Clay Calvert*
Minch Minchin**
Kéran Billaud***
Kevin Bruckenstein****
Tershone Phillips*****
In March 2015, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC or Commission) proposed fining a Roanoke, Virginia, television station a whopping $325,000 for briefly broadcasting extremely graphic and explicit sexual material, specifically, a video image of a hand stroking an erect penis. The offending content aired for three seconds on WDBJ Channel 7 during a 6:00PM news segment about a former female porn star turned local volunteer rescue squad member.
At first blush, the FCC‘s proposed indecency fine seems like a legal slam dunk. As media attorney Harry Cole wryly writes, “[e]rect penises (and the manipulation thereof) are well outside the range of conventional prime-time acceptability.”
* Professor & Brechner Eminent Scholar in Mass Communication; Director of the Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project at the University of Florida, Gainesville. Ph.D., 1996, Stanford University; J.D., 1991, McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific; B.A., 1987, Stanford University.
** Graduate Research Fellow, Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project. M.A., 2014, University of Florida; B.S., 2011, University of Florida.
*** Graduate Research Fellow, Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project. M.A., 2014, University of Florida; B.A., 2012, Emory & Henry College.
**** Graduate Research Fellow, Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project. B.S., 2014, University of Florida.
***** Graduate Research Fellow, Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project. B.S., 2014, University of Florida.