Children's Media

Recently there has been much concern for the violence, the sexual content and the bad language that is incorporated into adolescent TV programs and media in general. Today, each and every piece of media available to the public is created with the interest of making money. Coincidentally for some unknown and twisted reason, everything that we would like to ride this world of is what most of us are attracted to. With undiscovered shame, the genre the American people want to see most is that of reality TV shows. Shows with the harsh reality we must face such as sex, violence, and crime. People get wrapped up in television lives where in real reality they cease to live their own.

Our past daily influences are what shaped us into the people we are today. We get our ascents form the language we speak, what would make s think that we would not get some sort of ascent from all of the media influence we get? One might find it disturbing to think about the influences that is reaching our youth, our future. All sorts of explicate content fills our media. How much and to what extent is our youth being exposed to?

The youth in America, ages 2 through 18, participate in six to eight hours of media a day. In one day they watch more TV, listen to more music and read more magazines than they sleep. Think about it. We are most usually always listening to music, on the computer, reading a magazine etc, we are almost always completely immersed in media. There is no way that one can have so much exposure to an outside influence and think that there will be no side effects. That is like staying out in the sun and expecting not to get sun burned. There is always an opposite and equal reaction for everything that happens in this world. One would have to wonder what the reaction is when such a heavy supply of harsh content is weighing on our pliable youth.

One topic in particular that is disturbing scientists and has concerned parents is the amount of violence that is publicized. The National Television Violence Study evaluated almost 10,000 hours of broadcast programming from 1995 through 1997. Nearly 417 days of television programs, more than a full year of material, was studied. The NTV found that 61% of the programs examined portrayed interpersonal violence, much of it in an entertaining or glamorized manner.

Frequently American media portrays violence as a necessary means to succeed; often “heroes” are portrayed using violence as a justified means of resolving conflict and prevailing over others. They observed that television, movies, and music videos depicted weapons as a source of personal power and in turn makes them wanted and accepted in the media.

Alarmingly the highest proportion of violence found in TV programming was in children's shows. Of all animated feature films produced in the United States between 1937 and 1999, 100% portrayed violence. How often is anything 100%? Watching adolescent programs as an older viewer, mush fo the content surprised me.

Just because we are immune to the things that we are watching does not make them ok/acceptable. We are allowing harmful influential content to reach our children. If we are not allowed to go around killing people, then why is it allowed on our TV? It seems to me that we in a way are telling our children to go out I in the rain but not to get wet. Material that is being provided for is affecting; it is cluttering, hazing and creating a thought pattern that would not be found in the mind unless we put it there. It is the lack of processed knowledge that keeps people blissfully unaware of the harsh and soon to be bitter matters of this world. Violence we are expected never to commit is deemed ok in media, People are concerned for the content in children’s media because there is reason to be.