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Why Does The Media Industry Fail To See The Problem affecting children? 

The negative impact of media violence on our children is supported by hundreds of studies and research materials, yet the industry (producers and distributors of Entertainment Violence) chooses to ignore these facts and continue as normal, dishing out more violent programs.

Do we know the reason why? Can all these premier health association and research institutes be wrong? Can producers and distributors of violent programs/products targeting children be right?

Why does the industry fail see these efforts against violent content in multimedia? The answers could be simple:

Violent content sells and industry (producers and distributors of Entertainment Violence content) is not willing to disturb that equation;

The bottom line is revenue/profits. They do not want to lose them;

The industry does not want to recognize these reports;

Efforts are made to ignore or downplay them;

The industry wants to give a ‘look and feel’ that everything is fine.

The above reasons are not without basis. Big Tobacco, or the seven largest tobacco products manufacturers in the United States, was in similar situation a couple of decades ago.

 The Tobacco Industry Shows Us The Reason

Millions die, every year, from tobacco use. The companies that make up Big Tobacco, as well as their public relations agents, lawyers and industry fronts, have known for more than 40 years that their tobacco products contain large amounts of nicotine – a highly addictive substance – as well as numerous carcinogens and other harmful elements.[i][i]

Tobacco products are not only addictive; they are abnormally dangerous and unfit for human use. Tobacco products kill, maim and injure virtually all who use  them. The tobacco companies know this, but continue to deny the existence of   adverse health effects in their public statements.

Despite evidence showing their cigarettes caused lung disease and cancer, Big Tobacco chose sales over public health and safety. Starting in the 1930s and continuing until the mid-1950s, Big Tobacco made express claims and warranties as to the healthiness of their products with reckless disregard to the falsity of their claims and the consequential adverse impact on consumers. Examples of these health warranties include the following: Old Gold – ‘Not a cough in a Carload’; Camel – ‘Not a single case of throat irritation due to smoking Camels’; Philip Morris – ‘The throat-tested cigarette’.

Consequences:

Approximately 50 million residents of the United States smoke cigarettes and another six million use smokeless tobacco products. Nationwide, tobacco-related deaths are a national tragedy: more than 400,000 deaths per year in the United States are tobacco related.

Here are some numbers published by the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2002:

Tobacco use is the single most preventable cause of death and disease, causing 442,398 premature deaths in the United States annually from 1995 to 1999;

Direct medical expenditures attributed to smoking have risen since the early 1990s and now total more than $75 billion per year. In addition to direct medical expenditures, smoking results in losses to productivity. Those losses now total more than $80 billion per year.[ii][ii]

In the first class-action suit by sick smokers to come to trial, a Florida jury found that cigarette makers addicted and defrauded smokers and could be forced to pay billions of dollars in damages. According to the verdict, cigarette companies had concealed the dangers of smoking, conspired to hide their addictiveness and made a product that caused more than a dozen deadly diseases from heart disease to lung cancer.[iii][iii]

If Big Tobacco had their way, they would never have admitted that smoking was injurious to health and they would have continued to sell the pleasure of smoking even today. Awareness against smoking, government rulings and resultant rejection of product by consumers helped us move away from tobacco.

What we learn from this:

Industry will go to any length to protect its business, even if it involves killing more than 400,000 people every year or creates health costs running to billions of dollars.

If we translate the Big Tobacco experience to the Entertainment Violence industry, in context to our children, the lessons could be:

Caveat Emptor – Consumer beware;

Media works in its best interest – not necessarily that of our kids;

The sole motive of industry is revenue and profits;

The media industry is not interested in being socially responsible;

They are your kid/s – you should protect them.

Tobacco vs. Entertainment Violence Industry: