Hello. I'm Craig, and this is Crash Course Government and Politics. Today I'm gonna talk
a little bit about the media. Specifically, the way the media interacts with the government
itself, and more specifically, the way the government regulates the media. Some of you
might be saying, "Craig, get real, the government doesn't regulate the media. We live in a free-market
capitalist society and the only real regulation on what gets published or broadcast is determined
by consumers, Craig." Right Clone: Right on.
Craig: Except that there are things you can't say on television or print in a newspaper
either because they're harmful or untrue, and there are a number of government agencies
that exist to place limits on the media and to make sure that we have access to information.
Left Clone: Right on! Craig: Don't you mean left on? [laughs]
But wait, so you guys both agree then? Clones: No.
Craig: Oh, I guess I misunderstood.
[Theme Music]
Let's start our discussion of government regulation of the media with a little review. The oldest
form of media in the US is print, so you might think that it has been the most regulated,
but you'll remember from our episode on the freedom of the press that this isn't really
the case because of the pesky first amendment.
The freedom of the press was written into the Bill of Rights because the framers wisely
recognized that without a free press, Americans would be less able to have the information
they needed to make good political decisions, which they do all the time. They also make
bad political decisions, too. They just make a lot of decisions.
So there are very few government regulations on what can and can't appear in the newspaper.
Near v. Minnesota basically said that there could be no censorship in the form of prior restraint.
In New York Times v. US, the Pentagon Papers case made it difficult for the government to use
national security as an excuse to prevent publication of sensitive, or in that case, embarrassing material.
There are still libel laws that allow individuals to sue newspapers and magazines when they
print something that they don't like. But as far as public figures are concerned, the
Supreme Court's decision in New York Times v. Sullivan makes it pretty hard to censor
the press by suing for libel. So I can say anything I want about public figures. Public figures are dumb.
In order to win this type of lawsuit, the plaintiff must show that the article, or advertisement,
was both untrue and published with actual malice or reckless disregard for the truth,
which is a very, very high bar. What this means in practice is that the first amendment
pretty much protects print media from government regulation. Although as we saw in the last
episode, the number of Americans getting their information from print is shrinking. So maybe
the markets are doing the regulation after all. Although I don't think people are buying
fewer newspapers as a way of regulating their content. They probably just don't want the
papers cluttering up their house and they don't wanna get that ink on their hands, you
know, the black ink the rubs off.
The government is taking a larger role in TV and radio, possibly because it reaches
the largest numbers. Broadcast media is the most tightly regulated among the information sources.
The first and probably least transparent way that the government regulates broadcast media
is through control of the airwaves, which is done through licensing. Broadcast spectrum
is a limited resource and is technically owned by the public, so if you want to broadcast,
you need to purchase a license from the federal government. This gives you the right to operate
your television or radio station under certain well-defined conditions. These licenses must
be renewed every five years and they almost always are. The licenses are granted and most
of the government regulation of broadcasters is managed by the Federal Communications Commission,
the FCC. It was founded in 1934 to oversee a chaotic radio industry and it soon expanded
to include television. As part of its mission, the FCC required that in order for a station
to be granted a license, it had to show that it was operating in the public interest. In
terms of politics, this meant that the FCC has come up with some rules regarding what
gets broadcast. Every channel has to have a CSI.
The first rule, dating back to 1949, is called the Fairness Doctrine. This requires broadcasters
to give equal time to each side of a public issue. So if a station airs a program criticizing
a war, say the one in Vietnam or the one in Iraq, it has to air another program of equal
length that supports the war. What this meant in practice was that stations shied away from
controversial programming, even though the Fairness Doctrine was never rigidly enforced.
The lack of enforcement and generally non-controversial nature of commercial broadcasting
didn't stop Ronald Reagan's administration from pushing for the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine in 1983.
Congress voted to reinstate it in 1987 when Democrats took control, but Reagan said
"uh-uh," and he vetoed the legislation. As a result, the Fairness Doctrine is pretty much dead.
Other rules related to the Fairness Doctrine are the Equal Time Rule, which requires that
broadcasters not discriminate in selling time to political candidates, and the Right of
Rebuttal, which ensures a political candidate will have the opportunity to respond to a
personal attack if it gets aired. These rules do not apply to eagles, however. Yeah, you stay down.
There's another important FCC rule that deals with media ownership, but I'm gonna
talk about that later because the FCC didn't tell me I can't.
The FCC also regulates what can be broadcast, but these rules doesn't relate to politics
so much as obscenity, indecency, or profanity showing up on radio or television.
Sometimes these FCC rulings and fines become Supreme Court cases as people raise concerns
about whether they deny our precious, precious free speech. One of the most famous cases
in this area, FCC v. Pacifica Broadcasting, dealt with comedian George Carlin's Seven
Words routine, which I will not be repeating because Crash Course is a family-friendly educational channel.
This case established that it's okay for the FCC to require that certain language and images not be
broadcast during family times, which is before 10 PM.
The FCC also hands out fines for f-bombs and wardrobe malfunctions to keep us safe and virtuous.
I should point out here that these FCC rules only apply to broadcast media and not most
basic cable channels, which is why there's so many naked people in Game of Thrones.
I don't know if that's why there is, but that's why they can do it.
Congress also tried to regulate broadcasters by passing legislation, as it tried to do
with the 1996 Telecommuncations Act. This act was best known for its failed attempts
to regulate the internet, but it had other more interesting effects, too. As with any
congressional legislation, this act was subject to Supreme Court judicial review. The court
did strike down part of the law, Title V, which was called the Communications Decency Act
and was meant to regulate online pornography, because its definition of obscenity was overbroad,
and the court said that it violated the first amendment.
Speaking of the internet, unlike print and broadcast media, it's largely self-regulating.
This is possibly because Congress has recognized that it changes so quickly that most laws
and regulations will be out of date by the time they're finally written. But this hasn't
stopped them from trying. After the court struck down the Communications Decency Act,
Congress tried again with the Child Online Protection Act in 1998, and they failed.
This one didn't make it all the way to the Supreme Court, but lower federal courts enjoined the
government from enforcing it in 2007.
A more effective way to regulate the internet has been through lawsuits, especially those
around intellectual property. As viewers of our IP series know, this is super complicated,
but basically people can use the courts to restrict the internet. A good example of this
was the Napster case, where courts ruled against the file-sharing company and it was shut down.
It takes individuals, and Metallica, and corporations to bring these suits, but they use the government
to shape the internet to meet their interests, so it can be seen as government regulation.
Speaking of corporations, this is a good place to bring up a couple of very complicated
regulatory issues involving the internet, television and newspapers.
The first one has to do with media ownership. Let's go to the Thought Bubble.
Part of the 1996 Telecommunications Law, Title III to be more exact, dealt with the regulation
of cable television. Actually, it was a deregulation of the cable industry, allowing for companies
that own newspapers and radio and television stations to also own cable companies. This
kind of cross-ownership was supposed to lower barriers to entry into the cable business,
and it was clarified by the 2003 FCC ruling that allows a single company to own and operate
the leading newspaper, television and cable companies in a single market. This has led
to concerns about monopolization of the media as more and more companies merge. And it's
hard to argue that this isn't happening. So the number of companies that provide media
content and access has been shrinking precipitously in the past 30 years, which is probably why
the FCC and Congress scrutinize media mergers so closely. Critics point out that these kinds
of super-mergers can lead to a lack of diversity in media. This can lead to fewer points of
view represented in our news coverage and our stories.
Net neutrality has also been a big issue, you've probably head about it. The question
revolves around whether the FCC should pass rules that allow internet service providers
to charge differential rates to companies that use their bandwidth. For example, internet
service providers sometimes sell faster or better service to large companies like Netflix
at the expense of smaller competitors or individuals who don't pay as much.
Thanks, Thought Bubble. The net neutrality issue is a really complex regulatory question,
but the debate over it, which takes place in Congress, on television, on the internet,
and even through the FCC's website, where anyone's allowed to make public comments on
proposed rules, has been fascinating and it points out a number of key issues involving
government regulation of the media.
First, it shows that a lot of media regulation involves a number of actors. In this case,
George Clooney. No, no, no, not those kinds of actors. Private media companies, media
organizations themselves and executive agencies like the FCC. It also points out that the
overarching regulatory structure is built by Congress but that the real key actors are the
regulatory rule makers and enforcers of the executive branch. And George Clooney. He has aged so well.
Even more important though, are the questions that lie behind the debate. When we think
about regulation, what comes to mind is regulation of content or censorship, but with net neutrality
rules as with FCC cross-ownership rules, what we're really looking at is regulation of access
and how much media will be available at a given price. Those who argue that the internet
should be regulated like a public utility rather than just another set of corporations
that take their cues from the market are getting at something. The media is different from
other corporate entities because it serves a public function, something that the framers
realized when they wrote freedom of the press into the first amendment. Without a robust
media, Americans may have less access to information that they need to make smarter political choices.
Of course, all the access we have doesn't mean that we necessarily will make smarter
choices, but in this case, being able to hear more points of view is better than only hearing a few.
That's why we're skeptical of censorship and why many people wanna keep the internet as open as possible.
Thanks for watching, I'll see you next time.
Crash Course Government and Politics is produced in association with PBS Digital Studios. Support
for Crash Course US Government comes from Voqal. Voqal supports nonprofits that use
technology and media to advance social equity. Learn more about their mission and initiatives
at voqal.org. Crash Course is made with the help of all these monstrous jerks. That's
not libel, they're public figures. Go ahead, try and sue me. Thanks for watching.