Road Kill Radio #21 will air Nov. 27!

Sooooo.... where were we?
It's a date: the new edition of Road Kill Radio (produced by students in the radio class at ECA) will air November 27 at 6 PM on WPKN (www.wpkn.org) and will soon be posted on this site.

But what I really wanted to talk about this week is this question: To Censor or Not To Censor youth voices? When do words and ideas push the envelope (which is cool) and when do they cross the line (which is not -- as in gratuitous profanity, hate speech, etc.)? The current roster of Radio Elective students at ECA have talked a lot about this issue of late. It comes up frequently when we consider how to present edgy ideas, radio plays, music, creative writing or opinions -- the nuts and bolts of youth culture.

If students are staying within the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decency guidelines and observing their community standards for speech and self-expression, should there be any topics or language which are out of bounds?

FYI: The FCC (http://www.fcc.gov/) disallows the use of the "seven deadly words" -- long live George Carlin! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_dirty_words) -- on the air waves during the hours of 6 AM and 10 PM. So we "edit" them out of Road Kill Radio productions.

Who should decide the limits to creative expression and free speech? One of the missions of Youth Radio CT (and the shows hosted here) is to present students with the opportunity to decide this question for themseves.

So what is youth culture, anyway, and how can young people create and explore their world if they are always looking over their shoulders for Big Brother? I'm just sayin'...

And I'm also just askin' -- so I hope this kicks off a discussion of this question on this site (comments link below) and elsewhere.

Talk to you later,
PS -- For best results post comments as anonymous.