As a follow-up to my blog questioning CBS’s apparent decision to de-sexualize the same-sex OTALIA storyline on the now canceled daytime drama, Guiding Light, I thought it would be insightful to examine these network standards and practices, or Program Practices at CBS.

Standards and Practices, put simply in the vernacular, is the department of the network censors.  Broadcasting licenses are a finite resource, and thus acting as stewards of such, broadcasters have been the paternal overseer of the content of the airwaves for decades.  The crusade of the Standard and Practice has been to review all non-news broadcast content for compliance with community standards.

Network censors serve as surrogates for the network’s affiliates, assuring that the programming is acceptable to the mass audience. They serve as the chaperones of taste with respect to language, sex, and other subject matter deemed inappropriate for children.  According to CBS’s own website, “The review process involves an interaction among producers, program executives and Program Practices executives (censors), who ensure that CBS entertainment programs conform to generally accepted standards of public taste. The extent and degree of Program Practices involvement in ongoing series, ranging from general consultation to close episode review and supervision, depends on the nature and subject matter of the series generally and of particular episodes.”

Now that the roll of network Program Practices has been established, one big question remains, who decides?  Who is it exactly that determines a ménage à trios after-scene is more acceptable in the children’s hour than a same-sex kiss between two loving, adult women in a committed relationship? Who provides that elusive checklist that determines appropriate content and the correct compliment of family values?  Is it the moral majority, who ironically according to the latest CBS News/NYT poll, are not quite in the majority anymore?

Who really knows; it is a very well kept secret among the corporate boardrooms of the networks.  What we do know is that Guiding Light after September 18th will be illuminating little more than a historical montage of the beacon it once was.  Some of those commenting on my blog have suggested as a result, what do the producers have to lose, just do it.  It’s a nice thought, but content is released out over the broadcast airwaves only when the networks say it is appropriate.  So for now, Crystal Chappell and Jessica Leccia have as much chance of pulling off an impromptu over-the-air kiss as my partner and I have making out down the halls of Focus on the Family.