Regulating Violence on TV: Some Recommended Reading

Well, here we go again. Politicians in Washington are talking about regulating “excessive violence” on television, and this time around they plan to sanitize cable and satellite TV while they’re at it. I’ll have more to say about this issue in coming days and weeks as the debate unfolds. For now, I thought I’d just pass along some recommended reading for policy makers who haven’t given enough consideration to the sensibility or constitutionality of this quixotic endevour:

• Jonathan Freedman, Media Violence and Its Effect on Aggression: Assessing the Scientific Evidence (University of Toronto Press, 2002).

• Robert Corn-Revere “Regulating TV Violence: The FCC’s Rorschach Test,” Communications Lawyer, Vol. 22, No. 3, Fall 2004.

• Geoffrey R. Stone, “The First Amendment Implications of Government Regulation of ‘Violent’ Programming on Cable Television,” NCTA regulatory filing to the FCC, October 15, 2004.

• Jib Fowles, “The Whipping Boy: The Hidden Conflicts Underlying the Campaign against Violent TV,” Reason, March 2001.

• Amicus brief of various scholars and authors in the field of media and communications in Indianapolis video games censorship case, 2001.

• Gerard Jones, Killing Monsters: Why Children Need Fantasy, Super Heroes, and Make-Believe Violence, (Basic Books. 2002).

• Harold Schechter, Savage Pastimes: A Cultural History of Violent Entertainment, (St. Martin’s Press, 2005).

… and, what the heck, I’ll throw in two things I’ve written on the subject while I’m at it…

• Adam Thierer, “Censoring Violence in Media,” Cato Institute TechKnowledge No. 86, August 10, 2004.

• Adam Thierer, “Thinking Seriously about Cable & Satellite Censorship: An Informal Analysis of S-616, The Rockefeller-Hutchison Bill,” PFF Progress on Point 12.6, April 2005.

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