V-Chip Mandate Puts the Networks in Touchy Situation

The passage of a federal telecommunications reform bill mandating a V-chip in every new TV set presents the broadcast networks with a serious challenge to their public image.

Television executives believe the measure violates their companies’ free-speech rights and are considering challenging it in court. But they fear they could win the legal battle and lose the public opinion war if they are seen as trying to stymie parents who want to protect their children from programming laden with sex and violence.

“Public sentiment is running so high on this issue,” said one broadcast executive, who requested anonymity, “that we need to do something to address parents’ concerns about what their kids see on television. The question is, ‘What should we do?’ ”

President Clinton, who has endorsed the V-chip technology and is expected to sign the telecom bill that Congress passed last week, will be ratcheting up the pressure on the networks later this month. He has invited key TV executives to a Feb. 29 meeting at the White House to discuss the V-chip, the creation of a TV ratings system and children’s programming.

According to the provisions of the legislation, every new TV set sold in the United States must be equipped with a V-chip--an electronic device that can be set to block out programming that a viewer might deem objectionable. (The “V” stands for violence.) The chip would be activated by a rating electronically encoded in the TV signal.

Supporters say this would make it far easier for parents to prevent their children from seeing inappropriate programming. TV programming providers would still be free to produce and transmit anything they chose; they would simply have to label it, as the movie industry does with its ratings, so the viewers could set their TVs to receive or reject it.

It is the development of the rating system that is now at issue. The legislation gives the TV industry a year to come up with one voluntarily; if it doesn’t, the Federal Communications Commission will form a panel to do it for them.

“How ‘voluntary’ is that?” asked NBC Senior Vice President Richard Cotton. “Are we going to have someone in the government saying that ‘ER’ is too violent because there’s blood in it?”

NBC, Cotton said, is “very seriously considering” a lawsuit to challenge the V-chip legislation.

CBS executives said they are also considering legal action. But this hesitation, coming after months of promises that the measure would be challenged in court, reflects the dilemma the networks find themselves in. Cotton acknowledged that “other discussions” will be taking place along Broadcast Row here to determine the networks’ strategies now that they’ve lost the battle in Congress.

While some studies have found that cable television is more violent than the broadcast networks because of the uncut theatrical films shown on many of its channels, the cable industry has backed the V-chip and said that it would support a voluntary ratings system for television.

“Broadcasters could find themselves isolated from the cable industry on the ratings issue,” said one industry observer. “Cable might come up with a ratings system on its own because they find that’s a selling point to consumers.”

“The problem [with ratings] for the broadcast networks is fundamentally economic,” said Winston H. Cox, senior vice president of Viacom, whose cable operations include MTV and the Showtime pay channel. “The broadcast networks have a legitimate concern that shows that are rated [violent or sexual] will lose advertisers.”

Broadcast executives maintain that it is the enforced linking of the rating and the V-chip they object to the most.

“The legislation says that if we come up with a rating, we must transmit that rating electronically,” said CBS Senior Vice President Martin Franks. “That’s like having a movie rating that stops people from going into the movie.”

What are the alternatives for broadcasters?

Executives said they may expand their use of parental advisories--on-air cautions that a program might be unsuitable for some viewers. They might also include these advisories--which now are given to only a handful of shows, and only for violence--and other content information in the printed program information they provide to newspapers and TV guides.

“They manage to get the plot, the stars and the VCR code for every show into TV guides,” said Greg Simon, chief domestic policy advisor to Vice President Al Gore. “Surely they can get more information in there for parents about the content of the show.”

But these measures may not be enough in today’s climate. “The V-chip is a simplistic solution to a complex problem,” said one network executive. “But it has a lot of appeal to parents and politicians.”