Uncertain Effects Of Television Violence

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30405, 2 April 1964, Page 1

Uncertain Effects Of Television Violence

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, April 1.

One could never be sure that the small number of young, disturbed persons were not affected by a display of violence on the television screen, the chairman of the New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation (Dr F. J. Llewellyn) said today.

He was addressing a meeting of the Honorary Justices of the Peace Association, of Wellington and district, on the occasion of the corporation’s second anniversary.

The effect of violence on viewers was by no means a clear-cut issue, he said. There was little evidence that violence in films was automatically harmful. Referring to censorship, Dr. Llewellyn said that problems had been simplified because, though not obliged to by law, the corporation -submitted overseas television films to the Government film censor. There were also the “ground rules” which the television industry itself had formulated. Nevertheless there remained four areas in which censorship problems were ever present: sex, liquor, crudity and violence.

“There is always a conflict between the portrayal of life as it is, with all its crudity and sex, and life as some people would like it to be. “On the one hand, we are urged to be original, even dazzling. Then there are complaints. On the other hand, there are those who would be

even more restrained than we already are. “One tries to steer a course that is morally and ethically justifiable between these two extremes. “Why are there so many American programmes?” Dr. Llewellyn said he was often asked. The simple answer was that 90 per cent of television pro-

grammes produced throughout the world were American.

“Why are there so few locally produced programmes?” was another common question. But up to 30 per cent of television time was taken up by locally-made material, including news and advertising. That was a high figure for an industry as young as New Zealand’s.