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Keep performer fines and license forfeiture out of the
"Indecency" Act
Right now, Congress is considering legislation on
enforcement of broadcast decency standards.
Earlier this year, the United States House of
Representatives passed an extremely punitive “indecency”
bill, aimed squarely at penalizing performers, recording
artists, and broadcasters. The bill would impose fines on
individuals of up to $500,000 and revocation of broadcast
licenses.
The Senate Commerce Committee is currently marking up its
version of legislation on broadcast decency, which does NOT
contain these extreme and dangerous provisions.
Help keep performer fines and license forfeiture out of
the “Indecency” Act.
Send a message today to Commerce
Committee members and your own Senators to oppose
legislation that imposes fines on individual Americans for
broadcast decency violations.
Send a letter to the following decision maker(s):
Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Below is the sample letter:
Subject: Don't impose fines on individual Americans for
broadcast decency violations
Dear [decision maker name automatically inserted here],
On May 18, the Senate Commerce Committee will "mark-up"
the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act (S. 193), sponsored by
Sen. Brownback.
You may be aware that earlier this year, the House passed an
extreme bill, which would fine individual Americans for
indecency violations. Although the Brownback Bill currently
does not contain provisions for individual fines and license
revocation, I am extremely concerned that there may be an
effort to add the extreme and outrageous provisions of the
House legislation to the Brownback Bill.
The House of Representatives' version of this legislation
(H.R. 310) would levy fines of up to $500,000 against
individuals with no warning mechanism whatsoever. This
legislation is extreme and could subject actors, recording
artists, radio announcers, and journalists to financial
ruin.
License revocation is bad for employees who work at local
television and radio stations. If a station loses its
license to broadcast, everyone who works for that station,
including engineers, clerical staff, management, on-air
talent and sales staff, would be out of work. The license
revocation provisions of the House bill penalize everyone
who works at the station, even if they have no role in
programming decisions.
Specifically, I respectfully request that you attend the
mark-up on May 18 and vote against any amendment that would
increase fines against individual Americans.
Additionally, I urge you to please support any amendment in
mark-up that would strike fines against individuals from the
Brownback Bill.
Please resist any attempt to impose fines on individuals for
broadcast decency violations.
Sincerely,
Charles Laskonis
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What's At Stake:
Earlier this year, the United States House of
Representatives passed an extremely punitive “indecency”
bill, aimed squarely at penalizing performers, recording
artists and broadcasters. The Senate Commerce Committee is
currently marking up a bill on broadcast decency (“the
Brownback Bill”), which does NOT contain these extreme and
dangerous provisions relating to individual fines and
license revocation. These fines could be imposed even
against performers in scripted and recorded programming
Although current FCC regulations permit fines against
individuals, there is a warning mechanism in the existing
regulations, and the maximum fine is $11,000. The House bill
eliminates any warnings prior to imposition of a fine, and
increases fines against performers, artists, and
broadcasters by nearly 500%. A fine of that magnitude could
subject announcers, actors, journalists, and recording
artists to financial ruin as a result of a single indecency
violation.
Additionally, the House bill would permit a station’s
license to be revoked with as few as one indecency
complaint—resulting in the unemployment of everyone at the
station, from the receptionist, to the sales staff, to
on-air talent, to top management.
The Senate Commerce Committee is currently marking up a
bill on broadcast decency (“the Brownback Bill”), which does
NOT contain these extreme and dangerous provisions relating
to individual fines and license revocation. However, AFTRA
members are very concerned that the extreme provisions on
performer fines and license revocation will be amended into
the Brownback Bill, during mark-up.
If you share our concern about this amendment, it is
extremely important that you contact your Senators
immediately. A number of groups advocating censorship will
be flooding the Senate with e-mails asking for performer
fines and license revocation. The time to contact your
Senators is now.
Campaign Expiration Date:
June 11, 2006 |
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