When, if ever, should the FCC be able to take away a broadcaster's license?
Recall that John R. Brinkley lost his license because he was using his radio station to promote dangerous practices such as his goat gland surgeries and the dreaded Medical Question Box. Further, he was making so much money at the time that merely fining him might not have forced him to stop.
But does that give us a standard we can work with? Should the government be able to shut down any radio station it thinks is dangerous? How should "dangerous" be defined?
Here’s your challenge: imagine that you’re the program director or DJ for a Clear Channel radio station. It’s September 13, 2001, and you just received the now-famous memorandum. Go through it and identify at least three songs that you’ll definitely avoid playing for now, three songs that you don’t quite get why they’re there, and three songs that you think should still be on the air (though whether you want to risk angering the owner is a different question). Use what you learned from the readings about how songs ended up on the list and how actual people in your position responded at the time.
For this discussion, imagine that a radio talk show host regularly includes hostile commentary about an ethnic or religious group to which you belong. He calls you cockroaches. He says you should be denied the right to vote. One afternoon he even says “It ain’t legal in this country to kill these scum, but killing ‘em sure ain’t a violation of God’s law.”
What’s the best response to this kind of thing? Report him to the police for making a criminal threat? Filing a complaint with the FCC? Organizing a boycott of the radio station’s sponsors? Try not to take him too seriously? Use thoughts and examples from the readings to justify your answer.