Oregon daily emerald., September 26, 1977, Page 17, Image 17

PTA plans attack on TV violence
By KEVIN HARDEN
Of the Emerald
it was 1927. In a small
warehouse in San Francisco
young Philo T. Farnsworth was
working on an experiment that
would revolutionize the age of
communication.
The invention was ready for
testing. A flick of the switch, and
Farnsworth’s experiment was a
success: a beam of light was sent
through special electronic signals
and projected onto a tiny clear
glass screen. Television was
bom.
Nearly fifty years later,
Farnsworth’s invention would be
under attack for its improper por
trayal of life. What Farnsworth in
tended to be used for the good of
all, had somehow contributed to a
problem that has caused large
groups of people to be very upset.
The problem: Television violence.
A new season of television
programming is beginning, and
Barbara Hasek is excited. She is
not excited because of the new
programs scheduled to be shown
during the "family hour,” but what
she and the National Parent
Teacher Association (PTA) are
planning to do about some of the
more violent shows on the air.
Hasek, in her second year as
president of the Lane County
PTA, is pleased that the organiza
tion has attacked a problem that
has an effect on nearly all school
children. Up to now, she said, they
have been struggling with prot>
lems ot less importance
"I’m glad that now we re really
doing something,” she said. "For
the longest time I was griped with
the PTA because all they did was
sit around and plan school carni
vals and then argue about how to
spend the $1,000 they made from
those carnivals. But now it looks
like we can do something better."
The National PTA's involve
ment with the effects of the media
on children began over 60 years
ago, when, in 1910, the organiza
tion urged parents in its local units
to supervise the attendance of
their children at motion picture
theaters and vaudeville shows.
Since 1964, the PTA has pas
sed several important resolutions
concerning television violence at
national conventions. It wasn’t
until 1975, however, that the as
sociation took direct aim at the
problem and began instituting a
program of television monitoring
and protest against shows that
were overly violent.
Since that time, the PTA has
started a TV Action Center in
Chicago which acts as a clearing
house for information on prog
rams, provides the names and
addresses of over 50 prime-time
advertisers and conducts training
programs for PTA volunteer tele
vision monitors.
Four such programs to train TV
monitors were held in Eugene and
Springfield last week, according to
Hasek, but the results of the PTA’s
efforts won't be available until
sometime after Jan. 1, 1978.
The training, according to
Hasek, is designed to begin a
county-wide television monitoring
system using volunteer PTA
members and concerned parents,
which will collect information on
TV shows.
The monitors will watch half
hour segments of specific prog
rams, record the network showing
the program, the names of the ad
vertisers during the show, the var
ious acts of violence committed
(from murder to kicking, abusive
language and rape) and the illegal
acts committed not only by the
show's villain, but also by the
police or law enforcement officers
Orndnn Huilv
portrayed on the shows.
The information will then be
used to write letters to the local TV
station broadcasting the violent
show, the network which is af
filiated with the local station, the
Federal Communications Com
mission (FCC) and the show’s ad
vertisers to register the monitors’
dislike for the program.
Hasek explained that the PTA
monitoring system isn’t out to stop
every show on television that may
be considered violent. “We’re
more concerned with the gratuit
ous violence that is shown over
and over and over every week,’’
she said. "We don’t want people
to think that we’re going to censor
any of these TV shows either. We
just want to make the parents and
other concerned people aware of
the violence that is being shown.”
The PTA monitoring system
was conceived last year after a
series of eight public hearings on
TV violence were held in eight
major cities around the nation. At
a hearing held in Portland, Dr. Ro
gers Smith, an Oregon physician
and Vice-Chairman of the Council
on Scientific Affairs of the Ameri
can Medical Association (AMA),
told the PTA television commis
sion that the AMA is now commit
ted to a public campaign of reduc
ing TV violence and making tele
vision a responsible medium.
“Television is a unique
medium," Smith told the hearing.
"It is a powerful, pervasive force in
the child’s environment. If the
programming the child is exposed
to consists largely of violent con
tent, the child's perception of the
real world may be significantly dis
torted and his psychological de
velopment may be adversely af
fected.
Smith concluded that although
there had been several studies on
the effects of TV violence, the de
gree of adverse effects couldn’t be
accurately judged without further
work.
The affects of TV violence are
varied, says Beverly Fagot, assis
tant professor of psychology at the
University, and can range from
violent behavior to imitation of
stereotypes. “Children imitate ev
erything," Fagot said. “They'll im
itate anything from the violence to
the commercials. TV in and of it
self isn’t dangerous. It only be
comes that way if it is the only
outlet of communication the child
has.’’
Much of the danger of TV lies in
what Fagot calls the entertain
ment syndrome. “Most kids have
good sense about imitating TV vio
lence,” she explained “Some
don't, and it’s that small portion of
children that don't have any boun
daries when it comes to re
enacting violent scenes on TV.”
Television is also bad for a child if
he or she doesn’t interact with any
other children, she said.
Jerry Patterson, through his
work at the Oregon Social Learn
ing Center in Eugene, has come
into contact with the effects of TV
violence on children as well as
families.
"I think there is a connection be
tween TV violence and violent be
havior of some children," Patter
son said. "But, the magnitude of
that effect maybe is hard to tell
right now.”
According to Patterson, TV vio
lence may increase the likelihood
that children may imitate the viol
ent acts, and then be considered
violent. But, he says, the effects of
TV violence are not confined to
just children.
"TV and movies are really mod
els of how to do certain violent
acts for some smarter adults,” he
explained. Studies done on that
basis have indicated that there
may be a connection between the
media coverage of violence and
similar violent crimes, he said.
Violence is a way of life, Patter
son asserts, and many television
sponsors have said that if there
wasn’t a market for violent TV
shows, then they wouldn’t adver
tise on them. “I believe that we re
a very violent society,” he said.
'We always seem to take this
John Wayne cut-em-up- shoot
em-up’ approach to problem solv
ing that is completely wrong," Pat
terson explained.
After observing nearly 100 viol
ent families in his work, Patterson
came to the conclusion that viol
ence is taught and television may
just provide the wrong role models
for children.
Determining the effects of TV
violence and stopping it are two
different things. According to
Hasek, the PTA monitoring ap
proach may be a good start.
The PTA project, however, may
cause some headaches for
Oregon television stations. Tele
vision license renewals for local
stations in the state are scheduled
for the end of January, 1978, and
too many complaints for a station
can add up to a lot of trouble with
the FCC, which requires that all
letters of complaint be kept on file
for public use.
“The airwaves are supposedly
public,” Hasek said. “But, if
they’re all taken up by violent
shows, then there’s no telling what
can happen to that station, be
cause that certainly isn’t in the
public’s interest”
But members of one of
Eugene’s two television stations
don’t seem to be worried. If the
complaints become too much, a
spokesman for Eugene’s KEZI
TV said, the ultimate way to deal
with violent shows would be to not
clear them for local broadcast.
Only two ABC-TV shows this
season may be considered viol
ent, the spokesman explained.
“Baretta" and “Starsky and
Hutch” have been moved to new
time slots later in the evening,
when younger viewers would
normally be in bed.
If violence goes, then what will
fill its void? Probably, Hasek pre
dicted, speaking mainly of ABC’s
controversial show, “SOAP.”
But, the KEZI-TV spokesman
explained, ABC is not planning to
replace violence with sex. “There
are a lot of programs on that are
much worse than ‘SOAP,’” the
spokesman said. “I think the gen
eral public consensus is that way
also.”
According to Hasek, the effort
by Lane County’s 3,500 PTA
members to reduce TV violence
will work if enough people begin to
complain to the advertisers and
the FCC. But, she hopes their ef
forts don’t become misinterpreted
as a “witch hunt.”
“We don’t want to just watch
things like The Sound of Music,’
but we re opposed to this violence
that is shown over and over,” she
said. “You can’t live isolated from
the world, you have to face the fact
that there is violence out there.
But I’ve never seen a murder; I just
don’t think it’s a natural occur
ence.”
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