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Email: "CANADIAN BROADCAST AUTHORITY OKAYS RIDICULE OF PRIESTHOOD BY PROGRAM"

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BY LifeSiteNews.com OTTAWA, February 18, 2003 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) has dismissed a complaint against a television station for ridiculing Catholic priests as being pedophiles.  In 2000, however, the CBSC found a radio program in violation of its code of ethics since it associated pedophilia with homosexuality.  The CBSC ruling explains the incident on the show noting that the CTV program Open Mike with Mike Bullard aired a criticized episode last year.  The CBSC said, “as part of a conversation between Bullard and the show’s resident band leader, Orin Isaacs, who asked Bullard how he had been able to deter some boys from hanging outside the studio and terrorizing guests.  The host replied that he ‘took care of it the best way I know how;’ the camera then cut to two young actors dressed up as priests who were standing around outside the television studio.  Bullard explained the gag by saying, ‘I hired a couple of Catholic priests.  Good work, fellas.  Today I haven’t seen a young guy within ten blocks of here.’”  The CBSC’s National Conventional Television Panel considered the complaint under the human rights provision of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Code of Ethics, which reads as follows: “Recognizing that every person has a right to full and equal recognition and to enjoy certain fundamental rights and freedoms, broadcasters shall endeavour to ensure, to the best of their ability, that their programming contains no abusive or discriminatory material or comment which is based on matters of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, [sexual orientation], marital status or physical or mental handicap.” The Panel concluded that the Bullard show “does not disclose a breach of the human rights clause.” In contrast, in a 2000 ruling, the CBSC ruled that a Dr. Laura Schlessinger program was in violation of the Code of Ethics for linking pedophilia and homosexuality by quoting from various studies demonstrating the link.  The CBSC took issue with the numbers of studies showing such a link and ruled: “Without getting into the relative numbers issue, the effective assertion by the host that paedophilia has to do with being gay is, in the view of the Councils, an abusively discriminatory comment based on sexual orientation in violation of the CAB Code of Ethics.”  See the Bullard ruling and the Dr. Laura ruling online at:  http://www.cbsc.ca/english/decision/030218.htm http://www.cbsc.ca/english/decision/000510.htm http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/canadian-broadcast-authority-okays-ridicule-of-priesthood-by-program/

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