would be more useful than one which needs to further have its hand held by those in power.

Edit: Oh. What Will said.

[Will2009]

I agree that we should have freedom of speech.

That's not exactly a controversial stand you're taking. You don't get any moral courage points for it.


I don't believe that extends to yelling fire in a crowded theater. I also don't believe it should include libel and slander.


Well, it's nice that you acknowledge that the Supreme Court has recognized that the First Amendment's protection of freedom of speech is not unbounded. In the former case, the justices have embraced a pragmatic view that unbridled speech in certain contexts can be harmful to public order and can even imminently endanger life and limb. In the latter instance, courts at English common law have long recognized, well before the US existed, that some false and defamatory speech can directly harm persons, and thus there exists a cause of action for libel or slander the courts will recognize and enforce under the appropriate circumstances. Again, you haven't stated anything controversial here, and I suspect no one here disagrees with your position.



When someone lies about your character you have the right to sue.


Well now you've just engaged in moving the goalposts in the discussion. How?

Your first two posts in this thread were ostensibly complaining about how journalists can render opinions posing as fact on television (apparently with which you disagree) and how you wish there were something someone could do about it. You suggested a couple of remedies:

1) In your 1st post you generalized the suggested remedy to laws regulating lying on TV, with punishments as enforcement, and then in your 2nd post you gave a more specific suggestion about requiring "journalists to tell us when they are sprouting opinion instead of observation," implying some type of government-required warning label; and

2) Having rival TV stations snitching "on each other to a law enforcement agency which would then issue fines that could be appealed in court." This is implicitly suggesting that a government agency should be empowered to fine TV journalists, or at least the stations or networks who host them, for expressing opinion and representing it to be fact. You would rely on the TV industry to enforce the fines by "snitching" on each other. Furthermore, you would burden our already overcrowded courts with hearing appeals from fines meted out by an executive agency that are prompted by private snitching.

Without addressing the merits of 1) or 2), I note that you neither mentioned explicitly nor implied in either of your first two posts that your thread was merely about libel or slander. That's why mentioning libel law here is moving the goalposts. You've shifted the focus of the discussion to something else entirely.

I'll note that libel law is already well established and certainly requires no additional laws or legislative strengthening of executive oversight, or tightening of executive enforcement in order to enforce it, so your whole point now is moot.


The problem is it is very difficult to determine what sort of penalty/restitution is reasonable in these cases. If this lie occurs on television the penalty should be greater than if it occurs on less distributed media because the damage in terms of people exposed to the defamation of your character is greater. Lies always hurt someone, even if those people aren't standing up for themselves.

You're right that damages in libel law can be difficult to establish. It's the most frequent hurdle potential plaintiffs face in trying to establish a prima facie case of libel or slander, but damages are in fact an essential element of the cause of action. In other words, not every lie is actionable.

(Parenthetically, I note that you seem to be some conflating some terminology here. You use "penalty/restitution" when I think you mean "damages." Although civil tort law encompasses punitive damages in appropriate cases, and they are sometimes imposed in appropriate private causes of action, a "penalty" in the law is usually imposed by an administrative body or executive agency, whereas courts mete out punishment in accordance with limits established by the legislature. Restitution is a remedy enforced in criminal actions brought by the state, and it is strictly intended to make a victim of a crime whole. For instance, a judge may order restitution to the victim for the dollar amount of hospital bills incurred as part of a sentence after a conviction of assault against a defendant. This is in addition to any punishment the court sentences. Therefore, strictly speaking, restitution isn't punishment).



The enforcement I would like to see wouldn't come from the government, but rather from competitive market behavior. If you give them the mechanism they will use it.


This is a half-baked idea. What do you think the existence of hundreds of channels available on cable or satellite TV is? Isn't that competitive market behavior?

Let's be honest here. I think your thread is inspired by what I'll presume is your distaste for the Fox News Chanel (your comments in your first two posts are barely-disguised references to it, in my estimation). Ideally, you would like to wish it away, but as that hasn't seemed to work, you are trying to rationalize some way to get rid of it and anything else on TV you don't seem to like.

That you wish to enable government to do something about the existence and ratings success of Fox News is where I take issue with you. For the record, I'm not a Fox News watcher or fan -- I've probably watched an aggregate of 10 minutes of it in my entire life, but I don't want to see my government ban it, explicitly or in effect.

How and why do you think Fox News came into being in the first place? I'll suggest that it was simply filling a perceived gap in the television news market for viewers who believe there exists a bias somewhat left of center (in US politics, not necessarily as other national cultures would perceive the political center) in TV journalism. If Fox News' ratings are any guide, I would say it is filling that perceived gap very well. That's the competitive market at work. TV news channels compete for advertising dollars from sponsors, who in turn rely on ratings to tell them what viewers are watching, and implicitly, what they want to see.

Whether you agree with any of the opinions expressed on Fox News is beside the point. Whether you think the existence of Fox News is beneficial to our culture or political climate is again beside the point. Fox News' very existence and success in the ratings is ample evidence that market competition in TV news exists and thrives. I'm all for said competition. Apparently, you are not, despite your nominal support for it.

Just what exactly do you mean by "If you give them the mechanism they will use it." Who are "they?" What is "the mechanism?" I honestly don't think you've fully thought out your ideas. The reasons why are explained above. In other words, viewers are already fully empowered and enabled with the ability to vote with their TV remotes. They can watch or not watch. We do not need nor want the government to help us in choosing not to watch. If you do not like Fox News, then don't watch it. It's really that simple.

Your suggested remedies are anti-democratic and anti-free speech.



You're ignoring the fact that both our government and our press are heavily influenced by corporate interests. Some might go as far as to say they are owned by corporate interests. You own the slippery slope argument though, congratulations.


OK, since you apparently are OK with meta-discussion, I'll feel free to indulge in it too.

What? What do corporate interests have to do with my position or yours? This is a free speech issue, not a corporate interests vs. individual interests issue. Interjecting anti-corporate rhetoric into this discussion is simply a red herring.

Your slippery slope comment is in response to my quote which I'll reproduce here:

I wrote above in this thread:


Why? Because the founders of our nation recognized that without such protection the press could and would easily be subverted by the ruling government for its own use and abuse. In fact, that's one of the very first things any totalitarian regime does -- seize control over the press and impose severe restrictions on speech, particularly any speech critical of government.

What you are proposing -- voluntarily no less, which is even more insidious that the government's taking it by force -- is nothing less than asking for government controlled content and only government controlled content. You want censorship of content, and only content broadcast, printed, or distributed electronically that is government approved, in effect. After all, that is the only way to enforce "speechcrime," which is essentially what you are proposing.

I urge you to re-read 1984. That's precisely what you are proposing. You want the government to be the arbiter of what is expressible and what is not. Shame on you and everyone who even mildly agrees with you. You fail basic civics. Hard.

That was in direct response to your suggestions in your first two posts that we need laws to regulate lying on television, particularly to hold journalists accountable and to be penalized for expressing opinions as fact, and calling for "snitching" to law enforcement agencies and their being able to impose fines for expressing opinions.

My reply is not a slippery slope argument. Your suggestions, taken as a whole, are in fact calls for the creation of what I labeled "speechcrime." That's what a law enforcement agency's fining someone for expressing their opinions is. It is the very anti-thesis of free speech. Furthermore, you did in fact bring government into in by suggesting the involvement of law enforcement agencies and fines and criminal, not tort, laws holding journalists accountable.

The First Amendment is expressly meant to prevent what you suggest from ever happening. It was not crafted in a vacuum. The drafters meant to prevent Congress from ever making any law abridging the freedom of speech or the press, and they said so. Any kind of speechcrime for expressing opinions, punishable by fine or any other form of punishment, is a relinquishment of the freedom of speech and freedom of the press and a ceding of control of speech and thought to government. That's about as un-American as you can get. It's not hyperbole to state it in those terms, because any reasonable reading of the Federalist Papers and other contemporaneous writings from the founders preceding the drafting, adopting and ratification of the original Constitution and the Bill of Rights supports the notion that the USA is founded on a set of principles, chief among them the freedom to express one's self without fear of retribution from government. It is exemplified best by Patrick Henry's maxim, "Give me liberty or give me death."

My mention of what the founders were guarding against -- government tyranny and tyranny by majority factions even -- is exemplified on one extreme by totalitarian states. Sure, that's an extreme. I wasn't excluding a middle, however. Our constitutional republic stands as the closest example of an ideal on the opposite extreme, however, with respect to protection of fundamental individual rights like the freedom of speech. The founders intended it to be that way, and our constitutional government is the foundation for making it stand out. It is why our nation is a beacon for so many emigrants all over the world.

Some of the founders also recognized that there would be pressures -- strong political pressures -- to erode the freedoms they were so careful to protect in the constitution. That's why they wrote and said things like, "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance." You aren't being vigilant of liberty in this thread. You are suggesting ceding to government-control of opinions expressed on television. That's the very essence of a government controlled press in our modern, electronic press era. You are perhaps unwittingly demonstrating the political pressure to willingly relinquish our most precious freedom: freedom of speech. You want to toss it out with the bathwater of political opinions that offend your sensibilities, and I'm suggesting that you cannot do that without also tossing out the baby of freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

I would argue that your suggestion is more dangerous to civil liberties than the expression of any political opinion you might hear on Fox News or anywhere else on TV. It's beyond irresponsible.



You shouldn't use the term "market forces" until you understand what it means.


Ironic. I'll leave it to other readers to determine whether I understand market forces in this context and in this thread. Yes. Yes, I did just suggest that your understanding in this context is less developed than mine.



The law is the greatest "market force" we have.


More irony. It's apparent to me from your misuse of legal terms and ideas in this thread that you are not a lawyer. Although it's irrelevant to the merits of the discussion, I happen to be one. I've practiced law for 22 years now. Thanks for the lesson though.



The market unbridled will lead to the most severe abuses of human rights possible. And our current laws are not sufficient to protect us.


Nonsense. You haven't demonstrated how our current laws are insufficient to protect us from the most severe abuses at the mercy of "the market unbridled." Furthermore, it's amusing that you mention just above that "the law is the greatest market force we have," and then you decry the "market unbridled" as being capable of delivering the most severe abuses of human rights. You seem to simultaneously regard the law as the best guardian of human rights and also its greatest threat.



I believe it is wrong to allow corporations to hire psychologists to figure out how best to sell unhealthy products to children. Think of a cartoon character that sells sugar to children and calls it breakfast. Also Joe Camel did not arise out of a vacuum. Your vision of free speech would give corporations the power to make our most vulnerable people believe anything the corporations want.


Now that's a strawman. Good job of knocking it over.



And thanks for adding an ad hominem to your list of fallacies.


No. I do not think that word means what you think it means.



This is called a straw man argument. It's also a fallacy.


No. You did in fact call for snitching. My mention of the Stasi was an illustration of how snitching and the government's rewarding it works. Also, a strawman argument is a fallacy.

Why don't you look it up?



I self-censor all the time. I think people who speak every little thing in their mind and lace profanity in every other word are not worth of the same respect and those who think before they speak.


I have no idea what prompted your comments about profanity. Is it because I used "fucking" and "bullshit" in some of my posts in this thread? Hey, well, that's for two reasons: 1) apparently this forum allows cursing, and I'm all about exercising the ability to curse when I can and under appropriate circumstances, especially in free speech discussions; and 2) I regard some internet message boards as somewhat analogous to late night BS sessions in a college dorm, as they often have that tone, so I thought it appropriate, as that's how I actually spoke in real late-night BS sessions in college. Otherwise, I'm not sure what your point is.


I do grant them the right however.


Well, that's awfully big of you. I've got news for you. You don't grant anyone any free speech rights. The founders of the USA regarded the right to free speech as grounded in natural law. To them, it was an unalienable right granted by our Creator, as they put it. To them, thankfully, it is the people of our nation who grant the government its powers and authority, not the other way around. The founders put it in the First Amendment because they wanted to ensure that Congress could never take it away from the people. Thanks for granting it though.


I also believe though that libel and slander are crimes and restrictions on one form of speech is not the same as restrictions on all.

No, actually libel and slander are generally not criminal offenses in the US. They are actionable torts giving rise to a private, civil cause of action for damages or sometimes an injunction, under an appropriate set of facts. Of course restrictions on television are not tantamount to restrictions on all forms of speech. No one argued or implied otherwise.


I think you've made a hasty generalization.

I think not. I've formally studied constitutional law and actually practiced it for years. I wouldn't call my opinions about free speech law hasty. You may disagree with them, but I didn't form them hastily -- without study or thought.



Consider that "Big Brother" could have been a corporate CEO that owned everything. Who did the proles work for after all? We know that when one company forms a monopoly it becomes in their best interest to create artificial scarcity in order to keep prices high. Same deal with the victory cigarettes and razor blades.


Ummm...the proles and everyone else worked for the state. That was kind of Orwell's point. Again, anti-corporatism is a red herring here.



I don't trust the government to inform me of the truth, but I trust the courts to be able to determine what truth is, and they're not the same thing.

This is more goalpost shifting. You did in fact posit in your first two posts that government, in the form of "laws regulating lying on television" and a "law enforcement agency," be the arbiter of what is opinion represented as fact by television journalists. I asked you rhetorically "What is true and what isn't? Who decides? What is opinion and what is fact? Again, who decides?"

Implicit in your first two posts is "government," which in context suggests an executive agency.

A court determines what is true on a case by case basis for a given set of facts and circumstances when a civil plaintiff brings a controversy before it, or when the state prosecutes what it believes to be a criminal offense. The courts are definitely not equipped to regulate the television news industry in the manner you suggest.

I conclude that your entire idea of regulating the television news industry for opinions represented as facts is half-baked and indefensible in its present form.

[kuranes]

The antidote to "bad" information is more information. Counter "bad" information with "good" information and let the marketplace of ideas sort it out. Good, well presented and supported arguments usually triumph over bad ones. Sure, but how do we ensure that "more information" and "good information" are ever presented at all, or are certainly presented as widely as "bad information" often is ?


I believe it is wrong to allow corporations to hire psychologists to figure out how best to sell unhealthy products to children. Think of a cartoon character that sells sugar to children and calls it breakfast. Also Joe Camel did not arise out of a vacuum. Your vision of free speech would give corporations the power to make our most vulnerable people believe anything the corporations want.


This goes right to the point, even though Will2009 later says it is a "strawman". It's an example of lying or lying by omission etc.




Well now you've just engaged in moving the goalposts in the discussion. I agree with Will2009 that slander and libel are extreme examples of the original "lying" concept in the OP.



You're right that damages in libel law can be difficult to establish. It's the most frequent hurdle potential plaintiffs face in trying to establish a prima facie case of libel or slander, but damages are in fact an essential element of the cause of action. In other words, not every lie is actionable. And some lies don't get discovered or proved until many years after their effects. It can be very hard to make things right by then. All the more reason to consider stopping or minimizing them in the first place.



This is a half-baked idea. What do you think the existence of hundreds of channels available on cable or satellite TV is? Isn't that competitive market behavior? "I've got 13 [hundreds of] channels of shit on the TV to choose from." - Pink Floyd lyrics.


If Fox News' ratings are any guide, I would say it is filling that perceived gap very well. That's the competitive market at work. TV news channels compete for advertising dollars from sponsors, who in turn rely on ratings to tell them what viewers are watching, and implicitly, what they want to see. So, if a huge market exists, of people who effectively want to be lied to about crucial things, then profit-oriented programmers should strongly consider catering to it ? Even helping to fucking shape it ? I know this is not what you said directly, but I'm curious how far along you're willing ( will2009ing ? ) to take your reasoning.



OK, since you apparently are OK with meta-discussion, I'll feel free to indulge in it too. OK.


What? What do corporate interests have to do with my position or yours? This is a free speech issue, not a corporate interests vs. individual interests issue. Interjecting anti-corporate rhetoric into this discussion is simply a red herring. Who is it that can afford to buy up much TV air time ? Corporations. That's kind of like saying "This is an argument about our general humidity and wetness, and not one about rain or oceans." Please. Talk about red herrings. That's like a purple one you just threw out there.


You seem to simultaneously regard the law as the best guardian of human rights and also its greatest threat. This reminds me of Lee's old comment about how capitalists themselves are often some of the biggest enemies of the free market, when we were talking about backroom price fixing to accentuate profits etc. :)



Implicit in your first two posts is "government," which in context suggests an executive agency.Good point, there. However, perhaps one can still argue about the merits and demerits of lying on television without knowing all the precise mechanisms of how one would hypothetically enforce a rule against lying.

Government typically has made a mess out of many systems it is designed to make sense of. Sometimes I think this is more due to problematic ways that the government has tended to do things in recent years versus the very notion of any body trying to regulate things. For example, in IT they say one must often judge ( during a feasibility stage ) whether to attack a problem in little bites or....to risk trying to design an all encompassing system "solution" that would be implemented all at once, without any "scope creep" or further tweaks being necessary etc., such tweaks possibly requiring re-design of earlier stages once thought settled etc. Too often I think that government automatically tries to do the latter of these options.



I conclude that your entire idea of regulating the television news industry for opinions represented as facts is half-baked and indefensible in its present form.Bolding mine. It sounds like you at least are open to future possibilities. :) I think the nature of this thread was more along the lines of "concept" than "implementation", as I said before. Brainstorming. One does not always have to work backwards from a "practicality of design" standpoint forwards when considering the desirability of something being proposed as a consideration.

[Greyphilosophy]

I note that you neither mentioned explicitly nor implied in either of your first two posts that your thread was merely about libel or slander. That's why mentioning libel law here is moving the goalposts. You've shifted the focus of the discussion to something else entirely.

Libel is a form of lying and should not be excluded from this discussion. As Kuranes mentioned it is an extreme example. Will's posts led me to believe he feels there should be no restrictions on free press and I am glad to see him recognize one.



You're right that damages in libel law can be difficult to establish. It's the most frequent hurdle potential plaintiffs face in trying to establish a prima facie case of libel or slander, but damages are in fact an essential element of the cause of action. In other words, not every lie is actionable.


Is that the way it should be? I would think the most frequent hurdle in establishing a prima facie case would be evidence. If there is sufficient evidence then at a minimum the court should order the guilty to announce a retraction or correction, and beyond that pay determined [damages] if any. But hey, that's just my opinion.



This is a half-baked idea. What do you think the existence of hundreds of channels available on cable or satellite TV is? Isn't that competitive market behavior?


Calling a stoner's idea half-baked is neither complement nor insult, we expect nothing less and are happy to raise the standard. Just because a market is restricted doesn't mean it isn't competitive. How news stations react to announcing who wins national elections is evidence of competitive behavior.



Just what exactly do you mean by "If you give them the mechanism they will use it." Who are "they?" What is "the mechanism?"


If a competitor in direct competition with another competitor can cause them to incur greater cost then over time they can cause the price of goods for their competitor to increase as well. This causes a change in demand and a shift in the market. Point being this behavior is profitable and this is how the mechanism works.

Now the mechanism I suggested was news stations could cause other news stations to incur a cost for lying. Since there are only a few news stations I believe they are indeed in competition and will use such opportunity if presented.



Your suggested remedies are anti-democratic and anti-free speech.


They may be anti-free speech, but would it make the world a better place? And it's only anti-democratic if it takes away our right to vote. Someone wise once said the best defense of democracy is an educated citizenry. I don't think this is anti-democratic and I believe it would ultimately empower the people, not deprive them of an unalienable right.


Your suggestions, taken as a whole, are in fact calls for the creation of what I labeled "speechcrime." That's what a law enforcement agency's fining someone for expressing their opinions is. It is the very anti-thesis of free speech. Furthermore, you did in fact bring government into in by suggesting the involvement of law enforcement agencies and fines and criminal, not tort, laws holding journalists accountable.


I could accept the label of "speechcrime" if it didn't necessarily mean the antithesis of free speech. Is yelling fire in a crowded theater a speechcrime or the antithesis of free speech?

As far as whether criminal law or tort law should be applied I don't really know which would be better. I think it should be a competing firm that starts the process in any case. Would you indulge me with how you would go about achieving this goal without creating dystopia?



The First Amendment is expressly meant to prevent what you suggest from ever happening. It was not crafted in a vacuum. The drafters meant to prevent Congress from ever making any law abridging the freedom of speech or the press, and they said so. Any kind of speechcrime for expressing opinions, punishable by fine or any other form of punishment, is a relinquishment of the freedom of speech and freedom of the press and a ceding of control of speech and thought to government. That's about as un-American as you can get. It's not hyperbole to state it in those terms, because any reasonable reading of the Federalist Papers and other contemporaneous writings from the founders preceding the drafting, adopting and ratification of the original Constitution and the Bill of Rights supports the notion that the USA is founded on a set of principles, chief among them the freedom to express one's self without fear of retribution from government. It is exemplified best by Patrick Henry's maxim, "Give me liberty or give me death."

Patrick Henry was an anti-federalist. That was the group that was opposed to the constitution. He probably believed an unalienable right is not something that can be taken away; it doesn't need law or legislation to defend it. Anyway you've beat the argument "our founding fathers thought this way" to death and I still find it insufficient.



You haven't demonstrated how our current laws are insufficient to protect us from the most severe abuses at the mercy of "the market unbridled." Furthermore, it's amusing that you mention just above that "the law is the greatest market force we have," and then you decry the "market unbridled" as being capable of delivering the most severe abuses of human rights. You seem to simultaneously regard the law as the best guardian of human rights and also its greatest threat.

Read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair and you'll see the abuse to human rights that were caused by too few restrictions on the market.

And by the way I took logic twice in college, not because I was bad at it but because I loved it. I don't always practice it, but I know that calling someone a fascist in an attempt to invalidate their argument is an argumentum ad hominem.



I have no idea what prompted your comments about profanity. Is it because I used "fucking" and "bullshit" in some of my posts in this thread?

Those comments were obviously not directed at you as you do not fit the description.



You don't grant anyone any free speech rights.


I bet I could win this argument ad hoc, but I also grant you the right to be safe from violence.



I think not. I've formally studied constitutional law and actually practiced it for years. I wouldn't call my opinions about free speech law hasty. You may disagree with them, but I didn't form them hastily -- without study or thought.


A hasty generalization is a logical fallacy. It means someone applied a small sample to be representative of the whole. It says nothing about the time spent formulating opinions, and it does not mean the conclusion is false, just that the argument is unsound.

[uragenius.]

I think I vaguely recall reading some articles in NewScientist recently (one which I think was titled, "Liar, liar: why deception is our way of life") and I think it was said that basically the part of the brain that is devoted to deception is huge - it could have been another article. So even if the law was amended I suspect that the sophistication of deception would probably be raised. This would probably deceive to an even greater extent as many would be under the impression that they were being looked after when they weren't. What is probably not appreciated by many is that the most sophisticated use of deceptive techniques tends to be more so used by politicians who don't have a strong foundation in logic. I suspect that incorporating better critical reasoning education into the education system would be very significantly more effective. As an aside are you just being a devil's advocate?

[Cam'ron]

Lol at this ridiculous nonsense. So you want to throw out the 1st amendment and create more bureaucrat jobs for us to pay for? Ok pal, sounds like you didn't really think this one through.

[Will2009]

Lol at this ridiculous nonsense. So you want to throw out the 1st amendment and create more bureaucrat jobs for us to pay for? Ok pal, sounds like you didn't really think this one through.

Ha. That's just about perfect. You distilled the essence of the problem with the OP's original idea and my criticisms of it into one sentence. I agree with you 100%. Thanks for being so succinct and to the point.

[Will2009]

Sure, but how do we ensure that "more information" and "good information" are ever presented at all, or are certainly presented as widely as "bad information" often is ?


The short answer is you can't.

I could pose all sorts of questions to you at this point to help steer this towards some thoughts you might want to think about in order to further distinguish exactly what the OP was proposing originally, and what I think you are discussing.

1. Who are "we" in your question? Is it the people in general? Is it the TV broadcasting industry? News reporters and editors? Advertisers and marketing professionals? The government?

You're going to get very different answers depending on who "we" are in your questions.

2. What's "good" information? What's "bad" information? Are you talking about unreliable facts? Opinions? Mixed statements of fact and opinion? Advertising pitches? Political commentary? Opinions you disagree with?

The bottom line is that certain kinds of "lies" can and are in fact regulated. The one area that is most protected by law and is held by US courts to be nearly inviolate is political opinion.

Political opinion is precisely the kind of public discourse the founders were so concerned about, and what they intended to keep sacrosanct and outside the reach of Congress to restrict. The Supreme Court has struck down and will continue to strike down every attempt to criminalize or restrict expressing certain content which is in the nature of political commentary or opinion. If you really want something to chew on, consider the difference between a challenge to the constitutionality of a statute on its face versus and an "as applied" challenge on First Amendment grounds. Also consider a state's compelling interests in public order and safety in whether reasonable restrictions on free speech might withstand scrutiny in a First Amendment attack in the courts. What role, if any, do time and place have in considering whether restrictions are reasonable? What about the likely or target audience? The issue is more meaty and nuanced than the discussion taking place in this thread suggests.



This goes right to the point, even though Will2009 later says it is a "strawman". It's an example of lying or lying by omission etc.


Sorry, but you're mistaken. The OP's dragging false advertising, particularly using an example of intentionally misleading the consumers about the safety of a dangerous product intended for the use of young children, and then ascribing a position of defending such conduct to me, is in fact a strawman argument. For one, I didn't condone or advocate such a position. Two, it's not at all what the OP meant in his posts prior to that. Read his first two posts in this thread.

It is very clear he was referring to political opinion masquerading as objective news fact on cable news channels, and I'm quite sure he had Fox News Channel in mind. I'm no mind reader, but I'm pretty fucking good at parsing what someone is really trying to say in a discussion. I'd bet $500 bucks that's what he meant, but it's just academic now because I will not accept his word at this point, as he has been intellectually dishonest with us and perhaps himself by shifting the goalposts to a different topic -- intentionally false advertising of unsafe products that the advertisers know to be unsafe. That's a very different issue from passing political opinion as objective fact. If you cannot see that distinction, then I'm wasting my time with you in this discussion.



I agree with Will2009 that slander and libel are extreme examples of the original "lying" concept in the OP.


They are centuries old exceptions to free speech jurisprudence, but I'm convinced they were not what the OP originally had in mind when he created this thread. He was pissed that Fox News Channel exists and has a large viewership. That's it.



And some lies don't get discovered or proved until many years after their effects. It can be very hard to make things right by then. All the more reason to consider stopping or minimizing them in the first place.

Are you talking about libel and slander again? If so, then no, you're wrong again. Except in some extreme cases, usually involving ill-gotten photos of celebrities that constitute severe invasions of privacy, the Supreme Court has soundly rejected prior restraint of speech. It is almost always after the fact, after something the subject claims is false and defamatory has already been published, that a plaintiff can bring suit for libel and slander. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, proving damages is an element of a cause of action for libel or slander. The only kind of relief a plaintiff can get to stop publication is an injunction. It does happen occasionally, but it's a very rare case and the exception, not the rule. It is very fact-specific. In other words, libel and slander law does not rely on injunctive relief or prior restraint.




"I've got 13 [hundreds of] channels of shit on the TV to choose from." - Pink Floyd lyrics.


Great song and album. It doesn't address my point that there is healthy competition for viewers in television news, and thus the OP's original point is moot. The marketplace has addressed his issue without the interference or heavy hand of government.



So, if a huge market exists, of people who effectively want to be lied to about crucial things, then profit-oriented programmers should strongly consider catering to it ? Even helping to fucking shape it ? I know this is not what you said directly, but I'm curious how far along you're willing ( will2009ing ? ) to take your reasoning.

Now that's a strawman, because I haven't advocated that position, nor is it a reasonable inference from my staunchly defending the principles of free speech as applied in the US in this thread.

The OP didn't ask a question about the morality of TV news stations' shaping public opinion. He asked whether laws should exist, which by definition requires legislative, executive, and ultimately judicial action on the part of government, to prevent a specific type of "lying" on television: lying by offering political opinion as objective fact.

Thus, the question as posed is whether government should intercede and regulate political discourse on TV. My answer is an unqualified no. Hell no, even. The government absolutely cannot do that in any form or fashion without running smack into the First Amendment. It runs afoul of both the letter and spirit of the First Amendment in the most egregious way. In other words, the only way to accomplish what the OP originally suggested is to repeal the First Amendment's protections of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. He betrays a serious deficit in understanding of basic American civics in advocating such a position, and so does anyone who continues to subscribe to his original position as I've parsed it.



Who is it that can afford to buy up much TV air time ? Corporations. That's kind of like saying "This is an argument about our general humidity and wetness, and not one about rain or oceans." Please. Talk about red herrings. That's like a purple one you just threw out there.


Sorry you don't get it. Corporations, as legal persons, have the same free speech rights you and I do as individuals. Congress cannot make it unlawful to speak your mind, individually or collectively.

You may remember that there was an extensive discussion about this very issue earlier this year in the landmark Citizens United case in which the Supreme Court struck down some restrictions of the McCain-Feingold Act on First Amendment grounds. Unfortunately, in much of the public discourse on the case that followed, too many people wrongly viewed the case as a "corporate rights" case, when in fact it was a free speech case.

From the majority opinion, authored by Justice Kennedy:


Premised on mistrust of governmental power, the First Amendment stands against attempts to disfavor certain subjects or viewpoints. See, e.g., United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group, Inc., 529 U.S. 803, 813 (2000)(striking down content-based restriction). Prohibited, too, are restrictions distinguishing among different speakers, allowing speech by some but not others. See First Nat. Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U.S. 765, 784 (1978).

...

The First Amendment protects speech and speaker, and the ideas that flow from each.

...

Speech restrictions based on the identity of the speaker are all too often simply a means to control content.


Citizens United v. Federal Election Comm'n, 558 U.S. ____ (2010)



This reminds me of Lee's old comment about how capitalists themselves are often some of the biggest enemies of the free market, when we were talking about backroom price fixing to accentuate profits etc. :)

I get the feeling that you think "profit" is a dirty word. Think again.



Good point, there. However, perhaps one can still argue about the merits and demerits of lying on television without knowing all the precise mechanisms of how one would hypothetically enforce a rule against lying.

Thanks, but when the OP begins with "I think we need laws to regulate lying on television," it's not hard to discern from that opinion that it takes government action to make, enforce, and apply those laws.

Reaching that conclusion doesn't necessarily require "knowing all the precise mechanisms of how one would hypothetically enforce a rule against lying." It merely requires that one recognize that government action is involved and that should send up red flags about the freedom of speech and freedom of the press protections in the First Amendment. Please keep in mind that they were and are intended to restrict government from taking any action to interfere with those protections, not to protect consumers from lies by individuals or by corporate entities. The First Amendment is a limitation on the power of Congress (and by extension via the Fourteenth Amendment on the power of state legislatures as well) to regulate or restrict the content of speech. It's not meant to protect individuals from private speech by other actors.



Government typically has made a mess out of many systems it is designed to make sense of. Sometimes I think this is more due to problematic ways that the government has tended to do things in recent years versus the very notion of any body trying to regulate things. For example, in IT they say one must often judge ( during a feasibility stage ) whether to attack a problem in little bites or....to risk trying to design an all encompassing system "solution" that would be implemented all at once, without any "scope creep" or further tweaks being necessary etc., such tweaks possibly requiring re-design of earlier stages once thought settled etc. Too often I think that government automatically tries to do the latter of these options.


I don't think this was meant to be a broad discussion about the government's efficacy in general at regulating behavior. It was originally proposing a specific "fix" to a specific perceived problem in television the OP believes exists.



Bolding mine. It sounds like you at least are open to future possibilities. :)


That was intentional.

To be fair, I'll state that I don't think it's possible without repealing the First Amendment, which I think is possibly the worst idea I've ever heard in discussing constitutional issues in the US.



I think the nature of this thread was more along the lines of "concept" than "implementation", as I said before. Brainstorming. One does not always have to work backwards from a "practicality of design" standpoint forwards when considering the desirability of something being proposed as a consideration.

I think the OP hadn't given his ideas much thought before he created the thread. I also think you think the discussion is about the problem he posed versus the solution. I've been discussing his proposed solution all this time, not whether or not there is a problem to fix at all. I suppose tangentially I have argued that there isn't really a problem because competition in the television news marketplace exists and it's healthy enough to allow for a broad spectrum of political opinions on television.

Even if it were not, it's still no business of Congress or the states to even think about doing anything about it. What part of "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press..." don't you understand?

[kuranes]

The short answer is you can't.
My posing the question of "why not do this ?" was prompted by you saying that it was this "providing good information" that was the preferred response. All I was asking was "how" ?

Who is "we" ? So far here I'm typically using this word in the context of consumers; and, yes, I saw this thread ( as can be seen by my first responses to it ) as being at least partly about ways to protect or filter for consumers, since the OP was worded so broadly. The OP says nothing to contradict this. It isn't until Post 13 that GP says anything that could be construed as being pertaining to Fox News, and even then, it is not indicated as an exclusive focus. You have simply decided to "make it so".

I would agree with you that "political opinion" is and should be protected by our laws. Can we make up "facts" to support "political opinion" on TV ? It's been done for some time in election ads that involve "winning ugly", but it hasn't been quite so obvious as being a part of daily news, however much there might have been a "demand" for it ( which does not justify it IMO ) up until recently.

So, no, I haven't been focusing on Fox News, nor does the thread title indicate we ( I ) should. You've indicated that there are existing laws to protect consumers in non-political spheres re: this, and so I will take it that you perhaps support those ? Maybe those laws say that all one has to do to cover the legalities is to say ( in a flash of small print ) that "results aren't the same for everyone." etc.

As far as Fox News and lying goes, we've had threads on that before.
http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=36616&highlight=Fox+news

[Greyphilosophy]

Lol at this ridiculous nonsense. So you want to throw out the 1st amendment and create more bureaucrat jobs for us to pay for? Ok pal, sounds like you didn't really think this one through.

Please reread my original post, my goal was never to throw out the first amendment, nor create bureaucrat jobs. My goal was to find a way to stop or reduce the number of lies presented on television. The suggestions that educating people to determine lies would either stop lies or make the lies more complex are somewhat compelling, but I'm not sure how this can be achieved.

In an ideal world those that break the law would have to cover the cost of their actions, including paying for costs incurred in processing (bureaucrat jobs). In the case of Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation the supreme court upheld the FCC's power to prohibit shows that are indecent (even if not obscene) during hours children may be watching. I don't believe this was the same thing as throwing out the first amendment, and if it was then the first amendment was thrown out long before this thread was started.

I've never claimed to have a fully thought through system, if I did I wouldn't have started a thread to open it to discussion.

[kuranes]

I've never claimed to have a fully thought through system, if I did I wouldn't have started a thread to open it to discussion.Here I thought you were going to settle this issue about whether the thread was all about Fox news or not. :sadbanana::)

I'm assuming that it isn't, since you did bring up ads that were designed to take advantage of the naive nature of children. Will seems to be saying that YOU have decided that this is all about Fox, and so therefore YOU can't bring up other examples of lying or misleading without being "off topic" - thus throwing out a red herring. However, it seems that it is more about HIM than you, as someone attempting to be a "master of ceremonies" in someone else's thread.

[Greyphilosophy]

I'll admit that fox news strikes me as a culprit, but not alone and not always. I think that other thread Kuranes posted a link to provides some good examples of fox news lying on TV. However, Bill O'Reilly, Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann, and other political commentators were not intended by me to be a part of this discussion because their shows don't pretend to be presenting anything other than commentary. If they claimed to be in a position of authority over truth and then abuse their position by telling lies then I would change my position to include them. In short I never intended this to be a crusade against a particular network, but rather discussion to develop a way to hold those who claim authority, TV reporters from all networks, accountable.

Likewise I wouldn't mind including in the discussion celebrity endorsement of products the celebrities themselves do not use or are harmful. This is because I believe celebrities are in a position of authority and this also constitutes an abuse of authority.

By the same standard I would attempt to hold government officials making statements on TV accountable. I know come the next election their opponents can bring up the issue, but I don't think that is good enough. Especially when an elected official with access to information the general public does not have access to tells the public that another nation is an imminent threat to our security, and as a result a great many people die on the battlefield, soldier and civilian, and it be proven that the original claim that started the war was a lie, there should be consequences. Some sort of checks and balances system.

And I also believe corporations should be held accountable for lying and misrepresenting their products. I know there are a lot of laws against misrepresenting products, but if that corporation happens to be selling religious programming on TV they still should be held accountable so long as it can be proven that they have lied. Proof is rarely presentable in matters of faith anyway. Tell me if I send you only $20 a month it will feed (not help feed) and clothe a child in Africa, and if I discover you have pocketed $15 and the other $5 is not sufficient then you have committed fraud, even if you are a religious organization.

I don't mean this list to be all inclusive either. Other forms of lying on TV and proposed solutions are welcome to this discussion.

[kuranes]

I'll admit that fox news strikes me as a culprit, but not alone........ In short I never intended this to be a crusade against a particular network

I don't mean this list to be all inclusive either. Other forms of lying on TV and proposed solutions are welcome to this discussion.Bolding mine. In short, Will2009 owes me $500.00 and its not casino cash ! :smooch:

[Will2009]

Bolding mine. In short, Will2009 owes me $500.00 and its not casino cash ! :smooch:

;) Ha. You didn't read the rest of the paragraph. Always check the fine print. Void where prohibited. Must be redeemed in wampum, etc.

I'm not convinced and I said I wouldn't take his word for it at this point, as he has been intellectually dishonest in this thread by moving the goalposts. Read the first two posts he made in this thread. Taken together, they scream, "I'm upset that the talking heads on Fox News Channel can say shit I don't agree with and I wish I could make them stop. Here's an idea I came up with when I was stoned. Check it out."

Anyway, I feel a lot dumber for having read and participated in this thread. It's just stupid stoner rambling.

[Flatchett]

I find it eternally baffling that the same people who hate and fear corporations trust government. They are both predominantly filled with people who are seeking their own interest. The difference is that the government has more guns and less accountability. A corporation that people hate will go out of business (if it's not propped up by the government). When's the last time you saw a government peacefully disappear?


If it were so important, why'd they forget until the original was done? It's the first ammendment...this implies a scene with Jefferson and Franklin smacking their foreheads, saying "OH CRAP! RIGHTS!" :p


I dunno if you're serious, but there was actually a big debate about it. IIRC, some people opposed it because they were afraid that it would actually give more power to the government by implication. Kind of an "exception that proves the rule" situation. If the Bill of Rights says government can't do X, Y and Z, that must mean it can do A, B and C. This is why we have the Ninth Amendment.

[Qfwfq]

Television is far too regulated as it is, and our culture should cultivate a higher standard of healthy skepticism. The last thing the people of the US need is for the FCC to hold their hands a little tighter.

The people of the US and planet earth are stupid and do need television to be regulated, regardless of how much faith you may put in them.

If you want to sharpen their wits, go to the education system. I assure you television just dulls them.

[Cam'ron]

Basically it comes down to you not wanting people to share their opinions on TV. This is the dumbest thread I've ever seen.

[barrylevon]

Basically it comes down to you not wanting people to share their opinions on TV. This is the dumbest thread I've ever seen.

Uhh, I'm pretty sure it was more about the misinformation that goes on. Also, opinions are fine, but people try and pass them off as fact on various news shows. I remember there being a post that said something about telling people when they were about to spew bullshit all over the air waves, that way they could go put on their boots.

[Flatchett]

^ Do you really believe that truth and opinion are two distinct categories of information?

[barrylevon]

I was talking about opinions being passed off as "facts". I did not say "truth".

[Apotheosis]

If Glenn Beck was no longer allowed to lie on television, I wouldn't be able to play my favorite drinking game anymore.

I call it suicide. I watch Glenn Beck and take a shot each time he says something illogical.