I’m not a huge fan of Howard Stern, mostly because I find crass, adolescent humor generally not to my taste. (Actually, that’s not true. I find Chris Rock insanely funny, as well a many other comedians whose humor is quite ribald. Also, I saw Private Parts and found Stern to be a character I could empathize with in different ways. I’m not a moral absolutist.) However, I’m deeply concerned by the trend toward monitoring and fining him for his use of language. I listen mostly to NPR, and the following excerpt from a New York Times essay caught my attention:

Here are just a few of the things we’ve broadcast on our show that now could conceivably result in fines of up to a half million dollars for the 484 public stations that run the program: assorted curse words, people saying ”damn” and ”goddamn” (a recent F.C.C. decision declared that ”profane” and ”blasphemous” speech would now come under scrutiny); various prison stories; and a very funny story by the writer David Sedaris that takes place in a bathroom and that violates all three F.C.C. criteria for ”indecency.” It’s explicitly graphic in talking about ”excretory organs or activities”; Sedaris repeats and dwells on the descriptions at length, and he absolutely means to pander and shock. That’s what makes it funny.

In the past, the F.C.C. would have considered context, the possible literary value or news value of apparently offensive material. And the agency still gives lip service to context in its current decisions. But when the commissioners declared in March that an expletive modifying the word ”brilliant” (uttered by Bono at the Golden Globe Awards) was worthy of punishment, it made a more radical change in the rules than most people realize. Now context doesn’t always matter. If a word on our show could increase a child’s vocabulary, if some members of the public find something ”grossly offensive,” the F.C.C. can issue fines.

–Ira Glass, This American Life, a public radio show.