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tv censorship
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
and so the post i just made dont go into 2 different topics, i just wonder how if 3 people complain about an advert or tv programme it can be taken off the tv!?!?
wish i culd do it about big brother!!!!! :mad:
wish i culd do it about big brother!!!!! :mad:
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For instance, anything that is remotely racy (by British standards anyway, which means not that racy at all) would receive hundreds of complaints from "outraged" viewers. However these complaints were invariably an orchestrated pyramid effort (i.e. tell 5 people you know to send a letter of complaint, and to tell others to do the same) from 'decency' and 'family values' groups such as Mary Whitehouse's and other such types. It's at Ofcom discretion how to categorise complaints as genuine or politically-motivated.
On the one hand I agree that adverts shouldn't be pulled because of 3, 5 or even 50 complaints. In a country of 60 millions
someone is always going to be offended about something. However the fagg*t ad wasn't an innocuous term but an offensive one- and in cases like that the number of people complaining doesn't matter that much.
As a result 30 or 40 complaints is seen as a massive problem.
Perhaps the answer is to make sure you ring up to compliment a program that seems controversal that you like.
Plus banning is pretty rare, as far as I know, most broadcasters will simply remove a program or advert if they think it's getting them bad press. Most of the complaints that actually go through tend to revolve around factual/news programs where people feel they were misrepresented.
The last major complaint I remember being upheld by the ITC against a drama show was the episode of twin peaks where laura palmer's cousin is killed. The murder occured just as the show started (on the dot of the watershed), contained violent and sexually violent images against a woman and there was no warning beforehand. The complaint was mainly due to the lack of a warning.
Let me see if I can find a list of upheld complaints.
Ofcom
They present a monthly bulletin for adverts and tv shows showing the number of complaints and decisions. The following pages are the lists of the bulletins
Programme complaints bulletins
Advertising complaints bulletins
and if you just want to see a quick link to recent decisions this is the latest program bulletin - interesting to see the comments about Coronation Street
Programme complaints bulletin June 28th 2004