COVER STORY : AT THE CENTER OF THE DOLE FIRESTORM

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) got plenty of attention when he scolded Hollywood about sex and violence in movies, TV and pop music. But, as The Times reports today (see Page A1), Dole’s comments aren’t changing the face of show business. Yet. The creative and business powerbrokers will tell you they’ve always been thoughful about what they produce. Here, then, are some snapshots of life on the front lines:

GERRY WEBER

President, Blockbuster Music

Walk into any one of the nation’s 536 Blockbuster Music stores and you’ll see clear evidence of a conscious decision about lyrical content: No CD or cassette bearing an “Explicit Lyrics” sticker will be sold to anyone younger than 16 without a parent’s presence, and releases with graphic or offensive cover art are kept behind the counter.

The stores also allow customers to preview records at listening stations and to examine album cover artwork so that parents and others can check out lyrics and graphics before making a purchase.

“We don’t want to be in the censorship business,” says Gerry Weber, 44. “But there’s a lot of music out there that I would not care for my children to listen to.”

Weber acknowledges that it’s an imperfect system, since the labeling is done by individual record companies on a discretionary basis. On the other hand, the film industry’s graded ratings system, implemented by a standards committee, allows for stricter policies, such as the Blockbuster Video stores’ ban on all X-rated or NC-17 releases.

“Obviously we would prefer not to have government-mandated issues and certainly not laws that would make it a crime to sell a product to teens,” Weber says. “We feel it would be unfair to place the retailer in the position of having to censor or judge what is or is not acceptable.”