Some people believe it protects their children, some
people believe it contradicts the Constitution, and
some think it's a waste of money. No matter whatever
what people think of the censorship of lyrics, it is
here, and it is not going away any time soon.
Article The Doors on The Ed Sullivan Show
Ed Sullivan
On September 17th 1967, The Doors played “Light My Fire” and “ People Are Strange” on
The Ed Sullivan show. When rehearsing for that evening live performance, Ed came to them a
producer from the show went into The Doors dressing room. He told the group that it was a must
that they change a line in their song “Light My Fire” the lyric “Girl
we couldn’t get much higher”.
The producer explained that the word “higher” was inappropriate since the show was a family
show on national television because of its relevance with illegal drug use and the song might be
mistaken for a drug reference. Jim Morrison, who was part of The Doors, became incensed and
refused to change the words but the rest of the group conceded and told the producer that they would alter the lyrics.
Nonetheless, after the producer left the room, Morrison announced, “We’re not changing a word”.
Doing the last act, having to wait an hour before performing, they then took the stage to perform two of their greatest hits.
Ed’s introduction for the group was very short and simple, “Now The Doors…here they are with their newest hit record, “People
are Strange”. Morrison sang the song with an untenanted look in his eyes. Promptly they got into their number one hit song, “Light
My Fire” after the first was done. The time came for the line “Girl, we couldn't get much higher”, Morrison, sang it the same way as
the line was originally written. In the movie version, they emphasized Morrison to exaggerate the line.As Morrison finished the
lyrics, the camera caught the guitarist Robby Krieger with a rapid smirk. CBS executives we shocked. Morrison sang the song
with no emphasis, and as he would regularly sing any other time.
After The Doors, performance, Sullivan went straight to a commercial for Purina Dog Chow. When the group went backstage,
a furious producer told the band “Mr. Sullivan waned you for six more shows, but you’ll never work The Ed Sullivan Show again.”
Morrison replied boldly saying “ Hey, man. We just did the Sullivan show.”
Click Here To Download The Song
OP/ED The Doors on the Sullivan Show "Economics Related"
Groups and bands mostly go on talk shows to get known which would hopefully increase their popularity. The Doors appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show on November 17th 1967 looking forward to perform to a wild crowd. Backstage, The Doors we told to change a line in their #1 hit song “Light my Fire”. Jim Morrison was raged with anger after hearing that they were demand to change their lyric.
While performing, Jim Morrision did not change the lyric that he was asked. After the show, the executive producers told The Doors that they were not allowed to come back to the show. The fact that The Doors were going to be on a TV show, also meant money. Ed Sullivan asked them to perform on his show and back then this show was very high in popularity.
In the groups eyes it would be another opening to a bigger career; Show up on the show, perform a couple songs, be watched by millions of people across the country in order to become more popular or well known, become targets of wealthy career opportunities. Just one appearance on the show would then have them swimming in thousands of dollars. Generally, this goes for other groups and bands who have performed on TV shows and were noticed by bigger people.
Ive come to learn that the FCC gets $105 billion a year from the consumers, including a $338 million dollar budget that they use to monitor public broadcasting. This is evidence that people are wasting money. We waste billions a year when it could be used on the debt that the country needs to pay off. I disagree with having the FCC, yet I believe that we should have some sort of cheaper monitoring company so that we don't fully turn the radio stations and TV shows into complete indecent stations for minors and people looking for clean entertainment.
Based off of experiences, when I am in the car listening to a new song that just aired the radio, I jam to it until they bleep certain phrases in the song. That criteria of bleeping the lyrics annoys me because it does not allow me to interpret what the artist is trying to say if his/her lyrics are being silenced to the listener. Yet, censoring lyrics causes people to want to buy the original. I can say this for myself as well as for the person I interviewed. Paige Gbasie says “ Like when I listen to a song on the radio and they bleep out some of the words, I seem to want to go online and download the explicit version of the song for free, that way I can know what the hell the artist is saying”.
Paige also brings up a point other than the censoring of lyrics. She said “...I seem to want to go online and download the explicit version of the song for free so that way i can know what the hell the artist is saying”. After re reading that part of what she said over and over, I'm beginning to believe that censorship in lyrics can lead to people wanting to buy the original. If a song just aired on the radio, most likely, the artist’s CD is not in stores yet; airing it on the radio is just a way to sponsor their CD which should be in stores soon. Therefore, if the CD that is not in stores yet which contains the song that is being aired with its lyrics being bleeped out, then that can make the listener impatience to actually buy the CD with the song, and they can end up illegally downloading the song from online.
In conclusion, yes, bands and groups go on talk shows and have their songs played on the radio in order to be recognized for who they are. How is that possible when the FCC is not allowing them to be themselves. The FCC basically monitors anything that has to do with lyrics. This method of silencing all of the phrases that they do not want the public to hear in reality makes their resolution more of a drawback because of the statistics in the money such as the budget that they use to monitor public broadcasting $338 million, and the money from the consumers $105 billion per year. Along with the intention to buy the original song because of the silence that the radio overwrites in some of the lyrics that makes it hard to understand the song. This motivates the people more to listen to the song when they cant hear anything that is being said. Its just as if someone was listening to a certain song for the first time through headphones but the song was very low so they can only make out some sound. So they turn up the volume. Turing up the volume relates to going to buy the song so that they can hear the song in better quality. With the song not in stores yet, the listener chooses to download the song illegally without any patience. Having the FCC in action, they defeat their own purpose economically and socially.
By:Simone Greene
The FCC and an Article
Woman next to very early radio.
When the radio was first invented I don’t think Mahlon Loomis, the inventor of the first wireless communication device, expected it to be as big as it is now. Now these days everyone is using radio, either to listen to music, advertise products, or speak to another person around the world. However, the radio could be accessed by anyone with the right technology and it is very new meaning everyone is going to want to listen in on the new tunes or stories or news broadcasted to the public. Recently, though, as you may have heard the Communications Act was passed and as a result the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, was established. The FCC prohibits obscene language and indecent imagery, so yes they regulate public television as well as public radio.
The FCC does not allow adult programs to broadcast from 6 am to 10 pm because this is the time period in which children may be watching, and as all parents might feel, children should not be watching programs of adult content.
However, there are many people who don’t entirely agree with the FCC.
Peter Suderman shares his opinion on the FCC, “Just about everything the FCC does is either onerous or ineffective.” He goes on to say that the FCC “cost consumers up to $105 billion a year” along with their “$338 million budget” it would seem as though the FCC is spending a lot more money doing something parents could do with a simple of switching off the radio. “It is time to pull the plug on the FCC.” Says Suderman and he is not the only one who thinks so.
Then there are those who believe that the FCC tampers with the 1st Amendment; the right to free speech. The Constitution states, “Congress shall make no law prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” Meaning that when the FCC decides to censor, or remove something from the public radio or the public newspaper, it actually contradicts the Constitution and what America stands for. This is exactly how Commissioner Michael K. Powell feels about what the FCC does. “The FCC subverts the Constitution!” says Powell, “Broadcast channels are continually increasing. We must admit to these realities and quit subverting the Constitution…” Powell, like others, see that maintaining everything the public has access to, aside from being a violation to the 1st amendment, is just impossible as the times change.
Maybe this nation doesn’t need the FCC; maybe we could raise the awareness to parents that they should keep an eye on what their children are listening to. We could simply warn the audiences what they are about to watch or listen to of indecent imagery or vulgar language. You know, ask parents to become parents.
The FCC and an OP/ED
When it comes to the radio, there is no better way to get straightforward imformation without all the flashy imagery distracting you like a television commercial would, or an annoying pop up ad on a website. When you listen to the radio you are engaging nearly only once sense, your sense of hearing. Meaning there is only so much you can do to get the attention of the audience but when you do the radio cannot waste the precious time it has of getting the imformation out to you, which is why some ads are so blunt about what they want from you. So when the election season turns the corner you hear numerous ads of two competing political figures bashing each other with ads that make one another seem like they don’t know how to hug a child. Television is effected with commercials, and the Internet sometimes gets involved depending on the popularity of the website.
However when you hear these ads when each campaign person starts stating why the other person is not eligible for the job, they talk about all the flaws and imperfections the person has. I’m not saying this is a bad thing, it’s called competition, but it didn’t always used to be this way.
In 1949 the FCC, the people in charge of monitoring the public broadcasts, made the Fairness Doctrine, which says that if you talk about a controversial topic you must talk about both sides of the topic. This is almost saying that you cannot argue about something you don’t agree with, and if you do the FCC will removed the broadcast from being aired. Which is a suppression of free speech with goes against the Constitution. So in 1987 the FCC wanted the Fairness Doctrine to become a law, but President Reagan vetoed the bill and the FCC just abolished the doctrine.
So now people can be as one sided as they want to, as you see in the election ads, and not get legally in trouble, the way things should be. People are now able to speak their minds without worrying that the government is going to come crashing down on their head. However it seems that with all the censoring of words, information and such it’s like the one thing that most people fear is happening: the government is trying to control our thoughts and expression for personal gain.
It’s like the Equal-time rule created by the FCC in 1927, which says that if you broadcast and give airtime to a candidate you must give equal time to the opposing candidate. With exceptions to interviews and news reports the FCC does not want the people to be so easily persuaded during election time by one sided broadcast and bias opinions.
I take this as an insult from the government that they assume us as a whole will be so easily pushed in one direction. I have learned in my American History class you must look at different sides and perspective of a story to actually learn something, and what the government is saying is that we as the people tend to just hear one side and be done with it, as if we will not put in time to learn about what we hear about. The government is trying to control what we hear because they believe it is what we automatically assume true, so they try to make sure we hear what they want us to hear to further their control and power and image.
By: Alexander Ringgold
The Beatles: Band or BANNED?
Beatles’ fans all over the world were in shock to hear John Lennon’s outrageous comparison of the Beatles’ popularity to Jesus’. The country is in violent protest; Beatles’ records are being burned and from the looks of it, many of the band’s concerts will be canceled. There is even word of the once beloved band being threatened by protesters.
The well-known teen magazine, Datebook published one of Lennon’s remarks during an interview that occurred about five months ago, stating, “We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock 'n' roll or Christianity,” in reference to the Beatles’, causing havoc all over the country and around the world. The public wants to teach them a lesson. Radio station WAQY’s DJ Tommy Charles said, "We just felt it was so absurd and sacrilegious that something ought to be done to show them that they can't get away with this sort of thing." This has not only become a boycott against the Beatles, but also a tremendous danger to the boys. Threatening phone calls are being made and there’s even been a couple rumors about the band’s concerts being picketed by the Ku Klux Klan! After several apologies to the public from John Lennon and the rest of his group members, there was still plenty of animosity towards the band. One of the "cancelled" concert in Memphis was held anyway, but a firecracker thrown during the performance led the band to believe they were the target of gunfire. After completing the tour, the Beatles never performed a commercial concert again.
As a people, we’ve been known to block out anything we don’t find convenient, or anything we just don’t like. Banning, or as other people would call it, “censoring,” the Beatles for John Lennon’s comments isn’t surprising. Since the comment was seen as being anti-Christ or against Christianity, most people took it to offense and decided to completely block out the Beatles as a whole. "I had to stop listening to them for a while," said Jared Hutchins, who lives in Cumming, Georgia. He said the group's world view "had a negative effect on me," and made him irritable and angry.
Despite everyone else’s decision to turn their back on the Beatles, Walter Shenson, an American producer, claimed that the banning of the Beatles will have no effect on his decision to start the musicians in any of his productions. "I know all of the boys well," said Shenson. "I also know them as not irreverent and not irreligious. But I also know them to be honest unto themselves." Walter Shenson is one of the few people who remained a faithful fan of the Beatle’s and decided to not change his opinion about them. A couple other people also remained supportive to the band. In the US too there was criticism of the reaction; a Kentucky radio station said that it would give Beatles music airplay to show its "contempt for hypocrisy personified,” while another magazine called America wrote that, "Lennon was simply stating what many a Christian educator would readily admit."
OP/ED of Censoring Lyrics
Music and radio censorship are usually two things that just don’t belong together. There have been a countless amount of great songs that have ended up being ranked high on the Billboard charts, winning awards at award ceremonies such as the Grammy’s and even being played over and over for weeks on high ranked radio stations. Most of these songs, however, have lyrics and content that is never publicized. What makes a song so great is the artist. So why do artists such as Lil Wayne, Drake, Eminem, Jay Z, etc., always get censored? I don’t know about everyone else, but if I created a painting that was hung at the world’s most famous art museum, I don’t think I would want there to be tape that reads “CENSORED” all over my painting that I dedicated so much hard work and time on.
The same concept applies to music. Musical artists take time, effort, energy and dedication into making hit songs and great albums. If their music is being heard and loved all over the world, shouldn’t every little piece of their artwork be shown? Censoring a hit song and taking out lyrics or modifying them defeats the artists’ purpose for the song, don’t you think?
Some fans are a little upset at CBS’s use of the bleep button during Drake, Lil Wayne and Eminem’s performance of hit songs “Drop the World” and “Forever” on this year’s 52nd annual Grammy Awards. Although the artists made the effort to make their own edits to make the performance appropriate for audience, CBS still censored out a great chunk of their performance. This completely took out the performance’s effect, and upset many viewers at home who were stuck listening to huge pauses of silence in between lyrics. Some even just thought it might have been a technical difficulty on CBS’s part. The performance would have been great without the censorship because of the artists’ effort to making sure the songs were clean enough for any audience to listen to.
Why do we censor music we love so much, instead of just accepting it the way an artist presents it?
By Yadimar Marquez
The same concept applies to music. Musical artists take time, effort, energy and dedication into making hit songs and great albums. If their music is being heard and loved all over the world, shouldn’t every little piece of their artwork be shown? Censoring a hit song and taking out lyrics or modifying them defeats the artists’ purpose for the song, don’t you think?
Some fans are a little upset at CBS’s use of the bleep button during Drake, Lil Wayne and Eminem’s performance of hit songs “Drop the World” and “Forever” on this year’s 52nd annual Grammy Awards. Although the artists made the effort to make their own edits to make the performance appropriate for audience, CBS still censored out a great chunk of their performance. This completely took out the performance’s effect, and upset many viewers at home who were stuck listening to huge pauses of silence in between lyrics. Some even just thought it might have been a technical difficulty on CBS’s part. The performance would have been great without the censorship because of the artists’ effort to making sure the songs were clean enough for any audience to listen to.
Why do we censor music we love so much, instead of just accepting it the way an artist presents it?
By Yadimar Marquez
Annotative Bibliography
Primary Sources:
http://earlyradiohistory.us/1902col.htm
In this source I thought it was important to use as research because it helped me understand what an early radio inventor was thinking when he made one of the first telephones that would lead to help make one of the first radios. Collins wrote this article himself as to how radio waves work, how telephones work, and some terms I was unfamiliar with, and would not be able to explain unless I conducted more scientific research, that went into extreme detail on how radios and telephones work. I thought it would be appropriate to at least glance at what makes a radio tick and what other source to check than a man who worked closely to Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the first telephone?
By: Yadimar Marquez
http://earlyradiohistory.us/1922incr.htm
In this source I wasn’t particularly looking for it, but I decided to look into it since it was a article from a radio station back when radio stations were becoming very popular. The article states that 98 stations total in America were broadcasting music, concerts, lectures, weather reports, and the market. I wanted to compare this to the number of radio stations in 2004 compared to the 1920’s. There are currently
13,467 radio stations total in the United States, and that’s only in America. It makes me wonder how many are going to exist in 2020 because it’s apparent that no matter how technology evolves we always incorporate the radio.
By: Alexander Ringgold
Secondary Sources:
http://www.examiner.com/the-doors-in-national/the-doors-appear-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
The band ‘The Doors” were asked by Ed Sullivan to come on his show. The show is very well known because the staff asked the band to change the words of “Light My Fire” with the word ‘higher’ that can be mistaken as a drug reference. The Doors ended up not changing their lyrics of the song, and when they made a movie for The Doors, they emphasized Jim saying the part of “Light My Fire”. I choose this site because it gave a lot of information, not just because of what happened in the incident, but they gave information about the movie as well.
By: Simone Greene
http://www.edsullivan.com/jim-morrison-the-doors-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
Before performing, The Doors were asked to change their lyrics of ‘Light My fire’. Jim became angry and he dais that he was not changing anything. They preformed their first song People are strange” and after they finished that song, they went on to their number one hit “Light my Fire”. Surprisingly, Jim Morrison did not alternate the lyrics and at the Ed of the performance they were asked not to return back to the Ed Sullivan show. I choose this site because I received very detailed events of what happened as well feelings.
By: Simone Greene
http://earlyradiohistory.us/1902col.htm
In this source I thought it was important to use as research because it helped me understand what an early radio inventor was thinking when he made one of the first telephones that would lead to help make one of the first radios. Collins wrote this article himself as to how radio waves work, how telephones work, and some terms I was unfamiliar with, and would not be able to explain unless I conducted more scientific research, that went into extreme detail on how radios and telephones work. I thought it would be appropriate to at least glance at what makes a radio tick and what other source to check than a man who worked closely to Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the first telephone?
By: Yadimar Marquez
http://earlyradiohistory.us/1922incr.htm
In this source I wasn’t particularly looking for it, but I decided to look into it since it was a article from a radio station back when radio stations were becoming very popular. The article states that 98 stations total in America were broadcasting music, concerts, lectures, weather reports, and the market. I wanted to compare this to the number of radio stations in 2004 compared to the 1920’s. There are currently
13,467 radio stations total in the United States, and that’s only in America. It makes me wonder how many are going to exist in 2020 because it’s apparent that no matter how technology evolves we always incorporate the radio.
By: Alexander Ringgold
Secondary Sources:
http://www.examiner.com/the-doors-in-national/the-doors-appear-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
The band ‘The Doors” were asked by Ed Sullivan to come on his show. The show is very well known because the staff asked the band to change the words of “Light My Fire” with the word ‘higher’ that can be mistaken as a drug reference. The Doors ended up not changing their lyrics of the song, and when they made a movie for The Doors, they emphasized Jim saying the part of “Light My Fire”. I choose this site because it gave a lot of information, not just because of what happened in the incident, but they gave information about the movie as well.
By: Simone Greene
http://www.edsullivan.com/jim-morrison-the-doors-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
Before performing, The Doors were asked to change their lyrics of ‘Light My fire’. Jim became angry and he dais that he was not changing anything. They preformed their first song People are strange” and after they finished that song, they went on to their number one hit “Light my Fire”. Surprisingly, Jim Morrison did not alternate the lyrics and at the Ed of the performance they were asked not to return back to the Ed Sullivan show. I choose this site because I received very detailed events of what happened as well feelings.
By: Simone Greene
Works Cited
http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/fairness.html
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode47/usc_sec_47_00000315----000-.html
http://reason.com/archives/2010/04/05/the-fcc-doesnt-need-to-be
http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/freespeech.html
http://tech.mit.edu/V113/N43/neimark.43o.txt.html
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/constitution/html/amdt1.html
http://www.criminalgovernment.com/docs/powell.html
http://reason.com/archives/2010/04/05/the-fcc-doesnt-need-to-be
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2euBN3gbKc8
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aqh&AN=21396532&site=ehost-live
http://www.examiner.com/the-doors-in-national/the-doors-appear-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
http://www.edsullivan.com/jim-morrison-the-doors-on-the-ed-sullivan-show
http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/freespeech.html
http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/bclr/vol49/iss4/4
http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1631016/20100201/drake.jhtml
http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1631016/20100201/drake.jhtml
http://articles.cnn.com/2007-08-22/us/gw.teen.christians_1_fire-rally-stadium-rallies-popular-culture?_s=PM:US
http://www.sahistory.org.za/pages/chronology/thisday/1966-08-08.htm
http://dailyperspective.newspaperarchive.com/discovery/1008474231facebook/2009/11/23/1966-beatles-banned
http://www.rocklistmusic.co.uk/banned.html
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/r/20859806/detail.html
