Miedzian and Postrel - Comparision

Comparison/contrast of Miedzian and Postrel

According to Virginia Postrel's essay "TV or not TV" and Myriam Miedzian's "How We Can Tune Out Children from Television Violence," Americans are concerned about violence in today's society. The only common ground found between both of these articles is that violence is a consistent problem in the United States. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, in 2002 approximately, 47.6% of whites were victims of gun homicide, while 50.6% of blacks are murdered by guns. Both authors agree that violence is inevitable in today's society, but they have different perspectives. When it comes down to television violence there are two types of people. Those who want to blame the rise in violence on television violence and have stricter TV censorship. While many others want to defend television from its attackers and leave TV the way it currently is now. These two essays argue the opposite ends of the topic, Miedzian argues in favor of TV censorship, while Postrel disagrees and thinks that television air waves should be left alone.

According to Myriam Miedzian the average American child had seen approximately 26,000 murders on television. Miedzian believes that television causes Americans to be the least physically fit, and she uses an logical fallacy stating that TV causes more teenage mothers and irresponsible fathers. To help censor television Miedzian wants the United Stated to control TV violence more by having all televisions equipped with lock boxes, so parents can prevent their children from watching inappropriate shows. Meanwhile Postrel debates that television is not to blame. She is strongly against television censorship. She states:

"They are quite willing to sacrifice the freedom of the many to the willful violence of the few, to ban powerful works of art because some people commit evil acts. That way you don't have to make moral judgments. You can simply blame television for crime." (Postrel, 459)

Postrel uses sarcasm to get her point across. We as people make decisions for ourselves we don't let the television make them for us.

A study done by psychiatrist, Brandon S. Centerwall stated that homicide rates among whites in the United States, Canada, and South Africa raised after television was introduced to these countries. His conclusion was that "children raised watching television start killing each other when they become adults." (Postrel, 459) In Miedzian's "How We Can Tune Out Children from Television Violence," essay she uses the same Centerwall study but supports his research, stating the following:

"Centerwall examined other possible casual