Arizona Ponders FCC Decency Standards For the Classroom 122
einhverfr writes "Eugene Volokh has posted an interesting discussion of a bill that has been introduced in Arizona, which would tie public school educator conduct to the FCC standards for decency for radio and television. The bill is essentially a three strikes system, firing teachers if they violate FCC standards three times. While the goal of the bill may seem reasonable, the details strike me as silly."
Our repressed media is bad enough (Score:5, Insightful)
There's no need to bring this puritanical nonsense into the classroom.
Any good high school teacher should be able to say "you guys need to get your shit together" in good conscience. If, on the other hand, a genuinely bad teacher is abusive towards students, this is a job for the parents and school administration to handle rationally.
There are already enough rules handed down to schools by politicized bureaucracies to make education a nightmare, why add to the burden with further insanity from the FCC?
Re:Our repressed media is bad enough (Score:5, Insightful)
You can already say "Shit" on TV if I recall, this sounds more like a back door attempt to stop proper sex education in favor of abstinence only propaganda.
There's no need to bring this puritanical nonsense into the classroom.
Any good high school teacher should be able to say "you guys need to get your shit together" in good conscience. If, on the other hand, a genuinely bad teacher is abusive towards students, this is a job for the parents and school administration to handle rationally.
There are already enough rules handed down to schools by politicized bureaucracies to make education a nightmare, why add to the burden with further insanity from the FCC?
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For example quit promoting the good teachers out of positions where they can actually help students.
that doesn't happen in my state (NC) .. good teachers just stay where they are with zero reward.. and the bad ones.. well if they have tenure stay too.. OR along with bad principals.. get moved to "central office" where they don't have interaction with students..
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i know commenting on my self is not good, but by they way.. i was trying to point out that my state is still screwed..
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You can already say "Shit" on TV if I recall, ....
Not in the States.
But you can say "Crap", "Poop" and "Excrement". Talk about brain damage in the system.
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That was my thought too, but it doesn't seem very targetted. It would make sex education difficult and dangerous to teach, even if you follow the rules, but really all it's doing is inviting angry parents to complain about teachers they don't like.
Re:Our repressed media is bad enough (Score:4, Insightful)
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He asks why we invent a word and than decide it is not appropriate to say?
History.
Most (but not all) of our 'dirty words' today were regular anglo-saxon English words prior to the Norman invasion of 1066. After the Norman conquest the elites spoke French while commoners continued to speak English. Over time the elites were assimilated into the English speaking community (similar to how China keeps assimilating their conquerors over and over again (e.g. the Mongols, the Manchu)). But this separation that existed and how the elites adopted English leaves a lot of relics in our lang
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'Proper people' would use French-descended terms brought into English. Essentially it was a form of 'class war' in which the elites may have adopted English but they rendered older English vocabulary of the lower classes into something unacceptable.
And of course, a lot of the time those "proper" words are in fact themselves slang imported from other languages. Eg. penis. This is a latin word meaning tail. What makes it any more acceptable than saying bollocks is a mystery to me.
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This also requires the teachers themselves to BE abstinent, even if they are married, having sex with their own spouse in the privacy of their own home would violate this law.
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When and where? I never hear that word on local broadcast television/TV stations even during late hours. I do hear other words like damn, bastard, etc.
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Teachers are often children's only source of professional adults they come across. The teacher really need to be sure that they are professional in their jobs.
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They couldn't tell their students "that they need to get their act together"
Teachers are often children's only source of professional adults they come across. The teacher really need to be sure that they are professional in their jobs.
Where I come from, telling someone they need to get their shit together is perfectly acceptable. I had teachers say precisely this to their classes when I was a student.
Saying "shit" every once in awhile and swearing up a storm are two different things, and the former is pretty much part of life unless your religion forbids it.
I'm sure there are jobs where every swear word is counted against you (thank God I don't work there), but graduates entering the work-force should be able to use that other thing the
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Hmmm... my manager curses occasionally. Generally only when something especially annoying happens -- e.g. her manager has an accident, and she has to cover for him.
But one of my colleagues says "fuck" as much as some people say "like". "I was, like, arguing with the other guys on the project, like, and they were like, 'Let's do it this way'." becomes, "Fuck, I was arguing with the other guys on the fucking project, and they fucking said 'Let's fucking do it this way'". It's very unprofessional, and I fin
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My wife's brother is the same way, and then gets all pissy when we tell him to stop doing it around the kids.
I've said 'fuck' now and then in the office, but I'd say it's infrequent, as in less than once a day most of the time.
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I agree. In fact, this does not go even nearly far enough. All public employees should be prohibited from cursing in public. And that includes politicians. Three strikes and they're out of office permanently.
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I can just imagine packs of dissatisfied voters stalking senators and trying their best to get them to break. :)
Re:Our repressed media is bad enough (Score:5, Interesting)
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It'll be interesting to see how you're supposed to run a sex education class with media if "popping boobs" are banned.
Typical stupid politicians, trying to make a name for themselves and get some media exposure.
Unfortunately, the general public is likely to nod and say "good idea" rather than think about all the educational material that would be illegal to broadcast in the US.
Do you realize that in Canada our attitude on sex is so much more liberal that we actually have soft core porn aired after mi
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Then again, maybe that's the whole point.
It's pretty much illegal to ban sex ed classes, so the puritans who hate such courses are trying another tactic to strangle the programs. Literally.
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The real question is: (Score:2)
Re:Our repressed media is bad enough (Score:5, Insightful)
It's very important to raise generations of people incapable of distilling the real message out of the myriad pieces of nonsense that are bombarding an average person from all the MSM outlets.
There is a very important reason to do this - running a totalitarian war machine is made much easier with a complacent population, it's much easier when the population believes everything it is told.
For example: Iraq was not a threat to USA at any time, nor were they linked to 9/11, but majority of people (70% in that poll) were brainwashed by the politicians and the MSM enough to believe it. [usatoday.com]
Right now every MSM channel in US is pushing Iran war, it's not even a question that the political mind is made up, the MSM system is in all gears to push that nonsense (and of-course US has a 'standing army', so there is nothing really that Congress or POTUS need to do to run that war, there is no need to search for more money, it's all already 'budgeted in'.)
But how do you start, how do you create this insane mind control over the population? Well, you start young. You start with small type of censorship and then you go from there. Thus my previous comment [slashdot.org] (that was moded 'funny' but also a 'troll' as well) stands.
Two words (Score:1)
Teachers' Unions.
Firing a teacher for anything short of driving their car into the school while drunk and getting a hummer from the head cheerleader is nearly impossible because of them.
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Teachers' Unions.
Firing a teacher for anything short of driving their car into the school while drunk and getting a hummer from the head cheerleader is nearly impossible because of them.
Tell that to the 22,000 California teachers laid off last year.
Education is consistently targeted for cuts during this recession, and people keep insisting teachers have it easy.
Wake up. It's our kids that are going to suffer.
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Contracts allow for downsizing and layoffs due to budget cuts is entirely different. Even tenured professors can be laid off due to budget cuts. Getting fired from a job means you specifically violated your contract or simply aren't performing well, firing for which is something that is near impossible to get away with in many school districts (Case in point: Until recently, New York City's "rubber room", Reason's flow chart of the process [reason.com] or Google preview [google.com], see also, Washington, DC).
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Tenure is there largely to protect educators' ability to teach effectively.
While there are downsides to the system, the upshot is we have teachers who are partially shielded from political or cultural sway so they can decide a curriculum based on reason rather than the popular flavor of the season.
You can talk about introducing a merit based system, but all this will do is create a popularity contest where effectiveness is measured by how well an educator can mimic whatever is currently in vogue.
You could s
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Firing != laid off
The two are synonymous. Look it up, if you don't believe me.
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Firing != laid off
The two are synonymous. Look it up, if you don't believe me.
It depends on your dictionary, as with all questions of semantics. However, the point being made boils down to this:
"Firing" is referring to what happens when an employee is dismissed for something they have done, e.g. driving a car through the school while drunk.
Being "laid off" is what happens when an employee is dismissed because they are surplus to requirements and is commonly called "being made redundant" where I'm from (compared with "being sacked").
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Allow me to make a small correction then:
Being "laid off" is what happens when an employee is dismissed ostensibly because they are surplus to requirements and is commonly called "being made redundant" where I'm from (compared with "being sacked").
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Fuck all of them. Homeschooling for the win.
Parents teach children to swear (Score:2)
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If these "legislators" enact this BS...they are also public employees. When they are forced to live their lives by the same shackles as they are putting
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Having lived in Arizona before I moved to Idaho...every time I hear about stuff like this from Arizona/Oklahoma/Mississippi I almost give myself a concussion when slapping my forehead.
Luna's education agenda [magicvalley.com] is just as asinine as any sort of state sanctioned No Cussing Club [nocussing.com]. Laptops and iPads does not a good education make.
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Laptops and iPads does not a good education make.
Sure...it makes perfect sense when you realize Luna/his family/associates are going to make a killing from all the kickbacks...even when he's impeached for being so stupid.
Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
Censorship must start early in life, that's the first rule of government running propag... education system.
Re:Censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
I keep telling you people, the federal government has no business in public education, the local and state government. As stupid as this bill seems, the next "logical" step would be for Obama to force it on the rest of the nation.
You think it is "logical" that Obama is just itching to pass a federal version of a state decency law written by a bunch of conservative Republicans? That word, "logical", I do not think it means what you think it means.
Keeping all education local would prevent this stupidity from leaving Arizona's borders.
That sure worked with local control of science standards and creationism, didn't it?
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sounds like he went to school in Arizona.
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RTFS, it is a state bill, not federal. Trying to use the FCC standard not put the FCC into the school. Looks like the Arizona reps are ceding classroom decorum standards to the state, how's them apples.
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Sorry to the feds
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RTFS, it is a state bill, not federal. Trying to use the FCC standard not put the FCC into the school. Looks like the Arizona reps are ceding classroom decorum standards to the state, how's them apples.
You are using the "F" letter in an inappropriate way - you are being watched!
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If you actual would bother to read my post, I know it is a state statute. I said as much. The problem is that it gives ideas to to the fed, which could impose the same standard on other states, including states that don't want it, or they don't get their "education funding". That is the complaint. Let Arizona do something stupid, that is fine, the problem is that many fed programs (Obama care, for instance) started out as state programs, and the fed comes in and pushed it down everyone's gullet. This i
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Yeah the later part of your post implies you know it is a state statute but you led off with saying keep the fed out of public education, implying that this was the feds idea. Why not lead off criticizing the idiots that think this is a good idea.
Re:Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
And those words they can't say really help the students how?
- :) it doesn't. It helps the authorities with an early start of conditioning people into believing that what government authority (and any kind of authority) tells them is the truth.
It's not about 'fuck' and all the other Carlin's favourites, it's about "Iraq was tied to Al Qaeda", "Hussein tied to 9/11", "Iran has nuclear weapons", "Iran is a threat to USA". It's about "Income taxes on the rich improve the economy". It's about "Income equality is government's mandate". It's about "Paper currency is money". It's about "Bailouts are necessary to save the economy".
That's what it really is all about.
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did you just call george carlin a pedophile?
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These words are often used because they are unable to come with the proper vocabulary word of the time. Shows when someone is being more emotional then thoughtful. Also pedafiles tend to use such language to get kids attracted to them.
I can see that you have "come with the proper vocabulary word of the time." Perhaps before commenting on the use of language, you should learn how to write it first. Swearing and cursing are entirely appropriate in certain situations and admittedly your point (once I deciphered it) has some merit, apart from the part about 'pedafiles'.
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Also pedafiles tend to use such language to get kids attracted to them.
Nice you're thinking of the children, but thank fuck you're not an English teacher.
Re:Censorship (Score:4, Funny)
fuck yeah, the motherfucking shitty 'education' system has gone tits up enough already! Everybody and their cocksucking cunts should be pissed!
There are so many things wrong with this ... (Score:5, Insightful)
... it's hard to know where to even start. But possibly the absolute worst is at the end of Paragraph B:
B. For the purposes of this section, "public school" means a public preschool program, a public elementary school, a public junior high school, a public middle school, a public high school, a public vocational education program, a public community college or a public university in this state.
(emphasis mine)
For K-12 teachers, okay, I can kind of see this, although the penalties seem Draconian and I'm willing to bet that they already have in-school codes of conducts that prohibit swearing in the classroom. But are they actually saying that this is going to apply to professors in a classroom full of people who are legally adults? To discussions of literature containing the word "fuck"? To research faculty in their labs? Seriously?
Apparently the bill's sponsor, Lori Klein, showed off her gun by aiming it at a reporter [huffingtonpost.com] a while back. That tells you everything you need to know about the mentality of the people behind this. They're completely insane. Um, apeshit, if you will. And they're growing in power all over the country.
Re:There are so many things wrong with this ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think this is still push back for declaring "Make Love, Not War".
Re:There are so many things wrong with this ... (Score:5, Interesting)
I think this is still push back for declaring "Make Love, Not War".
I think you're right. They lost the culture war decades ago, and deep down they know it, but they're going to keep fighting to make the mopping-up operation as nasty as possible.
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IIRC the FCC doesn't care about didactic nudity. I think a TV station did a "How to do a breast cancer self-examination" segment (which involved broadcasting breasts) and the FCC was fine with it.
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if breasts are your only bit for Sex ed - i think there is a problem here. showing a penis or a vagina or god forbid both near each other.. that's hardcore stuff.
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To discussions of literature containing the word "fuck"?
Indeed... it would seem that this law would make most courses in modern literature null and void. If the teacher can't say the words, then certainly it follows that the curriculum cannot contain books which contain the words. This would also seem to prohibit all anatomy, sexual/gender studies, much of biology, most of film studies, etc etc...
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To discussions of literature containing the word "fuck"?
That's right. No more Alan Ginsberg, Ezra Pound, Chaucer.
Re:There are so many things wrong with this ... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm kind of curious where the impetus for this is coming from. Is Arizona suffering from a rash of swearing teachers? Are children all across the state going home and saying "Hey Mommy, my English teacher said the guy she picked up in the bar last night fucked her good, and we were all like 'No Ms. Jones, he fucked you well!"
An excuse! (Score:3)
I picked him out because he should be well-known to the slashdot crowd, but this isn't a liberal-vs-conservative thing. There are plenty of teachers from both sides who like to use their position to advance their own agenda (It's why some of them become reachers) and a lot who are simply incompetant. They are just very difficult and very expensive to get rid of. Teachers have some very powerful unions, and have used that power to achieve incredible job security.
So think.. what would schools really like to help manage their teachers? How about some rule that is hard to obey, ideally so convoluted that you'd need a lawyer just to work out what it permits, and for which offenders can be promply sacked? The FCC standards are ideal. Hard to even figure out, and it only takes a momentary lapse of thought to violate them. The law appears to have no right of appeal, no board review. It's just written for selective enforcement. If the management wants to continue employing a teacher, they can just turn a blind eye to the occasional bit of mild profanity... but if they want rid of a teacher, all they need to do is wait. When the rules are so difficult to follow, everyone will slip up sooner or later. Indecency becomes the perfect excuse.
Exactly what that results in would just depend on the school. It might be used as a quick-and-sneaky way to fire inept teachers without having to go through years of reviews and appeals, which is good. But equally it might be used for ideological clensing, so management can more easily stock the school with a staff who will indoctrinate the students into their own political agenda.
Re:An excuse! (Score:4, Insightful)
That is an idiotic example. Hurting students or otherwise inappropriately taking advantage of them leads to a fine or prison.
This is a level where the school need not and _should_ not be involved, criminal prosecution is none of their business.
And I really doubt it is hard to fire someone who is in prison and can't come to work.
Also that the court process cost "millions of dollars" has nothing to do with teachers but only with a completely and thoroughly dysfunctional US court system, which basically tried to find anything that could be done wrong and then implemented it.
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That is how hard it is to get a teacher fired. Even if one goes so far as to burn students (admitidly volunteers) with a high voltage generato
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I had a super liberal social studies teacher who, through pushing her ultra liberal agenda, actually got through to groups of rowdy rowdy students and taught us why it's important to know geography, multiculturalism and respecting others.
She was awesome.
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Freshwater was nutty, even by Pentecostal standards. Even so, he wasn't short on support. The cross burning thing had a somewhat limiting effect on his support. The people coming out strong for Freshman were the fringe wingnuts.
Religion does indeed complicate this. While Freshwater and his fellow fundies have no regard for the constitutional protections for faith and lack thereof, the state must do things by the book. That will unfortunately lead to delays, and having to entertain spurious legal challenges.
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As long as it applies to the students, as well ... (Score:2)
... then they might end up with a lot of empty classrooms. Great for saving school system costs.
. . . the details strike me as silly . . ."
"Oh, what sad times are these when ruffian teachers are allowed by FCC regulations to say 'Ni!' at will to school children!"
"Reasonable"? (Score:5, Insightful)
How are these goals in any way reasonable?
Reasonable ? (Score:5, Insightful)
While the goal of the bill may seem reasonable,
This is the Arizona Republican Party we are talking about here. Of course the goals of this Bill are not reasonable.
College (Score:2)
I'm glad this doesn't apply to college. The first day of the capstone class of my major, our assignment was "I want two pages on the following topic: Why the fuck are you guys here?"
Of course, that was the sixth class I had with that particular professor, so things were a little more laid back.
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Unclear wording (Score:1)
Shock Value (Score:2)
I'm guessing Howard Stern won't be a substitute teacher any time soon.
Think less, not more (Score:1)
Yet another chunk of government that needs 90% less power than it has.
define "decency" (Score:1)
"Decency" is a subjective thing. What's not decent in the US, may be perfectly decent, or even boring, in most EU countries. What's not decent in the US, like showing a nipple, is prime time TV in the Netherlands. I want my kids to have a free mind and a fair amount of knowledge about sex, so they don't get a girl pregnant and they don't catch diseases. Puritanism causes teen pregnancies, so let's not introduce this bs into the class room. It's bad enough as it is.
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Graphic depictions of violence are considered acceptable in the US, but in most EU countries this is not acceptable. And in some countries such depictions are even regulated in the media.
Have fun trying to establish a connection between two cultures on a topic where they differ significantly.
Nice (Score:5, Insightful)
I can only guess that teachers in Arizona are not in the habit of ripping off nipple shields... so what is this really guarding against? Bad language? Most teachers have to look up the curse words of kids.
No, this isn't about teachers mis-behaving. This is about art, sexual education and the "wrong" kind of books. There are plenty of parents who want to sanitize all education so that little Timmy doesn't learn anything that might upset his parents and this is the way to do it. Don't bother banning books, art or subjects, simply say that undecent things are not allowed and then watch teachers censor themselves to not loose their jobs.
Real nice.
Only two unions left in AZ with balls... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Yes, only giant corporations and millionaires should be able to directly pay for campaigns.
Pandering (Score:1)
We have the worst Republicans in the country in Az (Score:2)
And I say that as a Republican. Just recently we had a group of them go after our University funding, claiming that if tuition is higher then the students will benefit because they'll value their educations more. The moron pushing this had a degree from the University of Pheonix.
They all get elected on a mix of religious social issues and their oppositions refusal to admit that illegal immigration is a problem(even though Arizona is now the kidnapping capital of the country and there are entire sections of
One big problem with this. (Score:2)
Cut Arizona some slack (Score:2)
The probably don't have a lot of experience with this education thing. Change can be unsettling; they're probably uncertain what goes on in these new-fangled "classrooms". Under the circumstances it's quite understandable that they'd turn to the comfort of something more familiar to them, like broadcast television.
Purpose is to bust the unions (Score:2)
When you ain't got one hook on to one. (Score:1)
When you have no clue hook on to another with no clue.
I think the cat will do it to the pooch when the courts
force the FCC to scrap it's standards. The only thing
funnier was a company that requires employees to abide
by the Geneva Conventions... I asked for a copy... and
did not get one.
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