TV VIOLENCE

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It is essential for  the well-being of the Youth  of Australia that we

adopt a less tolerant attitude to violence on  television. It has been

known  for  some time that  young  children  can  be disturbed by  the

violent scenes presented  by the television  scene. No apparent effort

however has been made by either the producers of children's programmes

or the programmers of children's programmes to take this into account:

one only   has to look at the   extraordinary popular cartoon `Teenage

Mutant Ninja Turtles'.  At some schools   it was necessary  to ban the

accessories  associated  with the   programme  because  children  were

engaging in fights in  the playground, emulating their cartoon heroes;

this  sort of situation is deplorable,  this  incident also highlights

how impressionable young children are. There is a definite danger that

children, after  years of exposure to violence  on television, come to

accept  that violence is an acceptable  solution to conflict. It is of

vital importance for the future of Australia that young people realize

that  violence is   not to be    condoned, nor applauded. It is   also

essential that young people do not associate violence with bravery and

heroism, which is an inevitable outcome  if we persist in allowing our

children to be influenced by the garbage that  fills our screens every

afternoon  and evening, and  succeeds in passing for entertainment. It

is  possible that children  come to accept  violence as an inevitable,

but vaguely unpleasant part of the world. if this unfortunate scenario

becomes true,    we will  never  combat violence.     It is of  utmost

importance  then, that  the   television industry assumes  a  sense of

responsibility by  carefully regulating the   materials that appear in

children's programmes.