Ottawa, February 23, 1999 – The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) today released its decision concerning a movie entitled Eclipse broadcast by CITY-TV (Toronto). A viewer complained of the “several sexual scenes and conversations between men and women.”
The Ontario Regional Council considered the complaint under the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Sex-Role Portrayal Code and Violence Code. While it concluded that the movie “was controversial, both in its subject-matter and in its presentation”, it stated that “by accepting this as a fair characterization of the movie, the Council does not, however, conclude that the film should not have been aired.” The Council did not find the movie exploitative or in violation of any other broadcaster Code provision. Accordingly, it concluded that “the broadcast comes well within the purview of the broadcaster’s freedom of expression”.
The Council noted that “Canada’s private broadcasters wished to balance freedom of expression and the expectation that not all persons will wish to watch all programming.”
They did this by establishing a watershed hour of 9 p.m. for programs containing violent content intended for adult viewing, a principle which broadcasters have been entirely willing to extend with greater and greater frequency to all genres of programming containing other types of material thought not palatable to all. They did this by providing a system of viewer advisories, again originally intended for programming with violent content but extended more and more frequently by broadcasters to other forms of content not suitable to all. They did this by establishing a classification system and on-screen icons. The presence of all of the foregoing categories of information are designed to enable viewers to make the choices suitable for their homes and families even in circumstances where there is no breach of a Code.
The Council considered that “CITY-TV took every reasonable step to diminish the likelihood that anyone who might be offended by the film would be likely to be exposed to it.” It noted specifically the airing of the film after the generally-accepted “watershed hour” for adult programming, the inclusion of viewer advisories at the beginning of the movie and after every commercial break and the rating of the movie as “18+” with the icon displaying this rating being shown at the beginning of the film and then at the top of each hour throughout the movie. In the Council’s view, “the broadcaster could not have done more to ensure that vigilant viewers would be appropriately advised of the film’s content.”
Canada’s private broadcasters have created industry standards in the form of Codes on ethics, gender portrayal and television violence by which they expect their members will abide. They also created the CBSC, which is the self-regulatory body with the responsibility of administering those Codes, as well as the Code dealing with journalistic practices created by the Radio Television News Directors Association Canada (RTNDA). More than 430 radio and television stations and specialty services from across Canada are members of the Council.
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All CBSC decisions, Codes, links to members’ and other web sites, and related information are available on the World Wide Web at www.cbsc.ca. For more information, please contact the National Chair of the CBSC, Ron Cohen, at (###) ###-####.