Baiting the Pro-life Movement: NBC Refuses Super Bowl Ad

NBC will not sell air time during the Super Bowl to CatholicVote.org, which wants to run a moving, but non-confrontational ad about the potential of life. The decision is outrageous, but it is also a trap for conservatives, who should think carefully about their response.

The ad is available on YouTube, and has more than 850,000 hits since its introduction during the Inaugural. It will exceed two million by the time the Super Bowl is played, thanks to the controversy – and CatholicVote.org won’t have to spend up to $3 million for the spot.

NBC says it rejected the ad because it does not allow advocacy ads at the Super Bowl. It points to its rejection of an ad by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to show that it’s not playing favorites – but it rejected the PETA ad because it was too sexual, and offered suggestions on how to tone it down to a level it would be accepted. (The ad is an utterly inappropriate for broadcast double entendre. It’s on YouTube too – but you’ll have to look it up.)

Aside from the irony of NBC claiming it has any standards at all, the law is clear that a private news outlet has the freedom to choose what advertising it will accept. It is government censorship that is banned by the First Amendment. Private censorship, on the other hand, is itself a protect freedom. An over-reaction to this snub will have unintended consequences.

For years, the liberals – who have little affection for actual liberty – have advocated a return to the misnamed “Fairness Doctrine,” which required equal time for opposing viewpoints. (Who decides which viewpoints are "opposing," and how many?) The doctrine was scrapped during the Reagan Administration, but liberals have been wroth at their inability to penetrate the talk radio market and want to bring it back.

Unable to draw an audience for their ideas that would create a profitable business model, liberals would like government to force broadcasters to give them what they cannot earn. The NBC decision could easily enrage enough prolife conservatives to create bipartisan support for a return to the Fairness Doctrine.

The Fairness Doctrine is communism imported into what Supreme Court Justice William Brennan once called “the marketplace of ideas.” Lovers of liberty and life should avoid a response that will make it harder, not easier, to get their message to the people.

Do this: forward the link to this post to people in your address book. Urge them to watch the video. The best response will be to make NBC wish it had taken the movement’s money, rather than give them the audience for free.