I only watched the NBA All-Star Game long enough to catch Indiana Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle looking decidedly uncomfortable as he was being introduced during the pre-game, but I apparently missed Beyonce Knowles uncovering plenty of skin for the TNT cameras.
Matt at The Goat Belt has some questions:
Am I missing something? How come no one is outraged about Beyonces copious boob-spillage at the NBA all-star game? I'll grant you that the nipple is still in there, but isn't there almost as much actual boob-tissue exposed as there was at Janets whole debacle. Whats the difference here? Was this performance more tasteful somehow?
I can understand Matt's confusion, but the issue here is pretty simple. The Super Bowl is the most watched entertainment event of the year, and it's always on broadcast television. The NBA All-Star Game migrated to cable last year, meaning not as many eye-balls were peeled during Ms. Knowles provocative performance.
But the real bottom line is that while the FCC is perfectly within its rights to throw a fit over "broadcast indecency" (insert your definition here), it really can't say the same about cable, which after all customers pay for.
Had such a performance traveled over the "public airwaves," you can bet the FCC and assorted other politicians would have pitched a requisite fit.
Besides, it's far more fun for politicians to grill the folks at Viacom, CBS, MTV and the NFL in a way that plays to their political constituencies.
Thanks to Costa Tsiokos for the link.
Eric, also don’t underestimate the Tivo factor. Had the Janet Jackson incident happened ten years ago, it would have been a mere footnote to the Super Bowl, because CBS’s quick cutaway would have basically ended the “scandal”. What made Jackson’s exposure so prominent was the fact people were digitally recording the game and could repeatedly replay the incident for themselves. In a very real sense, modern technology thwarted the regulatory urge to restrict what the public saw. Add to that the Internet’s ability to blast-broadcast a photograph throughout the world, and you have veritable regulatory anarchy.
On the flip side, modern technology also gives pro-regulatory voices a way to amplify their position.