Parents Group Raises Alarms Over Increasing TV Violence; FCC Calls for Action
by Jim Brown
January 11, 2007
(AgapePress) - - A new report from the Parents Television Council (PTC) says the television season that began in the fall of 2005 was one of the most violent ever. The pro-family media watchdog group's report examines violence on prime-time broadcast TV over the last eight years.The study's findings were announced yesterday in a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. Tim Winter, president of the PTC, says it found that between 1998 and 2006, violence increased in every television viewing time slot and on virtually every network, "the only exceptions being that UPN and FOX actually aired less violence during the family hour in 2005-2006, compared to 1998."
According to the PTC's study, Winter notes, broadcast TV violence during prime time has increased 75 percent since 1998. And during this last television season, he says, "nearly half of all episodes aired during the study period contained at least one instance of violence."
Also during that 2005-2006 season, the pro-family spokesman points out, the WB network had the highest frequency of violence during the family hour, with an average of nearly four incidents of violence per hour. And ABC's short-lived series Night Stalker proved to be the single most violent program on television during the same season, he notes.
The PTC report also notes that during the 2005-2006 season, every episode of every program airing on NBC during the 10 p.m. time slot contained at least one instance of violence. And CBS also earned a dubious distinction for broadcast violence, Winter observes.
"CBS was the most violent network during the nine o'clock hour, with an average of 7.53 instances of violence per hour," the PTC's president says. "It is worth remembering," he adds, "that after the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, CBS president Les Munves said, 'Anybody who doesn't pay attention to what's going on and says the media is not to blame is an idiot.'"
| | 
FCC Commissioner Michael Copps |
FCC Official Urges Citizen, Government, and Industry Response
The Parents Television Council is not alone in expressing concern over the level of violent content on the television networks. Among the other voices decrying the current unprecedented surge in broadcast TV violence is Federal Communications Commission commissioner Michael Copps, who insists that it is long past time for all Americans to take meaningful action on media violence.Copps, who is also a former U.S. Assistant Commerce Secretary, says parents can limit their children's access to media violence even if they cannot control that access completely. However, he acknowledges, parents cannot solve the problem alone.
Parents must insist on positive action from both the government and the television industry, the FCC commissioner asserts. "Our media industries need to come to some kind of consensus about what they can do -- and they can do a lot -- to stem the tide of violence that study after study relates to terrible behavioral consequences for our kids and for our country," he says.
But in addition to the responsibility of parents and the government to address the problem, Copps contends, the onus is on the television industry to curb the trend of increasing TV violence.
"We don't need to hear more excuses from industry, like 'Oh, the other fellow's doing it, so I have to do it too,'" the federal official says. "That is not management of the airwaves to serve the public interest," he insists; "that's management of the airwaves to circumvent the public interest, and we are all of us paying way too high a price for it."
Copps believes the values of many American children are being adversely affected by what he calls the "extraordinary, escalating, and often brutal and usually gratuitous violence brought into our living rooms around the clock." And every day, the FCC official says, he hears from thousands of parents across the U.S. who are both concerned and angry about the messages the TV networks are transmitting.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
