Geoffrey Cowan’s See No Evil is about TV’s Family Viewing Hour and the FCC. This 1979 resource is an intense accounting of the 1970s power plays that rocked the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). In the early 1970s, white men in Congress attempted to curb progressive television content by threatening the FCC’s funding. This was in response to Norman Lear’s breakthrough sitcoms All in the Family and Maude. Additionally, conservatives rejected the violence creeping into prime-time cop shows. 

Based on the powers of its creation, the FCC cannot dictate content. Rather, it demanded ABC, NBC and CBS somehow reduce sex and violence on prime-time TV. The result was The Family Viewing Hour. Amazingly, its development, life and abrupt death is but a blip in television history.

But in essence, it was the conservative movement attempting to flex its muscle, both regulatory and economic, against the right of free speech. Television executives and writers who also wielded incredible power, were up for the fight.

If you find  this as fascinating as I do, you’ll like Geoffrey Cowan’s (1979) See No Evil: The  Backstage Battle Over Sex and Violence in Television. Cowan had a front row seat and wrote this accessible, enthralling, 300 page read.