Ruling: Katy Perry Song Not Harmful to South African Children - East Idaho News
Arts & Entertainment

Ruling: Katy Perry Song Not Harmful to South African Children

  Published at

Getty 022812 KatyPerry?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1339637683055Larry Busacca/Getty Images for EJAF(JOHANNESBURG) — Good news for South African Katy Perry fans — her hit “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)” will continue to be played on the radio in that country.  According to SowetoLive.com, the South African Broadcasting Complaints Commission has reaffirmed an earlier ruling that the song is not harmful to children.

A pastor named Ashby Kurian, a father of two daughters, had originally complained that the song was unsuitable for kids to hear because it “contained suggestions of nudity, inappropriate sexual behavior, and law-breaking.”  In his original complaint, he wrote, “Please put a stop to this or we will have more…boys and girls ending up [on the news due to skipping] school, drinking and rape.”

However, the commission found in its written judgement that despite the fact that the song mentions a menage-a-trois, streaking, skinny-dipping, drinking and “breaking the law,”  there was no “no excessively or grossly offensive language in the lyrics of the song,” and so it didn’t violate any of the country’s broadcast codes.

The commission also stated, “Songs like this Katy Perry song exist in the context of our free and fairly permissive society,” and added that parents should be the ones to protect kids from material they deem inappropriate.

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio

SUBMIT A CORRECTION