Still can't read "Howl" on the radio.

(((At what point in global history, can we look back and say with certainty, "Well, censorship was totally justified in that situation?" I wish this station would be a little more radical in their treatment of it.)))

From Boing-Boing

Public radio station in NYC won't air "Howl" for fear of the FCC

Posted by Cory Doctorow, October 7, 2007 4:19 AM | permalink

"The FCC's war on dirty words is having a chilling effect -- even WBAI Pacifica, the radical radio station in NYC, is scared of airing Allen Ginsberg's magnificent poem, Howl. "Why, 50 years later after a judge ruled that children could read this poem, people are afraid the courts will say that their ears shouldn't hear it," said Ron Collins, a constitutional law instructor and First Amendment advocate who is leading a small group of authors, broadcasters and free-speech advocates pushing to broadcast the poem eventually. "Yet they can go on the Internet and see far, far worse things."

Another irony: WBAI, the Pacifica Foundation station in New York that plans to post "Howl" online, is the same station that took on the FCC more than 30 years ago over the right to air George Carlin's comedy routine featuring the "seven dirty words." The challenge led to a 1978 Supreme Court decision governing what naughty words can be broadcast and when.

Pacifica's attorney for FCC issues, John Crigler, thinks airing "Howl" would be "a great test case" in the current environment. But he understands why WBAI won't broadcast "Howl," even between the hours of 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., the hours the FCC has cordoned off for rougher language.

WBAI program director Bernard White fears that the FCC will fine the station $325,000 for every one of Ginsberg's dirty-word bombs. If each Pacifica station that aired the poem - and possibly repeated it - were to be fined for airing "Howl," it could mean millions of dollars in fines."

Flarf

"My name is Morton Hurley and I maintain this site as a means of preserving and promoting the art of poetry developed from spam messages."

Link

Documentary on the poet Charles Olson

"Polis Is This' wrestles with the six foot eight inch 275lb colossus of poetry, Charles Olson, in the squared circle of understanding. Through never before seen footage and interviews actor John Malkovich leads an all-star unit in a search and explore mission."

Link

"  An American
is a complex of occasions,
themselves a geometry
of spatial nature.

 I have this sense,
that I am one
with my skin

  Plus this--plus this
that forever the geography
which leans in
on me I compel
backwards I compel Gloucester
to yield, to
change


 Polis
is this"

((((I have Eric Unger to thank for this link and knowledge of this man)))

Christian Bok-Sound Poet

(((Joe Moore turned me onto this guy a couple of years ago. Whenever anyone asks me if I've heard anything interesting lately, I always direct them to "Mushroom Clouds," "Motorize Razors" and "Ubu Hubbub.)))
Link