Associated Press The Condom Lady? She's back. So is Blanket Man and Queer Girl and a woman who will be known only as CommuniKate. With the flip of a giant switch, a ragtag collection of unlicensed broadcasters returned to the airwaves yesterday afternoon, defying the Federal Communications Commission in the name of free speech, alternative music and Benjamin Franklin. "We will not be silenced!" the volunteer disc jockeys shouted into a megaphone jury-rigged to a car battery. Operating from "a secret location in West Philadelphia," the 20-watt West Philadelphia Pirate Radio at 91.3 FM is bucking the FCC's effort to shut it down. Like hundreds of similar stations, the community radio station protests the expensive licensing process as an unconstitutional violation of free-speech rights. FCC agents visited the station November 25 and demanded that it stop broadcasting, said Phil TriDish, a station founder. The volunteers turned the agents away, but signed off until the downtown demonstration by about two dozen people on Monday. Several weeks ago, FCC regulators shut down another West Philadelphia-based pirate radio station, WSKR-FM, broadcasting on 97.7 without a license. Standing before Ben Franklin's printing house and negotiating with National Park Service officers trying to move the demonstration, WPPR operators likened the licensing to the colonial-era printing tax. "Ben knew that the policy limited democracy because not everybody who had something to say could speak out," said CommuniKate, who does not use her surname. The FCC would not comment on the WPPR case, said agency spokesperson David Fiske. The FCC licenses some 12,000 FM frequencies around the country, regulating the airwaves to prevent interference that can hamper police or other broadcasters. Licensing costs thousands of dollars. Pirates can set up a station for $1,500, but face FCC fines of up to $100,000. The pirate radio movement won a victory last month when a U.S. District Court judge in San Francisco refused to shut down a notorious station, Free Radio Berkeley. She also ordered the FCC to address the free-speech issues raised by the station. On the year-old WPPR, listeners in West Philadelphia neighborhoods hear an eclectic mix of news, music and public information. The Blanket Man discusses the criminal justice system on Incarceration Nation. The Condom Lady offers birth-control and sexual-health information and tells junkies how to smoke crack safely. Queer Girl runs a show called the Full Blown Revolving Queer Hour. "Most radio programming in Philadelphia is bland and banal," TriDish said. "We saw the need for an alternative radio station." "The broadcast you are listening to is illegal," CommuniKate said. "Can you believe this is against the law?"
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