Violence on TV

Ellen Goodman’s essay “How to Zap Violence,” is an essay about a device called the V-chip. The V-chip is supposed to help parents alter television shows that prove to be too violent for their children to watch. Bill Clinton promises “new technologies can put you back in the drive’s seat in your life”(458). The new idea is very appealing to parents who are concerned with the type of messages that come from their television.
Goodman states that Ed Donnerstein as not a “cultural coroner”(457). He feels that you can’t understand the dilemma with violence by doing a mere “body count” or a “bullet count”(457). The problem is more complex that just counting the bodies. It is true that not all the violence on television is equally damaging to young viewers. So the question is, what kinds of programs are harmful to young children and what types are of children are harmed.
On twenty-three channels, researchers analyzed 2,693 television programs that contain...