Media programmes containing violence have an immense impact on children and adolescents. Their exposure to scenes on violence in media, including televisions, movies, music and video games, poses a serious health risk to them. An extensive research indicates that media violence can contribute to children's aggressiveness in behaviour, desensitisation, nightmares and even the fear of being harmed. Parents do not do enough to address the cause of aggressiveness in their behaviour just allowing them to be less sensitive to the pains and sufferings of others and be more fearful of the world around them.
The children and adolescents are the asset in our society. Every effort should be made to provide them with equal opportunities for development so that they grow up as citizens who are physically fit and morally are right-minded and they are also endowed with skills and motivations that the society needs. Neglected children and juveniles fall an easy prey to criminality. Adolescents are more prone to violence than the people of other age groups due to their daredevil nature, lack of foresight, enthusiasm, physical strength and desire for adventure. Though violence is nothing new in society, it is now a growing problem. The media has a tangible impact on our lives and behaviour, especially the immature and mentally weak people in society.
Some researchers have found that very young children imitate aggressive acts on TV in their play with peers. Before the age of 4 children are unable to distinguish between the fact and fantasy and may view violence as an ordinary occurrence.
Heroes are violent and so they are rewarded for their behaviour. They become role models for youths. The typical scenes of using violence for a righteous cause may translate in daily life into a justification for using violence to retaliate against perceived victimisers. Hence, vulnerable youths who have been victimised may be tempted to use violent means to resolve problems. Unfortunately, there are few, if any, models of nonviolent conflict resolution in the media. Additionally, children who watch televised violence get desensitised to it. They may come to see violence as a fact of life and, over time, lose their ability to empathise with both the victim and the victimiser.
According to a recent study, the average 8 to 10-year-old children spend nearly eight hours a day with different media, and older children and teenagers spend >11 hours per day. Presence of a television (TV) set in a child's bedroom increases these figures even more, and 71 per cent of children and teenagers report having a TV set in the bedroom each. Nearly all teenagers (88 per cent) use text messaging. Teenagers actually talk less on their phones than any other age group except for senior citizens, but in the first 3 months of 2011, teenagers of 13-17 years of age sent on an average 3,364 texts per month. A half of the teenagers send 50 or more text messages per day and one-third send more than 100 per day. Teenagers access social media sites from cell phones.
More than 60 per cent of teenagers send and/or receive text messages after "lights out," and they report increased levels of tiredness, including at school. One study found that 20 per cent adolescents either sent or received sexually explicit images by cell phone or Internet. The following forms of violence comprised 77 per cent of the violent and graphically violent depictions aired during primetime broadcast: Child molestation, rape, mutilation/disfigurement, dismemberment, graphic killings and/or injuries by gunfire and stabbings, violent abductions, physical torture, cannibalism, burning flesh, suicide, beatings, guns and bladed weapons that were depicted but not used, and dead bodies. There were a total of 512 guns and bladed weapons depicted across all the broadcast shows examined in the study. Almost 70 per cent of those were guns. On a broadcast television a bladed weapon or gun appeared on the screen in every 3 minutes.
These calculations do not give the duration of a weapon appearing on the screen. Children watching 4 episodes of Revolution (during the fall of 2013) were exposed to, on an average, 91.5 acts of violence per episode. That is equivalent to a child seeing one act of violence every 39 seconds. Revolution aired more violence than 6 of the 7 most violent shows on cable and more graphic violence than 4 of the 7 most violent shows on cable.
Pediatricians offer the following recommendations to the entertainment industry for addressing the problem: (a) Avoid glamorisation of weapon carrying and normalisation of violence as an acceptable means of resolving conflicts, (b) Eliminate the use of violence in a comic or sexual context or in any other situation in which the violence is amusing, titillating or trivialised, (c) eliminate gratuitous portrayals of interpersonal violence and hateful, racist, misogynistic or homophobic language or situation unless explicitly portraying how destructive such words and actions can be, (d) if violence is used, it should be used thoughtfully as a serious drama, always showing the hurt and the loss suffered by the victims and the perpetrators, (e) music lyrics should be made easily available to parents so they can be read before deciding whether to purchase the recording, (f) video games should not use human or other living targets or award points for killing, because this teaches children to associate pleasure and success with their ability to cause pains and sufferings to others, (g) video games based on violence should be restricted, more specifically the distribution of videos and video games and the exhibition of movies should be limited to appropriate age groups.
Some major strategies should be considered to push down the trend of media violence at the societal level: first, to create public opinions through public debates and "common ground" talks between the five Ps: Politicians, Producers, Pedagogy, Parents and the probable Prosumers (active consumers); secondly, framing codes of conduct and developing self-control of media professionals; thirdly, the establishment of media education to create awareness among children, adolescents, competent and critical media users. As the citizens of Bangladesh, a developing country, we all have to pay more attention to our children and adolescents. We have to try our best to avoid unexpected and unacceptable cultural values which do not match our culture and tradition. Our government should implement a media policy to put a brake on ruination of our culture, tradition, norms and values alongside putting an end to media violence so that our children may grow up in a healthy and peaceful environment.
The writer is a lecturer of the Department of Sociology at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Science and Technology University.
anisrahaman01@gmail.com
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