Re:Search
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago the petty complaints that characterise the letters page of the Radio Times. While researching something I was writing elsewhere, I found myself visiting the websites of the various broadcasting regulators of the UK. These two points are connected.
Reviewing the list of things that apparently rational adults find to complain about on British television is truly eye-opening. The things that offend 'taste and decency' range from the depiction of sex aids on This Morning (insert obligatory John Leslie dildo joke here), to Chris Tarrant making an anti-Scouse joke at the Baftas, to Brookside running a storyline (that would have been planned and filmed well in advance) that on some superficial level might possibly have been perceived to have some slight similarities to the Soham murder case, and on into trivial quibble after trivial quibble. I think if I was an Independent Television Commission complaints investigator I'd probably have gone mad by now. You can find summaries of rulings here.