Fanning the fire over `Beavis'

Friday, October 15, 1993 by Donna Gable USA TODAY

Beavis and Butt-head -- MTV's notorious animated fire-starters -- are on the front burner with critics. An Ohio mother says the cartoon incited her 5-year-old son to start a fire which killed his 2-year-old sister. And Austin, Texas, investigators say three fires started by kids may have some connection to the show.

MTV claimed no responsibility for the Ohio tragedy by it's removing fire references from episodes of the weekday show, which features the antics of two misfit teens. Dr. George Gerbner, University of Pennsylvania, who has studied the effects of violence since 1967, says "Violence appears in 9 out of 10 cartoons at a rate of 25 times per hour." But "to pin it on one cartoon is scapegoating."

The cartoon is expected to be discussed Wednesday when Attorney General Janet Reno, Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.) and studio execs testify at a Senate hearing on TV violence. Simon says Beavis is another example of kids being influenced by what they see: "TV is a powerful sales medium, and too often what it sells is violence."

Here sounds a good compromise: Show only the late B&BH show.

Someone needs to slap these parents on the head with a baseball bat. IF they don't want their children to watch it or any other show they don't want to watch, ultimately they still have the CHOICE (regardless of what they might want to say about it) to THROW their TV out with the trash, get rid of their cable hookup, buy the various channel lockout devices that exist, etc. Time for them to stop feeling like vicitms and take action for their own world, instead of sniveling and whining trying to get someone else to make it "better" for them.

I'm sorry...no one is forcing TV or this show down anyone's throat.

All this parental victimization crap about TV in general makes me puke. If they don't want to watch the violence (the TV pictures from Somalia recently, for example, were many degrees more violent and shocking, partly because they were REAL) on TV, then they can listen to the radio for their news. Or, they can exhibit their ultimate power as a consumer and just not participate.

Anyone going to try and get on this pathetic lottery-winner's mailing list and post the diatribe to the net so we can throw darts at it or chainsaw its twitter off?