Since the creation of man, violence has played a natural part of human nature. Throughout the millennia, it has also become a crude form of entertainment for our species, especially since the arm of technology has extended its arm’s reach so greatly. To the surprise -- and anger -- of many, the majority of today’s addictive media revolves on an axis of desperation around violence. Although this may sound like a barbaric trend, it is a majority of greater good for many logical reasons. Violence in the media prepares children for the harsh slap of reality, helps them overcome their petty or crippling fears, and eminently benefits the economy; therefore, violence should more or less be widely accepted into modern media.
The innocent thoughts of children could bring an army’s worth of the toughest men to their knees, but their ignorance will not protect them later in life. Violence in media, though, will inflate their knowledge and expectations of the outside world with a practical imagination. Research states that an average twenty acts of violence occur per hour on children television shows, while an average of crimes committed per hour is significantly more. This will provide children a harmless yet realistic experience of the demeanor of society. As stated before, untrained children would be wiped out like an entirely different species as soon as they take a step into the outside world. Although some critics argue that “when young people view media violence over and over again, they can become emotionally numb -- or desensitized -- to its impact,” (Gelletly 52), there is no solid proof nor research evident to the statement’s truth. Still, not even a decade’s worth of media violence could cure a child of fear.
Fear is a constantly ...
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...d today, violence in the media cannot be prevented. Since that stands solid, we humans have found countless ways to gain strengths and weaknesses from it all, especially children. From preparation to fearlessness to money, violence in the media can be most certainly beneficial to people of all ages if taken in a serious yet professional manner. Albeit, there are some grisly boundaries in the world of violence that should not be crossed; however, if they not crossed beforehand in the farseness of media, the human population risks the boundaries being crossed in reality. That raises the definitive answer to the constant debate: Reality is violence, and reality is forever inescapable.
Works Cited
Gelletly, LeeAnne. "Desensitization." Violence in the Media. San Diego: Lucent, 2005. 52-66. Print.
Jones, Gerard. "Politics." Mother Jones. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2014.
Violent Media is Good for Kids, by Gerard Jones, is an article which makes many claims to support the argument in which a controlled amount of violence could be beneficial for a young, developing child. Even though the topic of this article can be controversial, the claims serve to support the argument in many noteworthy ways. It is written in such a way that it tells a story, starting when the author was a child and works its way to his adulthood. In this case the author uses, what I believe to be just the correct amount of each rhetorical strategy, and fulfills his goal for writing the article. This argument is interesting and at the same time, effective. Throughout the analyzing process logos, ethos, and pathos are searched for and scrutinized.
Gina Marchetti, in her essay "Action-Adventure as Ideology," argues that action- adventure films implicitly convey complex cultural messages regarding American values and the "white American status quo." She continues to say that all action-adventure movies have the same basic structure, including plot, theme, characterization, and iconography. As ideology, this film genre tacitly expresses social norms, values, and morals of its time. Marchetti's essay, written in 1989, applies to films such as Raiders of the Lost Ark and Rambo: First Blood II. However, action-adventure films today seem to be straying farther away from her generalizations about structure, reflecting new and different cultural norms in America. This changing ideology is depicted best in Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers (1994), which defies nearly every concept Marchetti proposes about action-adventure films; and it sets the stage for a whole new viewpoint of action in the '90's.
Leo, John. "The Amount of Violence on Television Has Been Exaggerated." Media Violence: Opposing Viewpoints. Ed. William Dudley. San Diego: Greenhaven, 1999.
When families sit down to watch television, they expect to watch family type of shows. Family type shows meaning rated PG or PG13, sitcoms and movies that do not include weapons, killing, foul language, and non-socially accepted actions. When children killing, they start to believe that it is accepted. Do children think that killing and hurting others and themselves have little meaning to the real life, children can become traumatized. Most killers or violators of the law blame their behavior on the media, and the way that television portrays violators. Longitudinal studies tracking viewing habits and behavior patterns of a single individual found that 8-year-old boys, who viewed the most violent programs growing up, were the most likely to engage in aggressive and delinquent behavior by age 18 and serious criminal behavior by age 30 (Eron, 1). Most types of violence that occur today links to what people see on television, act out in video games or cyberspace games, or hear in music. Media adds to the violence that exists today and in the past few decades. It will continue in the future if it is not recognized as a possible threat to our society. When kids go to a movie, watch television, play video games or even surf the web, they become part of what they see and hear. Soaking violence in their heads long enough becomes a part of the way they think, acts, and live. The line between pretend and reality gets blurred.
With today’s technology and media presence, a child may watch more violence in thirty minutes than an adult experiences throughout their whole life.
According to John Davidson's essay Menace to Society, "three-quarters of Americans surveyed [are] convinced that movies, television and music spur young people to violence." While public opinion is strong, the results of research are divided on the effects of media violence on the youth in this country. Davidson wrote that most experts agree that some correlation between media violence and actual violent acts exists, yet the results are contradictory and researchers quibble about how the effects are to be measured (271). Moreover, Davidson is not convinced that the media is the sole problem of violence, or even a primary problem. He points out that other factors, such as "poverty, the easy accessibility of guns, domestic abuse, [and] social instability" may have a greater impact on a child becoming violent than the influence of the media (277). Even though other forces may be stronger, media violence does have some adverse effects on the members of society. If senseless violence on television and in movies had no effect, it would not be such a hotly debated topic. What type of effects and whom they affect are the most argued aspects of the discussion.
Does entertainment influence society's attitude towards violent behavior? In order to fully answer this question we must first understand what violence is. Violence is the use of one's powers to inflict mental or physical injury upon another; examples of this would be rape or murder. Violence in entertainment reaches the public by way of television, movies, plays, music, and novels. Through the course of this essay it will be proven that violence in entertainment is a major factor in the escalation of violence in society, once this is proven we will take all of the evidence that has been shown throughout this paper and come to a conclusion as to whether or not violence in entertainment is justified and whether or not it should be censored.
Javier, Rafael Art., William G. Herron, and Louis Primavera. “Violence and the Media: A Psychological
The daily diet of violence and sex that the media feeds to children poses a serious risk to the future of the nation, writes Sisela Bok in Mayhem: Violence as Public Entertainment (1998). "Is it alarmist or merely sensible to ask about what happens to the souls of children nurtured, as in no past society, on images of rape, torture, bombings, and massacres that are channeled into their homes from infancy?" asks Bok. Before finishing elementary school, the average child will see some 8,000 murders and 100,000 acts of violence on television, according to a study by
The Internet is filled with grotesque images of violence – from gore websites, to “funny” videos involving graphic fights, and even news websites reporting on grizzly sites. Some of these things give teenagers entertainment and information, but at what cost to their minds? It seems that the Internet has created a new obsession with violence, but this fascination with violence is not new, as “the American psyche has… always been just as obsessed with violence as today”. The difference is that “viewers before the Vietnam era wouldn’t have been able to get their fix of it from film and television as they are now” (Nunnelly). Though many could argue that this new technology has no correlation to violent behavior, it has been shown in many cases that “violence in entertainment media is also considered by many to be a major contributor to aggressive and violent behavior” (Funk, 24). Earlier generations did not have the ability to gain access to violence as easily as “generation Z”. There is so much viole...
Several studies in the past decades have systematically assessed the prominence of violence in television. The results of the studies revealed that around 61 percent of shows on television alone contained some sort of violence, it is probable that those numbers significantly rose with the dawn of youtube and other forms of media that allows people to upload their own videos online for the world to see. Even terror groups use social media to show their violence such as ISIS and its twitter accounts revealing the beheadings of innocent civilians for the public to see. Violence in our society, though hard to admit is almost accepted and almost in a sense glamorized, “...nearly 75 percent of all violent scenes featured no immediate punishment or condemnation for violence. And almost 45 percent of the programs feature "bad" characters that are never or rarely punished for their aggressive actions.”(Donnerstein, Ed.) Most violence is not factual, as in the interactions that take place in let’s a fight or any other violent activity is unrealistic and not possible, but done in a way that some people viewing may accept it as possible and
Typically set in a crime stricken city. Centered around drugs, money, and violence. This is just a small overview of one of the best-selling video game series in the United States, Grand Theft Auto. Each game that is released is more violent and gory than the last. The high amount of violence contained in each game has risen one question to the surface of everyone’s mind, can media violence lead to the real thing? Even though we are continuously surrounded by violent films and games, most people would say violent media leads to a violent lifestyle, but I myself do not believe that.
As long as violent programmes are shown on TV, the role of the mass media becomes completely different from how it was originally treated. Violence is socially harmful and especially the youth are very prone to such scenes that may strongly affect their psyches. It is true that programmes featuring cruel pictures are marked as ‘only for adults’ but the time when they are emitted is relatively early and the access to them seems to be rather unlimited to young people.
...onditions that ensure an adequate counterbalance increasing consumption in some cases, end up having a negative effect on children. Children learn best through demonstration followed by imitation, with rewards for doing things the right way. While not all are affected the same way, it can be said that, in general, violence in the media affects attitudes, values and behaviors of users. You run the risk that children end up understanding that it is reasonably practicable to resort to violence. The fear is that the models of aggressive behavior can be considered suitable. Thus, in an investigation, a good proportion of children (third) defined as normal acts of violence they had seen him mightily little. It is not; here is a risk of direct imitation, but rather a change in terms of reference: where extreme violence appears to be normal any more light may seem harmless.
By the time a child reaches the age of one, they see about 200,000 acts of violence on television. (Nakaya, 3). The Media has been becoming more and more violent over the years. A poll in an issue of Times Magazine, from 2005, showed that 66 percent of Americans think that there is an abundant amount of graphic acts of violence on televisions (Nakaya, 18). People are exposed to thousands of acts of violence through video games, television, and movies. Many studies show that media violence increases violent behavior in in humans. Studies show, violent video games, and graphic television have physiological effects on children. The government has very few regulations on media violence. Some people believe the government shouldn’t limit content because others might be insulted by its material. Media violence is such a broad topic and has such a large presence in daily lives, so we cannot simple get rid of it. The Federal Communications Commission stipulates, “By the time most children begin the third grade, they will have spent the equivalent of three school years in front of a television set.” Even though the government shouldn’t censor the media, Media violence is becoming a serious issue because it is becoming more violent, it makes people behave violently, and it has little regulations.