Fun from television viewers

One of my favourite things is to read the decisions of the Broadcast Standards Authority. It’s often fun to see how worked up people can get over nothing, and the extent they’ll go to in order to demand that their “nothing” be treated as if it was really something. Actually, many of these complaints take themselves far too seriously.

Two recent decisions illustrate both points.

A Lower Hutt woman complained about a June TV3 News item on the MTV music awards. The report “showed actor Sacha Baron Cohen as his character Bruno dressed as an angel and only wearing a harness… lowered in front of musician Eminem… Bruno was suspended upside down so that his buttocks were in the musician’s face.”

The complainant alleged it was in breach of good taste and decency and children’s interests, but the Authority declined to uphold the complaint (Decision No: 2009-080). “The Authority has stated on a number of occasions that unaccompanied young children are unlikely to watch news programmes” (Ouch!). The Authority’s decision continues, “there is nothing inherently harmful to children in seeing a fleeting image of a man’s buttocks, and that the brief news item would have been more likely to puzzle than disturb young children.” The Authority also found that “the item did not contain any material that would have disturbed or alarmed child viewers.”

All very sensible and reasonable—to reasonable people. But what about when the complaint presents itself as an appeal to reason?

Last May, TVNZ’s Sunday programme carried an item about economist Gareth Morgan spending $500,000 of his own money to find out what the truth is about climate change. His conclusion was that climate change is real.

It’s probably obvious what happened next: Three climate-change deniers complained alleging the item violated standards of balance and accuracy. The three submitted what is the longest and most detailed complaint I’ve yet read, and the Authority’s decision (Decision No: 2009-063) was long, too.

Because they’re all so long, I won’t summarise them (follow the link to read them in their entirety). However, I’ll note that many of the complainants’ points are typically found in climate-change denier propaganda. Their sources weren’t listed in the decision, which is a shame: It would have either proven or refuted my suspicion that the complainants’ sources were of dubious quality or reputation. Certainly one book mentioned, written by an extremist christianist, has no credibility.

The Authority declined to uphold any complaints alleging a breach of requirements for balance. It also declined to uphold most the complaints about accuracy, except for one: The programme suggested that an atoll near Indonesia was “the ugly face of global warming” when, in fact, tectonic activity is a significant part of the reason the islands are sinking—a pretty specific and limited point.

What I find interesting about these determinations is that the Authority rules specifically and narrowly and isn’t swayed by emotive appeals. Sure it gets it wrong sometimes, but the vast majority of times it strikes the perfect balance. It also provides me with entertainment in the bargain.