Censorship

"Censorship is the act of suppressing publications, movies, television programs, plays, letters, and so on that are considered to be obscene, blasphemous, or politically unacceptable" (MccGwire 4). Censorship should be enforced because it is needed into today's society. Censorship needs to be used in media, hate speech, and obscene material.

To begin with, the media has very negative effect on society as a whole. "The mass media--movies, television, and recordings--need to be regulated, and not only because of appeals to irresponsible lust"(Lowenthal 19). "They have immersed us in violence as well, habituated us to the most extreme brutality, held it up as a model and surrounded us by images of hateful human types so memorable as to cause a psychological insecurity that is dangerous"(Lowenthal 19). "The only answer is governmental regulation, if necessary prior to publication--that is, censorship." (Lowenthal 19). The media has influenced young children into thinking that violence is acceptable. Children learn acceptable codes of conduct by imitating their mentors and others, such as celebrities that they look up to. Society needs to set a good example for children so that they can build bright futures for themselves.

The media is partly to blame for many of the hate crimes that take place in today's world. "Perhaps you have seen 'studies' by some experts telling you that depictions of violence do not lead to violent behavior. Pay them no heed. Even if true, which I doubt, there can be no question that brutality brutalizes. It corrupts taste and poisons the imagination" (Kimball 20). Violent video games, movies, and music lyrics influence people to retaliate against those people that hurt them. In the past few years there have been a great number of school shootings. Many of these shootings were copied off of famous movie scenes and video games. These obscene aspects of the media need to be banned from children. Children are still learning the difference between rights and wrong, therefore adults need to take on this responsibility of censoring what children watch, read, play with, and listen to.

Hate speech should also be banned. "Free speech has a class line. It also has a class responsibility. One person's beliefs cannot cross the line into threats of violence. Free speech does not cover that" (Albano 31). "Those institutions most concerned with social fairness have proven to be the ones most likely to promulgate anti-hate-speech rules" (Albano 30). "Part of the reason seems to be recognition that hate speech can easily silence and demoralize its victims, discouraging them from participating in the life of the institution"(Albano 30). "If so, enacting hate-speech rules may be evidence of a commitment to democratic dialogue, rather than the opposite, as some their opponents maintain" (Albano 30). People should not have to put up with harassment by others. People should not have to constantly live in the state of fear because others are threatening them; this is an invasion of their rights.

"Obscenity has never been protected by the First Amendment, though today we have sunk so low that some people, no doubt thinking of themselves as progressive revolutionaries, have begun to argue that pornography itself--the most primitive form of obscenity--should have the shroud of unconstitutionality lifted from it" (Lowenthal 151). Pornography needs to be censored, especially on the Internet.

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