From: To: A16.A16(kidstv) Date: 10/18/95 1:47am Members of the FCC: I am a second year student at Ithaca College and am writing to you in regards to the deabate over children and violence in television programs. As a child, I grew up in a two parent household where my father went to work and my mother stayed home with us. Since my mother was home, my sister and I were always supervised in whatever we did. Homework was done right after school, and if Mommy or Daddy did not approve of a television program, we couldn't watch it. I was lucky. Unfortunately not all children are raised in the same situation. Wtih the economy the way it is, many mothers have left the home and joined the work force out of necessity and can no longer give their children the supervision that they would like to give. Young children have become "latch-key kids" meaning that they come home to an empty house and are left to entertain themselves. This is where television plays its most important role. The American Psychological Association found that the typical child watches 27 hours of television a week, and in that time will have seen 8,000 murders and 100,000 acts of violence from ages 3 to twelve. Many studies have been done that can directly link violent behavior in children to the violence they view on television. Actual situations have risen where children hurt other kids because they saw it on television. For example, in the case of the young girl who was raped with an inanimate object by a group of kids who had seen the same thing done on a television program a few days before. The fact of the matter is that we need to do something to decrease the amount of violence that is broadcasts to homes all around the world, starting here. If that means approving the V-Chip, then so be it. There should be parent control syastems on all televisions, not just cable boxes. Certain scenes, such as explicit sex scenes, gruesome acts of violence, and the like should not be broadcast before 9:00 P.M.. This way parents can control what their children watch, and how much of it they watch. When you meet as a group to decide what it is exactly you will do, keep in mind that the children we speak of will one day be the leaders of the world. Shouldn't we use television as a way to better prepare them for these positions? Thank you for your time. Tamika Andre CC: Tandre1