People Watch On Television example essay topic

Brice Mitchell Leslie Walker Writing 10218 October 1999 It is human nature to try to solve every problem that comes up. Humans just do not feel comfortable saying, "I don't know", so we work long hours searching and studying to find solutions to every problem that needs one. So when kids started torching cars, shooting students and teachers at school, smashing windows, assaulting bus drivers, and even decapitating each other, where did parents and law enforcement officers look? This is not an easy question with a definite answer, but after researchers studied hard, they found an answer: television.

Could that little box that places images on the screen really affect the behavior of people so drastically? People now blame television for everything. Irresponsible parents who do not spend enough time with their kids and law enforcement officers who do not want to investigate to find a real cause to a problem are quick to blame television when their kids do something wrong. Instead of taking responsibility for their own kids, these parents lobby for restrictions to be placed on television and ruin things for everyone else. I see two problems with that. First, it is constitutionally wrong for someone to try to limit someone else's free speech.

The constitution does not specifically mention television, but it does not mention any other form of communication so it is assumed that television is included. Secondly, it does not make a lot of sense for a few angry people to try to control what everybody watches. I love to watch television, and I would be very angry if I could not watch what I wanted because it contained too much violence or if the producers of one of my favorite shows changed it to decrease the amount of violence in it. It seems like everyone has his or her own opinion on this subject. The two most obvious are that people think television violence is bad and something should be done about it or they think violence on television does not affect people's behavior and nothing should be done. Jeffrey Klein, the author of the article "Fire Fighting Little", believes television is causing problems everywhere in the world.

In his article, he examines the causes of the rise in juvenile violence, not only in America, but worldwide. He tries to find the answer to the question, "Why is juvenile crime erupting worldwide at a time when adult crime is diminishing and there is much less violence among nations?" (Klein 3). All of the fingers point to the rise in violence on television. Klein sites several studies that show a fourteen percent rise in violence on primetime television and also shows that there is no punishment for seventy-five percent of the violent acts shown on primetime television. These studies also point out the fact that the people that commit the crimes rarely show any remorse.

He tells of stories in France and Japan where teenagers, sometimes younger children, have committed violent crimes ranging from stabbing teachers to decapitating other children. Both the French and Japanese governments blame violent movies, television and video games for there rise in crime (Klein 2). Up until this point, Klein places all of the blame for the rise in worldwide violence on television, but here he rebuts his own argument by stating that both the French and Japanese governments also place the blame for their rise in crimes committed by minors on problems in their society. The French blame the vast unemployment rate for their problems. In Japan, the cause of the problem seems to be the extreme difficulty of their school system (Klein 2). Here in America, studies were conducted on seven American boys who went on rampages.

At first, the critics blamed television violence for their behavior, but the study revealed all of the boys lived in a home that had many problems, and they usually keep to themselves (Klein 3). The second part of Klein's argument seems to weaken the total argument. By stating that these two governments admit television is not totally to blame for their problems, he lessens the effectiveness of his total argument. I agree with the second part of Jeffrey Klein's argument. I think the environment of individuals will affect their behavior more than seeing a murder on television. Maybe if the French government did something about the unemployment problem or if the Japanese government made their requirements to get into schools easier their crime rates would decrease.

I personally believe what people watch has no effect on their behavior. If parents teach their kids how to think for themselves and teach them the difference between right and wrong, it will not matter what people watch on television. In "Stuff a Gag in the V-Chip", Art Hilgart attacks the V-Chip, a new technology that would allow parents to control what their children watch, and he explained how he controlled what his children watched on television as they were growing up. He tells of how he took one of his children to see The Three Penny Opera, which contained elements some people think children should not see. He took his other son to see West Side Story, a play that contains murder and rape (Hilgart 1). Both of his sons were five years old at the time, and the so-called experts say that these things would affect their behavior, but both boys turned out fine.

Neither son ever had a criminal record. One is an English professor and the other is studying political economy at Oxford (Hilgart 2). Hilgart did not try to limit what his children watched on television. His philosophy is simple: his children could see any movie they could get into and as for television, his only warning to his children was that 'commercials are cleverly produced lies, especially those for toys and breakfast cereals' (Hilgart 1).

Art Hilgart sums up my opinion in the first line of his article: "Of all the crybabies demanding government protection from their own free will, the parents wanting ratings of television programs deserve to spend hell watching the Jetsons" (Hilgart 1). There also are a lot of people that can not decide which side of this argument they want to support. Stuart Jefferies, author of "Television is Accused of Creating a Society of Violent, Illiterate Slobs", is one of these people. He believes television does cause some problems but overall causes more good than harm.

He states that a group called TV-Free America blames television for insomnia, depression, obesity, and illiteracy (Jefferies 1). Jeffries thinks that statement is a little harsh. He does admit there is a lot of violence on television -- the average child sees eight thousand murders on television before finishing elementary school -- but he also thinks television teaches some good virtues. He says television also teaches people how to love (Jefferies 6).

He gives examples of how he sometimes hears people talking about romances on television like they actually know the people personally (Jefferies 4). People sometime overlook the good things on television and just see the bad. There are lots of good shows that teach children how to do things like count and read, but no one notices these shows. I know everything on television is not the best programming for everyone to watch and maybe kids should not be allowed to watch everything, but I do not think it could have caused all of these problems.

Everyone should only worry about the television in their home not what everyone in the country is watching.