Standards on Violence Urged for Cable TV

The cable TV industry came under added pressure to enact industrywide guidelines on the depiction of violence during a congressional subcommittee meeting here Tuesday.

The move came after the three major television networks issued joint standards on violence last week. Rep. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House subcommittee on crime and criminal justice, which is looking into links between TV violence and societal violence, said he hoped to explore “the potential for such an effort in other venues,” such as cable.

Several industry executives defended cable’s record, however.

Winston Cox, chairman of Showtime TV Networks, told the subcommittee: “It is inaccurate to suggest that there are not standards in cable. That judgment is being exercised all the time.”

The violence issue gained prominence when ABC, CBS and NBC issued jointly a set of guidelines that will take effect next fall in a letter to Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.), a strong advocate of legislation to curtail TV violence.

The guidelines are not significantly different from those already in place, but the statement was viewed as putting pressure on other TV outlets to respond to Congress’ renewed concerns about TV violence.

Representatives of the networks underscored that point in their appearances before Schumer’s subcommittee, claiming that recent studies showed that the violent content of broadcast TV had decreased in recent years and arguing that the biggest problem was with their competitors.

“CBS does not shrink from competition (with Fox, cable TV and other networks),” said Beth Waxman Bressan, vice president and assistant to the president of the CBS Broadcast Group. “But we prefer it to be a fair fight.”

Bressan said in an interview that the broadcasters had contacted representatives of the Fox network and cable TV networks before issuing their guidelines, but the networks were “unresponsive.” Representatives of Fox and Time Warner, which owns the HBO pay-TV service, denied receiving any such invitation.

Peggy Laramie, spokeswoman for the National Cable Television Assn., the industry’s trade organization, said after the hearing that cable TV executives plan to participate in a meeting this spring among network TV executives and perhaps the Hollywood movie studios to discuss TV violence.