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Example research essay topic: England And Wales Local Authorities - 1,588 words

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Film Censorship Movies are one of the biggest conveyors of morals and ideas to people in todays world. The movie Money Train portrayed a criminally insane man that would like subway ticket booths on fire with gasoline. A few weeks after the movie was in theaters, someone started setting ticket booths on fire. When the perpetrator was caught, he blamed his actions on the movie. He said that the movie influenced him into doing what he did. In an online forum it was determined that, Censorship provides people with a means of control.

Without censorship people would be able to separate the good from the bad? Even though the film industry, has for many years practiced a form of self-censorship it is not actively enforced. Pornography is not the only thing that censorship deals with. Cartoons, specifically South Park, are a good example of violence in the media. One of the prime examples of this is the character Kenny. Kenny, one of the four kids in the show is killed in each and every episode.

The part that of it that is a bad influence on children is that it is taken lightly by his friends and forgotten about very quickly. Another example is that is it a good example for the children of the Great Britain to see their peers cursing at each other? Well in every episode of South Park, they curse, swear and are overall completely obscene. Violence stands right up their along side with it. Television being almost the unanimous culprit. Its far reaching influence spreads across the globe.

Violent childrens shows like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and adult shows like NYPD Blue tell us that shows with violence is in every category of preference. Studies show by the American Psychological Association that eight thousand to ten thousand acts of violence are seen by children on TV by the time they hit sixth grade. Its time to try keeping your kids off the tube rather than complain about the medias giving what the people want slogan. One critical source of the contemporary repudiation of censorship in the West depends on something that may be distinctive to modernity, an emphasis upon the dignity of the individual. This respect for individuality has its roots both in Christian doctrines and in the (not unrelated) sovereignty of the self reflected in state-of-nature theories about the foundations of social organization.

Vital to this approach is the general opinion about the nature and sanctity of the human soul. This general opinion provides the foundation of a predominantly new, or modern, argument against censorship against anything, in fact, that interferes with self-development, and especially such self-development (or, better still, self-fulfillment) as a person happens to want and to choose for himself. This can be put in terms of liberty the liberty to become and to do what one pleases. The old, or traditional, argument against censorship was much less individualistic and much more political in its orientation, making more of another sense of liberty. According to that sense, if people are to be self-governing, it must have access to all information and arguments that may be relevant to its ability to discuss public affairs fully and to assess in a competent manner the conduct of the officials it chooses.

Thus, freedom of speech, which is constitutionally guaranteed to the people of the Great Britain, first comes to view in Anglo-American legal history as a guarantee for the members of the British Parliament assembled to discuss the affairs of the kingdom. Although the ratings applied by the BBFC had been almost universally accepted for 50 years, there was (and still is) no statutory censorship or classification of films in the UK. Soon after the new classifications were introduced, the Greater London Council (GLC) began to issue its own certificates to allow some films to be seen in the capital that the BBFC had deemed should not be shown anywhere in the country and on the whole they were still not shown outside London. At the end of 1973, for instance, the GLC Films Committee decided to give an 18 certificate to Jens Jorgen Thorsens film Quiet Days in Clichy, which the BBFC had banned.

Both the GLC and the BBC, recognizing the changes that had in reality been in the air since the mid 1960 s, conducted surveys into public attitudes to censorship and the depiction of sex and violence on film and television. This liberalization trend did not go unchallenged and attempts were made to find statutes under which censorship could be applied. In April 1974 Mrs. Mary Whitehouse, the self-appointed watchdog of morality on television, failed with a private prosecution under the Vagrancy Act against La Grande Bouffe (Blow Out) and Edward Shackleton, a retired Salvation Army officer, brought an action under the Obscene Publications Act 1959 against United Artists for publishing Last Tango in Paris. The latter case went forward to the Old Bailey, where it was held that exhibition in a cinema did not constitute publication within the meaning of the Act. The only identifiable publication had been handing the print of the film to the manager of the Prince Charles Cinema, London, and evidence had not been presented that he had even seen the film, let alone been depraved and corrupted by it, as would have to have had to be proved for the action to succeed.

In some instances, local authorities took more restrictive views than the London-based censor. Two films to which the BBFC granted certificates, Ken Russell's The Devils (1971) and Walter Hills The Warriors (1979) were among films that suffered the fate of local authority bans. In January 1975 the GLC debated a motion to abolish film censorship altogether, and such was the interest that the debate was broadcast live on both London's local radio stations. The motion was lost by the relatively narrow margin of 44 votes to 50, but with a marker to review the situation a year hence.

One can only speculate about the consequences had the vote gone the other way; one result could well have been statutory national film censorship. A Cinematograph and Indecent Displays Bill had been before parliament but had not completed its passage by the time of the General Election on 28 February 1974. In June 1974, The Lord Chief Justice, Lord Widely, had ruled that films could be prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act, regardless of any decision by the BBFC. This was a controversial judgment that allowed the case again Last Tango in Paris to proceed but, as already indicated; Lord Widgerys view was not supported by the Central Criminal Court.

The Obscene Publications Act was amended in 1977 to include the distribution and exhibition of films. Cinema clubs, showing films to members only, were not exempt, even though they were in practice not required to comply with any other film regulations. With opinions becoming more polarized, the government set up a committee, chaired by the philosopher Bernard Williams, to review the laws concerning obscenity, indecency and violence in publications, displays and entertainments in England and Wales, except in the field of broadcasting, and to review the arrangements for film censorship in England and Wales. Appointed on 13 July 1977, its report was published in November 1979. Its recommendations were not followed up by the new Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher. The first censorial move by the Thatcher administration was to bring cinema clubs which of course were mostly showing porn films within the scope of the licensing regulations.

A private members bill, the Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, was introduced in 1982 but, as was pointed out in a letter to The Times by David Fisher, the editor of Screen Digest (OK, it was me), the bill was so loosely worded in terms of exhibition of moving pictures for commercial gain that it could equally apply to such things as training films and point-of-sale video displays. It was argued that it had never been the intention of the bill to extend to other activities but experience tells us that it is the letter of the law, not the spirit that counts. An Act intended to ensure that only qualified midwives delivered babies, as opposed to unqualified midwives, had just been used to prosecute a man for delivering his wifes baby at home without medical assistance. The bill was hastily redrafted and was passed (and not without a mention in both Houses of Parliament of that letter to The Times and its writer). British law gives local authorities powers of film censorship the basis of the classification system remains self-regulation voluntary and non-statutory.

Case law has grown up around BBFC decisions, however. In November 1996, the European Court of Human Rights upheld the BBFC decision to ban the film Visions of Ecstasy, about the life of St Teresa of Avila, on the grounds that is could be blasphemous. (The concept of blasphemy became a debating point in Britain for a while during the 1990 s. ) When classifying a film many aspects have to be put into consideration, the use of violence, sex and bad language can change the certification dramatically. British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is a private body, which has considerable power over the showing of films. The BBFC has developed a system of certification for films that provides guidance on the public acceptability of the film. Distributors pay a certification fee, and the Director of Public Prosecutions will not prosecute films that have been granted certificates. The Video Recordings Act 1984...


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Research essay sample on England And Wales Local Authorities

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