Subject: News Release: TORONTO WRITER CALLS FOR ABOLITION OF CRTC

From: [email-masked] (Brad Aisa)
Date: Fri, 06 Oct 95 01:18:54 GMT

***** News Release *****

Brad Aisa                                      tel (416) 423-4075
393 O'Connor Dr.                               fax (416) 423-8050
Toronto, Ontario                          email: [email-masked]
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                   October 4, 1995, 1800 EDT

Contact: Brad Aisa (416) 423-4075
Related article: _Freedom or Censorship?_ copies available from
Brad Aisa, or on-line at: http://www.hookup.net/~baisa.

           TORONTO WRITER CALLS FOR ABOLITION OF CRTC

Toronto writer and computer consultant Brad Aisa today called for
the privatization of broadcasting frequencies and the abolition
of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications
Commission (CRTC) in a presentation entitled _Freedom or
Censorship?_ made to the CRTC Hearings on Television Violence, at
the Plaza II Hotel in Toronto.

Mr. Aisa offered a reasoned and often passionate defense of
freedom of speech, which CRTC Chairman Keith Spicer described as
"stirring." Mr. Aisa mercilessly attacked the champions of
television censorship, whom he repeatedly referred to as "Social
Engineers."

Mr. Aisa began by offering a principled defense of two types of
children's programming which are currently under attack: violent
cartoons, and action/adventure shows, such as the recently banned
_Mighty Morphin Power Rangers._

On cartoon violence, Mr. Aisa said, "What any 5 year-old would
tell [the censors] is obvious: cartoons are make-believe, and the
characters in them are doing things you either can't or aren't
supposed to do in reality. That is precisely why they are so
funny. ...five year-old Johnny understands this."

Mr. Aisa went on to defend shows like _Power Rangers_ as valuable
inculcators of a moral view of existence, and as harmless popular
entertainment. On the sometimes violent content of these shows,
Mr. Aisa pointed out, "There is a big difference between the
force initiated by an evil person against the innocent, versus
the retaliatory force used by the agents of justice, such as the
Rangers." In contrast to social determinists, who often decry
violence regardless of context, Mr. Aisa insisted that children
evaluate and understand what they see. "...the message delivered
[by action shows] is not that violence is good, but that crime is
bad, and I submit children understand this."

Mr. Aisa then proceeded to offer a philosophic defense of full
unrestricted freedom of speech, based on man's need to use his
faculty of reason to achieve the values upon which his survival
depends. The arguments were based on the philosophic ideas of
novelist/philosopher Ayn Rand, who CRTC Chairman Spicer
complimented as being one of his "favorite philosophers."

The defense of freedom of speech offered by Mr. Aisa took great
pains to emphasize the need of this freedom as an absolute
principle. "Let's get this straight," Mr. Aisa said bluntly, "In
the entire history of ideas, men have always been fully free to
agree. There has never been any society anywhere, no matter how
repressive or primitive, in which you didn't have the
unrestricted, absolute right to agree with the accepted wisdom of
the day, and the opinions of sovereign, church, dictator, or
chief... The thing which has been lacking throughout history is
the right to _disagree_."

On the question of the basic cause of criminal violence in
society, Mr. Aisa made a provocative claim, at odds with that of
many social scientists: "...I believe the fundamental cause of
[violence in society] is the basic principle on which our current
society is built: collectivism. The welfare/interventionist state
is founded on a profoundly violent premise: that man does not
belong to himself, but to the state, which may use coercion
[against him] to any end deemed in the collective's interests.
The welfare state ... legitimizes violence."

After decrying censorship being, "not the answer to any of our
problems," Mr. Aisa went on to point out that adequate means
already exist for viewers to exercise choice with regard to what
they watch. "The most obvious tools of exercising choice are: the
channel changer, the video machine, the off button, or ...
absence of ownership." He then pointed out that content is also
restrained by threat of boycott or complaint on the part of
viewers, using Kelvin Klein's recent withdrawal of his
controversial ad campaign as an example.

Mr. Aisa ended his presentation with some radical and even
startling recommendations. He called for the privatization of
broadcasting waves and the elimination of the broadcasting
commission. ("...I completely disagree with the existence of such
a thing as a broadcasting commission in a free society...") He
also repudiated the claim of a government right to regulate
broadcasting conducted over privately owned cable facilities.

Mr. Aisa went on to "...urge the commission to move to an
unconditional form of licensing, which would not call into
question the content of broadcasters." He claimed that,
"Licensing itself is a form of censorship -- there is no such
thing as freedom of expression by permission."

                             - end -

--
Brad Aisa, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

"The highest responsibility of philosophers is to serve as the
guardians and integrators of human knowledge."   -- Ayn Rand

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