I decided to make a new thread to discuss current or past network preemption - whether a program is preempted for moral (including religious) reasons, violent content, money as in (make goods to advertisers) and ultimately sports.
What prompted me to start this thread now is NBCs upcoming two-part miniseries, Rosemary's Baby, where part one airs on Sunday 11 May, 2014 @9/8 C and the second half airs on Thursday 15 May, 2014 @9/8 C both parts end at 11/10 C. And for those of you who are not aware of the storyline of Rosemary's Baby it's about the occult where a naive housewife becomes aware of a plot that she will give birth to the spawn in exchange for her husbands acting career success.
Needless to say when I heard of NBC's plan to recreate Rosemary's Baby I expected there would be at least a handful of stations refusing to carry the miniseries the main one in my mind would be KSL 5 TV based out of Salt Lake City and is owned by Bonneville International which is the for profit broadcasting arm of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (a/k/a Mormons). KSL has a long history of preempting NBC network programming from refusing to run a show The New Normal about gay men trying to have a child because of it does not fit into the Mormon beliefs; it wasn't until this current season (2013-2014) that they would allow SNL to air on the regular tape delayed feed for the mountain time zone due to morals issues and they currently preempt Hannibal because of graphic content. For the record it was worked out with NBC that the shows no longer carried by KSL could be scene in KUCW usually at the same time as it broadcast live.
Now given what we established that KSL has preempted network programming for morals and violence grounds very regularly in the past but doesn't seem to be concerned about the lack of morals, blasphemy of religion and violence that will be aired during this four hour event show. I find it funny that a show like The New Normal which was wholesome and sweet was pulled off air for moral standards but KSL has no issue with a psycho thriller, horror show that dabbles in satanism and the occult.
Now my next question is what are the most common types of preempt ions that occur in your market and how often do they occur.
WBAL-TV is the Hearst owned Flagship NBC affiliate here in Baltimore, Md. WBAL has an older network affiliation contract where they and their Hearst sister in Sacramento, KCRA, are not required to carry the fourth hour of the Today Show during the dayside schedule apart from the Today All Night repeats that air at 2:05 AM nationally. WBAL then further preempts NBCs encore rerun of that nights Jim Cramer with Steve Harvey at 3 AM.
When it comes to sports WBAL-TV has in the past preempted nights of programming to carry either their sister network ESPN Monday Night Football and would simulcast the NFL Network Thursday Night Football but Thursday Night is now a package with CBS Sports. During the events leading up to the middle Jewell of the triple crown, The Preakness Stakes, WBAL does a three and a half hour pre show prior to the star of NBCs coverage preempts the a Stanley Cup which will be moved MeTV. Once the race is over they will preempt Nightly News for a,one and a half hour newscast. These preemption outside broadcasts are fairly complex and enjoyable to watch and one of the strong parts is the musical talent that has played in recent years they've had Daft punk, Macklemore and Lewis, Pitbull and this year Lorde.
WJZ-TV as a CBS O&O very rarely preempts programming unless it's because of a sporting game. MASN, the cable network that is majority owned by the Orioles and minority owned by the Nationals, state that their are 14 instances this summer when a MASN game will be played on WJZ pure emoting whatever CBS Sports has planned.
WMAR-TV, the Scripps owned ABC affiliate is a station that I rarely watch but I remember them having to preempt a pre season Monday Night Football game where WBAL-TV was supposed to carry it but couldn't preempt the Olympics that were airing on NBC. I believe the game even was produced by WBALs crew.
WBFF-TV, WNUV-TV and WUTB-TV are the Fox, CW and MyNetwork affiliates here I'm Baltimore that are ultimately controlled by Sinclair Broadcast group which if I recall correctly rarely preempt any program mining. But about ten years ago they forbid their ABC stations from airing a Night Line report listing the dead soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan on moral grounds and also for political motivation. Sinclair also preempted the movie Saving Private Ryan on its ABC stations for fear of being fined by the FCC.