This week in the media..

A B S * I T
Are you filling in the star for your child? By Kathryn Adams

“The people here sucked, back stabbing, manipulative, two timing, fame hungry, dim witted, certifiably insane, really weird. Psychotic, red necked, over bearing, goody-goody, know-it-all, party obsessed jerks.”

This is an excerpt out of the ABC’s newest children’s show, cartoon network reality show, Total Drama Island airing at 5:30pm on Monday. I may be turning into my mother when I say this but, do you really want to allow your children to watch this show? During one single episode I witnessed blurred nudity, bleeped out words, juvenile criminals and ‘red necked jerks’. I can not recall any of my early childhood television viewing being centered around such characteristics. The characters, who receive prizes for different challenges on the island, are developed to represent different stereotypes within society, the bully, the tom boy, the criminal, the ‘obese’ boy, the surfer girl, the DJ, the try hard and the list goes on.

Surely a G rating would mean that you could leave your child in front of the TV screen without worrying if you should turn the volume down or cover their eyes? So where does the responsibility lie. Should the media be responsible for the rating, time slot and its own affects or should it be up to the parents to protect their children from these discriminatory shows.

In 1999 in the wake of the Columbine High School Shootings many audiences claimed that video games and music were the main responsibility for the actions of the gunmen. The effects of media have been debated long before this event. It was the Payne Studies in 1928 that brought the awareness of media effects to the forefront of public opinion (Sparks, 2006, 46). Glenn Sparks writes that according to Albert Bandura, the author of the theory of social learning, children are more likely to imitate characters that receive rewards for their behavior and are seen more attractive than those who are not (2006, 48). According to Andrew Beck in his blog, How to Misrepresent Game Players -or- How to Stop People from Reaching Level 80 “Representations are extremely powerful in modern society,” authors deliberately misrepresent reality for their own benefit. The creators of Total Drama Island are deliberately misrepresenting the reality of their characters to construct them as more appealing to for viewers. The show promotes bullying through the use of degrading words and rewards.

Glenn Sparks explored the magic bullet model in his book, A Brief History of Media Effects Research. He identified that the effects of the mass media can be compared to that of a shooting gun in that “once the message reaches the audience, it will exert powerful, relatively uniform effects on everyone who processes it” (2006, 51). It was when McLeod and Reeves studied the effects of media that there was a more specific connection between the effects of content specific media. They argued that people who were exposed to a certain genre would develop attitudes similar to that of the genre (1980, 17-54).

Although many may argue that it is the responsibility of the parent to monitor their children’s viewing habits it can not be over looked that although not everyone is affected by a single message there are a select few that are. The messages underpinning Total Drama Island may not generate reactions in all viewers there will be a select few that will react.

But where can the line be drawn, when does it become the responsibility of the parent for their own child's viewing habits. Bring back the days of Teletubbies and Playschool and give the children a chance to grow up with out the prejudice.

Reference List:

Sparks, G. 2006. Media Effects Research: A Basic Overview in A Brief History of Media Effects Research, 43-62. Belmont USA: Wadsworth.

McLeod, M., B. Reeves. 1980. On the Nature of Media Effects In Television and Social Behavior: Beyond Violence and children, ed. S.B. Whitney and R.P. Abeles, 17-54. Hillsdale: Erlbaum.

Beck, A. 2009. How to Misrepresent Game Players -or- How to Stop People from Reaching Level 80. http://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_52794_1 (accessed April 16, 2009).