Television Essay Research Paper Television Violence and — страница 2

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act, he will eventually begin to have no emotion towards it. This process is known as desensitizing. When people are no longer aroused by violence they become less responsive to human suffering and may not be as willing to help during an emergency. Because society is becoming more aggressive, there will be more violent situations and if people do not help because they are desensitized to the violence, many lives could be lost (Lacayo). Television shows like Cops, WWF, Jerry Springer, and even cartoons flood the “must see” hours. Violent acts are constantly being used for a main source of entertainment. The study’s research showed that in most of the films, shows and videos they examined, violence was often portrayed as harmless or without consequence, but this does not make

it okay to kill someone as long as they are a villain. Violent acts like this are seen so much that society becomes less and less affected by it when it becomes reality. Little kids especially mimic anything they see on TV unknowing of the true consequences. Little kids are getting a hold of guns and shooting their friends accidentally because they are unaware of reality (Consalvo). Other effects of watching too much television violence at an early age are lack of concentration, no usage of body muscles (hence the term couch potato), a decrease in a child s sensitivity towards others, lack of creative, original thinking, and eventually trouble with relationships. By the time a teenage graduates from high school, they will have witnessed over 200,000 acts of violence on the

television alone. Television watchers put in less effort on school work, have poorer reading skills, are not as socially active, have fewer friends, have fewer hobbies, and are more likely to be overweight. Before a child even finishes elementary school, he will have seen over 20,000 murders (Dennings and Kalin). Perhaps the most famous case of television violence influencing a child took place in October 1993, in Morraine, Ohio. Two year old Jessica Matthews was killed by her five-year old brother after he set fire to their mobile home. The boy claimed that he lit the fire after watching an episode of Beavis and Butthead, who are notorious for being pyromaniacs. The case was widely reported in the United States and as a result, Beavis and Butthead was moved to a later time spot

(Kalin). In research studies performed on children it was discovered that aggression, academic problems, unpopularity with peers, and violence feed off each other. This promotes violent behavior in the children. The child watches violent programming, which causes aggression. The combination of aggression and continued television viewing lead to poor academic standings as well as unpopularity (Kalin). These can cause more aggression and a cycle begins to spin. In another piece of research children who watch a lot of violent television were compared to children who don t. The results were that the children who watched more violent television were more likely to agree that it s okay to hit someone, but only if it were for a good reason. The other group learned that problems can be

solved passively, through discussion. The most important aspect of violence in television is preventing it. There are many ways in which it can be prevented, but not often are many carried out. One such solution is to create conflict without killing. Michael Landon, who starred in and directed Little House on the Prairie, managed to do so in his programs. His goal was to put moral lessons in his show in an attempt to teach while entertaining. On the program The Brady Bunch the conflicts are usually personal and moral matters among the characters. Although some violence does occur in these programs, the theme is not the action, but rather its consequences (Kalin). Perhaps the most important way to prevent children from watching television violence is to stop it where it starts.

The parents should step in and turn the set off when a violent program comes on. The parents are the children s role models from which they learn. If they can learn at an early age that violence on television is bad, then they can turn the set off for themselves when they is older. Education should start at home (Dennings). Fixing the problems of children and television violence isn t easy. There are many factors that have to be considered and people to be convinced. This problem will, no doubt, never go away and continue to get worse as the years go by. However, there are measures that can be taken to prevent the children from ever being exposed to such things. After all, what s the world going to be like when the people who are now children are running the world? Works Cited