The controversial Super Bowl half time show on Sunday has driven it's actors and sponsors to a game of finger pointing. The corporate parties, Viacom, CBS, MTV and the NFL, all stated that they were surprised by the incident. Yesterday, Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake described the exposure of Jackson's breast as an 'accident'. Today, however, Jackson came clean, admitting to planning the incident in advance. One would be hard pressed to explain how advance planning could occur without Timberlake's participation.
In a demonstration of the entertainment industry's moral obtuseness (as if a demonstration were necessary), CBS announced that Jackson will present and Timberlake will perform during the broadcast of the annual Grammy Awards celebration on Sunday. CBS said today, "...it [will] air the Grammys with a longer tape-delay so that network censors [can] edit any crude language or behavior from the telecast". Censoring lascivious behavior does not address the issues behind the behavior. In fact, the CBS plan proves that networks aren't capable of self-policing.
A firm hand from the FCC is needed. In this case, all corporate parties should be fined, and Jackson and Timberlake should be banned from the public airwaves for a year.
Posted by publius at February 3, 2004 03:21 PM