Political Social or Cultural Issue That Has Impacted Society

Political, Social, Or Cultural Issue That Has Impacted the Society

In this essay, I will focus on the issue of violence on television and argue how it has impacted the society. I believe that over the years, television programs have become more violent. The research indicate that the children who watch less TV are less bothered by violence and the children, who watch more violent program in general become less sensitive to the pain and suffering of others, turn into more fearful of the others, behave aggressively toward other people, decrease cooperation with others, and undermine the human and social values. The impact of TV violence may be evident immediately in a child's behavior or may emerge years later.

Research also states that sixty percent of the content of TV programs is filled with violent scenes. Such programs often portray violence with success. According to Neifert (1995) the problem of TV violence has become more serious, because children spend a great deal of time in watching TV programs in which they come across several violent TV scenes. This problem becomes especially critical for children, as they have a harder time than adults distinguishing fantasy from reality and linking scenes together.

The abundance of violent scenes in TV cartoon program is also common. Shooting, stabbing, and killing are carried out by many carton characters, which are armed with handguns, missiles, and swords to kill their enemies. These kinds of programs are often targeted to children less than 7 to 8 years of age. Many children in this age group are unable to link the storylines together and may be easily influenced by the violence.

The topic of violence on TV is important to me because I believe that in recent years there have been sporadic incidents of school shootings across the country. The school used to be a safe place, a sanctuary for learning and knowledge gathering. However, when children feel threatened in the school because of the violence, we must look for the ways that will make school a safer and better place.

Obviously, one way to reduce violence in school is to ensure that parents carefully control and monitor their children's TV watching habits, or parents should watch TV programs with their children to guide them through the process of explaining what is good value and what is not good value. When children are taught strong values, they over time begin to make distinction between reality and fantasies for making the correct decisions in the real life.