Recently, the CBS network opted to drop its upcoming miniseries, "The Reagans," and hand it to cousin pay-channel Showtime, a move that many credited and/or blamed on the protests of various conservative groups or individuals, such as the watchdog group Media Research Center.
CBS has, of course, not aired the program (it was waiting until Sweeps week), so very few people had seen it. The protests were based on leaked portions of the script that appeared on the Internet, thanks mostly to 'net news-hawk Matt Drudge.
The leaked script portions revealed attacks against the character of the former president that were flat-out horrible and completely baseless. Just one example - the one which, understandably, has caused the most outrage - is a segment repeating the old lie that not only did Ronald Reagan do little to research and stop the early spread of the AIDS virus, but he also was uncaring to those who suffered from it.
At one point in the film, the fictitious Reagan is being advised on the AIDS crisis and responds with, "Those that live in sin, die in sin," making the former president come across as the classic fundamentalist bigot, heartless and homophobic. The only problem is: He never said it. There is no record of Ronald Reagan saying anything approaching this level of malice on the subject of the gay community or any other sufferers of the AIDS virus. The film's screenwriters have admitted as much.
With the fact that Reagan was portrayed by actor James Brolin and that his liberal wife Barbra Streisand reportedly gave no shortage of advice and set-visits to the filmmakers, the homophobia/AIDS smear is the least of sketchy production foibles. The man whom several public opinion polls have identified as the greatest president of the 20th century is portrayed as "a dimwitted actor of modest ability manipulated by a self-centered, domineering wife who is contemptuous of underlings," according to National Review's Ed Morrow.
Streisand herself called the decision to move the miniseries to Showtime (which would naturally lose the program millions of viewers) a "sad day for artistic freedom."
But jettisoning "The Reagans" is not indicative of a "Soviet-style chill" against dissent, as an editorial in The New York Times put it. This is not censorship or even a misunderstanding. Conservatives are more than aware that the canceled miniseries was a TV drama, and not a documentary.
But the inaccuracies in CBS's production went beyond the pale as far as creative license goes, and wandered into the realm of slander and character assassination. There is such a thing as "artistic freedom," and there is also such a thing as "lying."
Similarly, there is a healthy distinction to be made between the government uniformly silencing voices it disapproves of (censorship) versus decisions independent corporations make due to any number of nongovernment-related factors (not censorship).
Last time I checked, "freedom of speech" does not mean "speech free from criticism." Someone should tell Streisand and The New York Times about that.
Eric Spratling is a journalism senior, and he loves the truth only slightly more than he loves Ronald Reagan. Reach him at eric.spratling@asu.edu.
