Community standards13. We remark that the regulation of communication industries is culturally embedded and is generally reflective of the domestic environment. For example, most jurisdictions in the promotion and support of local talent stipulate the requirement of local content in the development of television programs. Since this is especially true in the context of content regulation, we view respect for community standards as our first guiding principle for xxxxxx- xxxx content. It is thus essential for the state (regulator) to ascertain the prevail- ing community’s attitude towards obscenity or in other words, the com- munity’s definition on matters such as (a) “obscenity”, (b) matters considered “indecent but not obscene”, (c) “grossly indecent but not illegal”, and (d) “harmful”. It is not sufficient for the state to refer to the dictionary for the literal meaning of these words. Instead attention to the meaning should be directed to, from within the community to which the standard may be applied, since the standards and the terms adopted and used as a result of those standards are meant to reflect “the community’s moral fiber”. In other words, we need (1) to enquire and (2) to ascertain the moral strand of the community. It is possible to obtain a fair and reasonable assessment of that by asking (a) what the community is willing to accept in terms of the different levels of obscenity, indecency, potentially dangerous, and harmful materials, (b) what they (the community) would tolerate, (c) what they would regard as repulsive, and (d) what they would regard as seriously impairing the physical, psycho- logical, and moral development of children and young people. As a tentative conclusion, we may state that the standards or moral strand of the community are country and culture specific and can vary within regions 13 Standards are normally used to define the acceptable characteristics of a product, process, or service. Most standards are voluntary and are developed by consensus among the government, and various stakeholders. For example, the British standards for business are developed by the businesses in collaboration with the government. See xxx.xxx-xxxxxx.xxx/ xxxxx.xxxxxx or localities within each state. Furthermore, the standards are not constant in that they change according to the generations and the period of time in which the material is perceived.14 In fact, Xxxxxx (1965) remarked that “Xxxxx- ing morality may more accurately be compared not with the ‘violent ove...
