NEWS RELEASE
For More Information Contact: Elizabeth Ben-Ishai (202) 588-7746
For Immediate Release: March 29th, 2002
Will President Bush Act to Reduce Americans' TV Watching to Curb Violence
Science Magazine released a study yesterday showing a link between TV watching by adolescents, and violent and aggressive behavior against others. Today, Commercial Alert urged President George W. Bush to make it a priority of his administration to reduce television watching by kids. The letter follows.
Dear President Bush:
During the 2000 campaign, you repeatedly encouraged parents and children to watch less television, or to turn off the television. For example, during the campaign, the Associated Press reported that you told a third grade class in San Diego to pick up a book instead of watching TV. In a debate with then-Vice President Al Gore, you said that to prevent TV and popular culture from undermining the values we pass onto our children, “the best weapon is the off-on button and paying attention to your children...”
Your administration has not yet turned these campaign statements about TV into action. But now comes an excellent opportunity to do so.
Science Magazine published a study today by Jeffrey Johnson of Columbia University that confirms what common sense tells us about television and aggression. The study showed a link between TV viewing during adolescence and adulthood, and aggressive acts, including violent crime.
The study, titled “Television Viewing and Aggressive Behavior During Adolescence and Adulthood,” found that adolescents who watched one or more hours of TV per day were four times more prone to subsequent violent acts than those who watched less than one hour of TV per day. The researchers discovered that only 5.7% of the teenagers who watched less than one hour of TV committed aggressive acts when they got older, compared to 22.5% of teenagers who watched 1-3 hours per day. For those who watched three or more hours of TV per day, 45.2% of males and 12.7% of females committed aggressive acts.
The study found that TV viewing was associated with aggressive acts against other people in general, as well as assault, robbery, physical fights, threats to injure someone, and use of a weapon to commit a crime.
As you know, violence and violent crime are a plague on our nation. We are sure that, as President, you would do everything in your power to reduce violence and violent crime. This new Science study reconfirms what millions of Americans—especially parents and teachers—already know: that we can have less violent, safer homes and neighborhoods if our children watch less TV.
This is just one of many reasons to make less TV watching a priority for your administration. There are more: childhood obesity, lack of reading time, and too little time spent together between children and families. Is there a single reason to feel good about the amount of TV that children watch today? Of course not.
We urge you to mobilize your administration to reduce TV watching—especially among our nation’s youth. In specific, we suggest that you:
- Use the presidency and the “bully pulpit” to convince Americans to cut TV watching by at least 50 percent over the next three years;
- Instruct Attorney General John Ashcroft to integrate efforts to reduce TV viewing into the Justice Department’s strategies to curb violent crime;
- Instruct the new Surgeon General, Richard Carmona, to use his office aggressively to urge Americans to halve the amount of television they watch; and,
- Support federal legislation to put warning labels on new TV sets that say: “Watching TV may cause violent behavior."
Sincerely,
Gary Ruskin, Executive Director, Commercial Alert
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Commercial Alert’s mission is to keep the commercial culture within its proper sphere, and to prevent it from exploiting children and subverting the higher values of family, community, environmental integrity and democracy. Commercial Alert’s website is at http://www.commercialalert.org.
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