Censorship in America

There's something a little strange about America being a bastion of free speech and simultaneously a nation of prudes. Before getting pay TV here I never realised that this irony plays out in the fact that their movies are full of swearing but TV is censored. (I also see a big problem with the fact that depictions of violence are fine any time but swearing and sex are not. But that's not just America, that's the West in general.)

The thing is, you don't notice how much swearing there is in a movie until you watch it on TV and find that half a sentence is hushed out and you can't follow the plot. (Yes, swear words are sometime key-words in action movies.) Unlike Australia, it has nothing to do with the time it's shown, swearing is hushed even after midnight! I looked into this and what I found was even more surprising: 1. Profanity laws only apply before 9 p.m. and 2. They don't apply at all for pay-TV. So why do (almost) all networks stop swearing all the time? Because apparently the advertisers demand it. (I think the only exception is HBO. Maybe some other premium channels.)

Here comes the funny bit - there are certain words that are ok by themselves but not in longer forms; "damn" is ok but "god-damn" has to be censored, "ass" is ok but "asshole" has to be censored. Guess what they do! They don't bleep or hush the whole word, they make it "***damn" and "ass****"! One word they don't bleep but over-dub comes out as "mother-lover"!

And they blur out raised middle fingers. I kid you not.

13th September
Apparently they even cut out foreign swearing. We're watching Matrix Reloaded and they cut out the best bit. Here it is:

I have sampled every language, French is my favourite - fantastic language, especially to curse with. Nom de Dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperies de connards d'enculés de ta mère. You see, it's like wiping your arse with silk, I love it.