EastEnders: A lesson in public broadcasting

5468

eastenders-a-lesson-in-public-broadcasting

The recent controversy created by the BBC’s popular soap opera EastEnders highlights yet another problem with state run television. The BBC took hundreds of telephone calls and emails over a controversial scene in which a Muslim character, struggling to reconcile his faith and sexuality, slams a Koran on the floor. The scene was thought by some to be offensive to the Islamic faith. The incident does not mark the first time the soap has been the subject of public criticism. Over the course of its twenty-five year history, it has been variously accused on multiple occasions of racial stereotyping and insensitivity, promoting homosexuality, defaming the police, and anti-religious bias.

The seriousness with which these complaints must be addressed is peculiar to a system of heavily regulated or publicly operated media. As the government forces anyone with a television to fork over £142.40 for the BBC, the public broadcaster must attempt to avoid any and all offensive broadcasts. In a society as diverse in opinion as the United Kingdom, this is a nearly impossible task, and the government undoubtedly collects money from some individuals to pay for programming they find to be distasteful. Even if they do not watch EastEnders, Islamic viewers that found the Koran scene to be offensive must still pay for the content to be broadcast to their fellow citizens.

In a market system without a publicly funded BBC, however, viewers would have choice, and could vote with their money and attention, allowing broadcasters to compete for advertising and subscription revenue by creating content that viewers enjoy. If EastEnders were a privately created program aired by a private broadcaster, anyone who found the show to be offensive could simply change the channel to something more amenable to their tastes. This would be a more efficient and just system than the regulatory process overseen by Ofcom, and perhaps the NHS would could reduce its budget for hypertension treatment for Britons who would have no longer have reason to fume about the expenditure of their hard-earned license fee on content they find to be disagreeable.

While many Britons undoubtedly enjoy EastEnders and other BBC programs, the repeated grievances are an indication that the current system could be operated in a fairer and more appropriate manner that would allow viewers to choose where their money is spent.

Facebook generation

5344

facebook-generation

The next generation of politicians will be the Facebook generation. With the proliferation of social networking, the huge numbers of embarrassing photos and a culture that encourages ‘status updates’ whether through websites or twitter-like social media, attitudes to life, privacy and transparency are likely to become more liberal.

It used to be that all politicians had an unknown past. Once they approached power, the embarrassing photos would emerge, school friends and university acquaintances would be interviewed and we would all judge. Remember the party leader interviews, or even the channel 4 docu-drama on Cameron and Boris Johnson?

In future, however, there will be too much to trawl through. The norm is that everyone bares their life to their friends, acquaintances, and occasionally everyone. Whilst the privacy is controllable and photos may be untagged, the fact remains that they’re still there and are likely to emerge at some stage into the public gaze.

This is a positive thing – it means that in future politicians may be more liberal when it comes to life-styles, marking a transition from the current hypocrisy of secretly imperfect legislators trying to perfect those around them, to a transparent, unembarrassed and open class of imperfect politicians allowing everyone else to continue their lives.

The current trend is often said to be towards increasingly bland and identical politicians, too scared to step out of line or flaunt their eccentricities within an environment of twenty-four hour news that journalists struggle to fill. However, this will not be the case for future politicians, for whom the norm will have been complete openness, almost bordering on a celebration of embarrassment from the outset. The public and future journalists will be more forgiving as most will have been exposed for equally embarrassing things.

As well as shattering the current hypocrisy of the ruling classes, the policy implications of this may be in favour of the decriminalisation of illegal drugs, more liberal attitudes to freedom of speech, to smoking, unhealthy habits, and transparency. If we continue like this, we can expect interesting people doing liberal things. I can’t wait.

Is Britain broken?

5149

is-britain-broken

Broken Britain has beem a common cry from the Conservatives party. Before 1997, Labour claimed much the same thing. Perhaps the rhetoric of decline hits the right notes if politicians want to come to power, yet I can’t help but agree with their diagnosis. Broadly speaking, there is something wrong with British society.

I doubt the sense of Britain being broken is particularly new. I have a feeling that things have been bad at least since the end of WWII. But even here, the argument of decline is a tough sell. After all, George Orwell’s journalism points only too starkly to the rotten life for many in the 19th century. Yet even in the squalor there is a sense of society and community. There should be no correlation between the rise in living standards and the withering of the ties that bind communities that seems to have taken place since.

I would hesitantly pinpoint the problem on the increase and centralization of government powers gained as a result of WWI and WWII, and Britain’s decline as a world power that these allocations of resources required. This is not a comment on the validity of these wars, but it is beyond doubt that the state ballooned and Britain declined as a direct result of them.

It is vital that the new government frees the people. I would go as far as to suggest that infantilism has become the new ‘British Disease’. Due to the limited knowledge amongst so many of the political class, I have very modest hopes for Britain being ‘fixed’ any time soon. Perhaps politicians can’t yet win elections by offering freedom in this country, but if they really want to fix Britain, I think they are going to have to roll back the state, trust people to take up the slack and not interfere with the discovery process that the remaking of society requires.

Douglas, drugs and the law

5072

douglas-drugs-and-the-law

More ridiculousness in America’s war on drugs yesterday, as the son of multimillionaire actor Michael Douglas was sentenced for five years for dealing methamphetamine from a trendy New York hotel.

The statutory minimum for this offence is ten years.

Whilst it is unusual to see a rich, white young man going to jail for drugs offences at all, this case does little to defend against the statistical fact that drug laws, particularly in America, are, for whatever reason, overwhelmingly enforced against poor young men from ethnic minorities with little or no education.

The fact that Cameron Douglas received a relatively lenient sentence highlights this problem in waging the drug war. Although the minimum sentence is technically much higher, it does seem somewhat perverse to throw a non-violent offender in jail at taxpayer expense for such a considerable length of time. This is especially true when it is clear that Douglas, like all drug addicts, needs treatment rather than punishment if he needs anything at all.

However, at the same time, the offence for which he was actually charged is the same that is used to go after violent, gang-affiliated thugs who sell exactly the same chemicals.

Because the same offence is used to criminalise such different people, it is only through mitigation pleadings in sentencing that differences between the dangerous, violent criminal, and the non-violent one can be distinguished. This is a relatively arbitrary process that gives an unfair prominence to wealth, race, social class, education and family background (or even more unjustly, a defendant’s political connections and the quality of his lawyers) to decide how long a person stays in jail.

The clear point of all this is that it is not the drugs themselves that should be the cause for coercive intervention by the state. Rather the harm done directly to other individuals is what should determine criminal liability and sanction. Before the government wastes time and taxpayers’ money prosecuting people, it should make sure that it is only doing so for violent offences. It should refuse to prosecute non-violent people who choose to make a living selling other people the means to get high.

Movies futures trading

5041

movies-futures-trading

Two American companies,Veriana and Cantor, have announced plans to offer futures trading on the potential gross takings of Hollywood movies. However, they have faced strong opposition from the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and several lawmakers from both side of the aisle. None of who seem to understand exactly how futures trading works, or the benefits it can bring to the industry.

Speculators, as Madsen Pirie wrote in Freedom 101, exist to help manage risk. "They offer people certainty and security now, in exchange for a higher return for themselves in the future", providing they make the right decisions. That is their function in the marketplace, and it is this very beneficial effect that Veriana and Cantor are showcasing.

However, cashing in on the theme of the moment, the MPAA, which represents the major film studios such as Universal and Paramount, and other groups, said that the new markets would "create a risk of rampant speculation and financial irresponsibility". There is something very disingenuous about the MPAA’s claims. Either the speculators are just online gamblers, like people who play roulette in online casinos. Or, they are analogous to the omnipotent bankers who apparently nearly destroyed the world. They can’t be both at the same time, and yet I am pretty sure they are neither.

The futures markets are very clearly not casinos, because it is with careful research and good timing that one can make money – not random luck. No matter how much careful research you conduct to find trends in roulette numbers, you cannot consistently predict where the ball will land. Moreover, the kind of ‘gambling’ that the MPAA say they are against is already allowed, on the Internet or in gambling shops. If we are free to go to a bookies to bet on who will be ‘Christmas Number 1’, then betting on box office receipts is no different. Crucially, these new futures exchanges will offer a regulated and transparent system in stark contrast to that found on the high street.

Nor, however, are the futures markets anything to do with the causes of the credit crunch. In much the same way that the government foolishly tried to clamp down on short-selling and hedge funds in the wake of the financial crisis, so the MPAA is seeking to capitalise on general resentment of all financial markets to push through their agenda, without focusing on specifics. The Futures Industry of America made this point quite forcefully in arguing on Veriana and Cantor’s behalf, by saying that ‘one of the lessons of the financial crisis is that the futures markets performed flawlessly’.

In all, the MPAA is acting in a manner that is not only misinformed, but also self-defeating. These companies are attempting to provide a useful service, but are being stalled by the very industry that could benefit from the risk-management they would provide.

Panic button

5037

panic-button

The protection of children is always a sensitive issue and a large responsibility, but the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre’s (CEOP) reaction to Facebook’s new safety measures shows to what extent self-righteous bureaucrats feel justified in spreading their remit. On top of a plethora of privacy settings, Facebook have decided to tackle internet predators with a £5m internet safety campaign, a 24 hour police hotline and the option to send information to CEOP when abuse is reported online. Nonetheless, the website has been attacked for refusing to install a ‘panic button’ on every user’s profile, which would give information to the quango directly. Facebook insists their research finds a single panic button would confuse and intimidate people, and be less effective in reporting abuse.

As a private company Facebook should not be coerced into fulfilling the egotistical aspirations of a quango, no matter how well intentioned; how they manage the threat of internet predators should be entirely up to them. The drive to remain popular and public concerns will no doubt mean that Facebook remains up to date when dealing with the ‘darker’ side of social networking such as grooming, bullying and exploitation. How they respond to this pressure should be their own choice. Also, many of my friends have had their birthdays changed, or obscene status updates posted as a result of prank. It seems obvious to me that a ‘this person is a pedophile’ button would be taken advantage of to cause mayhem, likely wasting police time.

Nevertheless, the CEOP have been supplementing their attack on Facebook with the ‘shocking’ fact that the website has never reported an alleged pedophile to the Police directly. This is because Facebook is compelled by US law to report cases to the American authorities, who then pass them on to the CEOP. This doesn’t stop the mighty child protectors targeting worried parents and schools. The issue at stake is not so much about Facebook’s safety controls, but the freedom of private organizations to develop, without being subject to the whims of government bodies.

Moore embarrassed by cronyism

5028

moore-embarrassed-by-cronyism

Predatory filmmaker Michael Moore has finally fallen into his own trap.

Moore, the incarnation of self-righteous envy politics, who in his film “Capitalism - A Love Story” demanded taxpayers’ money back form Wall Street (“capitalism is legalized greed”), has been trapped in flagrante - scavenging from tax funds himself.

Moore applied for taxpayer subsidies of up to $1,000,000 from the Michigan Film Office, whose very existence he had criticized only a few years ago. That criticism not only qualified him to be advanced to the Michigan Film Advisory Board in 2009, but also to push his snout deep in the trough of government subsidies – paid for, of course, by taxpayers.

Revealingly, Moore was recorded on video at the 2008 Traverse City Film Festival heckling competitors who were asking for a share of the Michigan Film Office’s funds:

“Why do they need our money, from Michigan, from our taxpayers, when we’re already broke here? I mean, they play one state against another, and so they get all this free cash when they’re making billions already in profits. What’s the thinking behind that?”

The Republican state senator Nancy Cassis is now asking Moore to withdraw his application from the Michigan Film Office, which would have reimbursed up to 42 percent of the costs associated with filming in the state. The film has generated over $15,000,000 in gross sales worldwide on an estimated production cost of around $2,000,000. A decision of the Film Office on Moore’s application is still pending, but shouts of ‘hypocrite’ are getting louder.
 

Building an entertainment powerhouse

5004

building-an-entertainment-powerhouse

A new blog is launched: 'Building an Entertainment Powerhouse'. Its first posting is HBO: Can We Have One?

The ultimate victory for tolerance

5003

the-ultimate-victory-for-tolerance

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling’s remarks regarding the right of Bed & Breakfast owners to reject gay couples may have been homophobic, or they may have been an ill-judged attempt to cater to a bigoted religious group. [Ed - I really don't think it was either. Grayling was just making a common-sense statement regarding the rights of people running businesses in the their own homes. More broadly, this whole thing can easily be looked at as a private property issue.]  However, they should have been an expression of faith in a society that would never accept such bigotry.

Without equality or anti-discrimination laws, liberals would like to think that people would boycott any institution that tried to discriminate on race, gender or sexuality. In the case of a Bed & Breakfast that banned gay couples, they would very quickly go out of business through lack of custom and popular public pressure. In the case of the BNP, activists to combat their racism abound. Even the furore over Grayling’s remarks attest to this effect. Liberals trust the people to enforce equality and tolerance.

Statists on the other hand assume that the government should take on this responsibility, creating and enforcing laws that compel all institutions to not discriminate. This is either because they think government is merely enforcing the view of the people, or because they do not trust the people to do it. I suspect it is the latter.

Some decades ago, when bigotry was more widespread, liberals would have argued that discriminating institutions would lose out to institutions that based their decisions on merit alone, proving the equality of homosexuals, women and other ethnicities, and the superiority of tolerance. Statists would have placed their trust in government rather than the free market to shatter the view that bigotry could be at all acceptable. However, in terms of banning discrimination within government itself to set an example, both liberals and statists would have been agreed.

Since then, the precedent for tolerance has been established, and the attitude of the majority has changed. If we live in a broadly tolerant society that cannot abide bigotry, which I believe we now do, equality laws should be redundant. After all, there is no need for a law that prevents something that could no longer exist. We should trust in the people to enforce equality – it would be the true test of a society, and the ultimate victory for equality and tolerance.

The Mountaintop: Success without state funding

4963

the-mountaintop-success-without-state-funding

This year’s Best New Play winner at the Olivier Awards, The Mountaintop, is a remarkable work. Not only has it won near-universal praise for its depiction of Martin Luther King’s final night alive and secured a production run on Broadway, but it has succeeded without any government arts subsidy. What this shows is that state funding is not necessary for the production of great art.

The play was first staged in a 65-seat theatre above a pub in Battersea and, thanks to popular acclaim and commercial success, made its way to the West End. Not a penny from the Arts Council was needed: this was a work of popular art that appealed to critics and theatregoers alike.

That a play like The Mountaintop was able to succeed without state funding vindicates the ASI’s recent report calling for government arts funding to be radically overhauled. Government funding for the arts distorts the market against unfunded but potentially very good plays by allowing bad, government-supported plays to undercut and out-advertise them. The result is that bland, state-approved plays can often outcompete better plays that could not win the Westminster stamp of approval.

Some have claimed that the free market inhibits innovation in the arts, which The Mountaintop’s awards and commercial success disprove. When government bureaucrats, not the theatregoing public, can influence which plays succeed, the art world risks being condemned to mediocrity. Thank god for The Mountaintop, whose critical and commercial success proves that great art can triumph simply by being great.