Dangers of Television
In 1996 the Television Parental Guidance system was created. This is the same rating system that is used to this very day. The big question if this 19 year old system is truly adequate. TV Shows are progressively becoming scarier and more violent, but the rating system has yet to reflect this change. This system is not specific enough and does not warn viewers exactly what makes the show get a certain rating. All it offers is a V for violence, but leaves the viewers wondering if there is an violent death, a brawl, or something else entirely. The rating system also ignores the fear factor. Some shows may frighten some kids and even have lasting effects. When I was eight, I watched an episode of Doctor Who for the first
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This means that the show calls for parental guidance for younger kids. It may have mild violence, suggestive dialogue, some sexual situations, or themes that are difficult to understand. This episode of Doctor Who opens lightheartedly. No one could guess what would come next. A few minutes into the show, it is revealed that the one of main characters, Rigsy, is accused of murdering someone. He had his memory wiped and discovered a tattoo on his neck that is counting down to his death. This is a very gruesome adults, let alone kids. Technically, it does comply with the standards of a PG rating, but it is ill-advised for kids to be exposed to dark plots, even if they can’t understand it. A few minutes later in the show the death of a background characters shown. A raven flew threw his chest and took his soul. This death was gruesome because the character was running and begging for his life. Even though this death was not gory, it could easily scare children. Last, the main character, Clara, dies in the same way, but this event was even darker and more emotional. Once again, this scene is not fit for young kids, even if their parents were near by. The themes of this show revolve around death, loss, and depression. These themes are not beneficial for little kids to be exposed to. The themes are too deep for them to understand. Overall, Doctor Who complies with the PG …show more content…
This episode opened with a slightly suggestive scene, but nothing that violates the PG rating. As the show progresses, two of the main characters end up in Bahrain, an area with much turmoil. In this scene there are many allusions to terrorism, violence, and suicide. The scene ends with a massive fight and a hostage situation involving a girl around the age of eight. This is past the PG rating for a few reasons. First, this scene was more than moderate violence. Secondly, it envolves the kidnapping of a child, which is not something that children should watch. Later in the show there is another intense fight scene in which a character is badly injured and the other was violently killed on screen. This was way past moderate violence and included gory images. If these scenes were not enough, the episode shows girl around the age of eight killing many grown men with her mind. This girl is the murdered by the main character. This scene is disturbing for children and adults alike. Once again, this guarantees that this show deserves at least a TV-14 rating. At the end of the show, scenes display and discusses the lasting effects of post traumatic stress disorder, which is a serious topic and is harder for kids under 14 to understand. The overall themes for this show are dark and not for children, even if their parent is watching it with them. The violence in this
This brings about another issue: children’s protection from this kind of content. More needs to be done to protect children’s eyes from inappropriate things on the TV, billboards, music, and other forms of media. Unfortunately, because society has gone as far as it has today, it will be very difficult to take a step back and re examine the effects violent media will have on children. People seem to care less and less about what children see. The need for protection from this type of content relies solely on the parents. Parents must take it upon themselves to guard their children against things on the media that they should not be seeing. Parents should be given different options with technology to help monitor the content their kids are allowed to see and what they are
A young mother has decided to take her children to see the latest blockbuster to grace the silver screen. Her two children, both boys, are aged 9 and 11. She is aware that the film they are going to see, the critically acclaimed Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises, is rated PG-13 but sees no problem with her kids seeing it. The rating states that “some material may be inappropriate for children under 13” and that “parents [should be] strongly cautioned” (Ratings Posters). But what could be so inappropriate in a Batman film that would require her parental guidance? For the following two and a half hours, images of dead bodies, grisly gun violence, and murder as well as implied sex, numerous profanities ranging from damn to a partially enunciated use of fuck, themes of terrorism and a world absent of law and order are shown to the gleaming, action hungry eyes of pre-teens. The mother leaves in utter disbelief that she had just witnessed numerous neck-snappings, head shots, and brutal beatings alongside her children. Movies these days are not what they used to be. Even the modern superhero film can be filled with graphic violence, ear splitting profanity, an abundant amount of sexual material, increasingly dark themes, and still be given a PG-13 rating. As a result of the excessive tolerance exhibited by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), films are being allowed to contain more explicit material than ever before and younger generations are being exposed to mature subject matter outside of their understanding.
The incident exemplifies a pressing issue in the ever-topical discussion of the oft-vilified film rating classification system in our country. Is the movie rating system, originally designed to assist parents in guiding the movie-going habits of their children, actually preempting parental choice?
The entire poem including the first stanza, as scanned here, is octametre with mostly trochaic feet and some iams. The use of a longer line enables the poem to be more of a narration of the evening's events. Also, it enables Poe to use internal rhymes as shown in bold. The internal rhyme occurs in the first and third lines of each stanza. As one reads the poem you begin to expect the next rhyme pushing you along. The external rhyme of the "or" sound in Lenore and nevermore at then end of each stanza imitates the haunting nature of the narrator's thoughts. The internal rhyme along with the same external rhyme repeated at the end of each stanza and other literary devices such as alliteration and assonance and give the poem a driving chant-like sound. The musicality of the rhyme also helps one to memorize the poem. This helps keep the poem in your head after you've finished reading it, lingering in your thoughts just as the narrator's thoughts are haunting him. The rhyme also helps to produce a humming beat in the readers mind driving him on steadily..
...not restrict violence in movies as much as it restricts sexual content, it allows children of young ages to be exposed to violent content, which could have serious consequences in the child’s future.
In today’s world of multimedia it has become extremely hard to avoid the introduction of adult themes to younger children, who lack the maturity to process and question the information. Young people are bombarded continually with unsuitable and undesirable concepts that give false images of acceptable behavior. Music, movies, television, internet and video games are accredited with the moral deterioration of present day youth. Great strides have been made to establish rating guidelines, parental controls and warning labels that assist adults in making informed choices on what their children should or should not be able to access but they are not perfect.
“The Raven” is a magnificent piece by a very well known poet from the 19th century, Edgar Allan Poe. Poe was well known for his dark and haunting poetry. Along with writing poetry, Poe was also recognized for his Gothic-style short stories. “The Raven” is one of Poe’s greatest accomplishments and was even turned into recitals and numerous television appearances. “The Raven” tells a story about an unnamed narrator whose beloved Lenore has left him. A raven comes at different points throughout the poem and tells the narrator that he and his lover are “Nevermore.” Poe presents the downfall of the narrator’s mind through the raven and many chilling events. By thorough review and studying of Edgar Allan Poe’s work, one can fully understand the single effect, theme, and repetition in “The Raven.”
Some books may be too depressing for children. Violent material may make children sad and take away the innocence that many adults look back on and smile. The article “Censorship: Banned Books”, states that, “…6,634 were challenges reported …737 were considered to be ‘violent’.” These violent materials may dampen the innocence that adults would cherish. Childhood is a precious resource that should be cherished, not spent on worrying about violence or other disturbing materials.
Today, our society likes to take time off to relax and watch a movie. Do you think it’s relaxing to watch people die and constantly be injured? Well most of the movies out today are violent. Even thought here are strict rating rules put on these movies, children are still seeing them. For example, The Power Rangers Movie. In this movie, five teenagers take on the roles of fighters. When kids view this PG rated movie they see how cool it is to kill other creatures and human beings. About three weeks after this movie was released in Chicago, two kids were playing power rangers; they decided to take the game a step further by involving pencils used as swords. This game ended with one of the two kids with serious incisions from the pencil. This situation could have easily been avoided if some of these movies were not so violently oriented.
The first thing that makes Jurassic Park not appropriate for young children is that it is amazingly gory. Michael Crichton describes people and animals being killed in a very descriptive manner. When Dennis Nedry, the computer programmer, was on his way to the dock to deliver frozen dinosaurs embryos to another genetic engineering company, a concrete barrier was in his way. He got out of his car and started to run into the jungle. When he reached the jungle river, he heard a soft hooting cry. When he turned around, he saw a dilophasaur standing directly in front of him. Suddenly, the dilophasaur spit at him. The novel refers to this by saying, “Nedry…felt an excruciating pain in his eyes, stabbing like spikes in the back of his skull.” It then says, “Slowly the realization came to him. He was blind…Then there was a new searing pain like a fiery knife in his belly, and then Nedry stumbled…then there was a new pain on both sides of his head. The pain grew worse, and as he was lifted to his feet he knew the dinosaur had his head in its jaws, and the horror of that realization was followed by a final wish, that it would all be ended soon (p. 196).” This demonstrates the horrifying description in the book. Another gory scene was when Ed Regis was swallowed by the juvenile T-rex. The book describes this by saying, “Regis yelled, and the juvenile ducked his head, and Regis began to scream. No words just a high pitch scream. The scream cut off abruptly, and when the juvenile lifted his head, Grant saw ragged flesh in his jaws (page 216).
There is bribing, threatening, bad usage of words, and much more. For instance, when Porky the Pig and the dog were hunting and trying to kill Bugs Bunny who they don’t like, the pig held up a sign with random symbols, indicating it is not a kid friendly word. Even though it doesn’t say a specific word, most people can figure out what it means. Another example of a scene that again is not appropriate for a children’s cartoon is in the episode “Blue Danube”. The mother of three white swans were swimming when a black duck came and started swimming along.
Children daily see hundreds of violent acts on television. Most parents notice the obvious acts of gore and try to avoid those types of shows; however, what parents do not realize is that cartoons contain just as much, if not more, violence per episode. When parents see shows such as “SpongeBob SquarePants,” for example, they seem more comical rather than violent, and do not grab the parents’ attention. However, children are more prone to being frightened by violence due to the fact that they are much more literal than older children and adults (Drinka 1).
I personally believe that children at a young age should not be exposed to nudity and cursing especially on public television. It can cause kids to act out. Lots of kids see and then do, midialit. org stated that many can't tell the difference between reality and fantasy. This can cause a lot of problems because if a child sees someone cursing on public television and then runs around cursing it looks bad for the parent and the child.
Lastly, The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy is blatantly violent, which I believe is not something children need to be watching. A main concern for violence on TV shows is that it can not only desensitize anyone to victims of such crimes, it can teach children of aggressive attitudes and behaviors. The American Psychology Association states that this violence is often glamorized, which can teach children that their actions of violence are justified. For this reason children may not suffer remorse or penalty for their actions caused from a favorite tv series. An example of this violence would be that in almost every episode as mentioned previously, characters wind up deceased or with major bodily harm and this is portrayed as humor.
I believe that the burden for teaching people right and wrong and that they should attack or kill people should be on parents and guardians rather than the television. I believe parents should teach their kids to differentiate between the real world and the world of television. I will also state that there is some burden on television and those involved in it’s creation, to forewarn the audience of the content of shows so that parents can react accordingly, either by not letting a child see something, or letting them prepare for a conversation about the content that their child will be exposed to. I believe that the rating system on television does an adequate job, but I think there should be a discussion at least about creating a more in-depth and specific system because there is just so much content and it is a daunting task for parents to keep track of and screen all of the content that their child may be exposed to. I don’t think, though, that there should be any kind of content restraint on what is produced.