This TV station censored last night's "SNL" and we have questions
While critics congratulated Dave Chappelle on his latest Saturday Night Live episode, WRAL viewers questioned why their broadcast was censored. Many Raleigh watchers believed the NBC affiliate silencing parts of the show was a violation of their freedom of speech.
According to Variety, the network cited, that while they were excited to air the special, some of Chappelle’s language breached their FCC Guidelines.
As fans of SNL, we know that their sketches are filled with “choice words,” but that’s why we love them! Unfortunately for the station, Chappelle’s style was a little too risqué for their standards. WRAL tried their hardest to intervene during its airing, which resulted in viewers experiencing short periods of silence.
To put an end to all of the speculation, the station’s executives issued a statement explaining exactly why the sketch was so heavily censored.
The statement basically said that the station has their own standards that they combine with FCC guidelines to decide whether or not something is deemed decent for their broadcast.
The statement clarified, "Obviously, SNL is a live show so we had no prior indication about what would be said during the broadcast. We understand this caused disruption during the program. We wanted our audience to know this was a station decision, not the network’s, and why we made that choice.”
It looks like the station just may be well within their right have to censored the episode. But, we totally understand why the viewers are not happy with the choice.