Creativity Quote by Dave Rowntree

Rowntree’s line lands with the dry pragmatism of someone who’s spent a career watching “edgy” art get flattened by broadcast standards, lawyers, and sponsors. The key word is “obviously”: it’s a small shrug that doubles as a jab. If you need reminding that TV is policed, you’re either naive or pretending. Coming from a musician shaped by Britain’s post-punk culture wars, it carries the lived sense that transgression is never just an aesthetic choice; it’s a negotiation with gatekeepers.

The second move - “as there are everywhere” - is where the subtext sharpens. It punctures the lazy myth of American exceptionalism in both directions: the US isn’t uniquely puritanical, but it also isn’t uniquely free. Rowntree isn’t defending censorship so much as reframing it as infrastructure. Every country has its own version: obscenity law, defamation, political pressure, licensing boards, informal blacklists. The point is less “America is strict” than “broadcast culture is regulated culture,” full stop.

Context matters: “on TV” is doing heavy lifting because television, unlike a club show or a record, arrives through licensed public airwaves and mass-market distribution. That brings a different kind of vulnerability: moral panic scales, reputational risk is immediate, and the punishment is often bureaucratic rather than dramatic - fines, pulled ads, lost slots, self-censorship disguised as “standards.”

Rowntree’s intent feels corrective. Not a rant, a reality check: if you want to understand what makes it to screens, follow the rules that never appear in the credits.