TV’s Role in Our Society Does Go Beyond That of Bad Guy

In a recent On TV column (“A New Era for Social Advocacy?” Dec. 15), The Times’ Brian Lowry posed some thought-provoking questions about television’s potential to do good as well as harm. He suggested that there is much that TV can do to lift up our culture and promote “pro-social” behavior. But he concluded by skeptically asking whether those of us who have been critical of television’s “depravity” would ever give producers and programmers any credit for these positive efforts.

I can understand Mr. Lowry’s skepticism. If I were to go by the news media reports recounting the ongoing debate about television content, which more often than not accentuate conflict and controversy and TV’s worst side, I would probably reach the same conclusion.

But the truth is that many of us “culture warriors” are, in fact, loving critics who enjoy watching television, who appreciate the contributions it has made to our society over the years and who recognize its immense power to enlighten and inform.

In my case, when I express concerns about television’s influence on our culture, I usually preface my remarks by professing with some pride that I am a child of the television age. The “tube” was a wonderful source of entertainment for my parents, my sisters and me, and it even played a central role in my decision to enter public service, opening a window to the world of national politics far beyond my home in Stamford, Conn.

To this day, I have vivid memories of watching the election returns in 1952. I was 10 years old at the time, and the television coverage that night inspired spirited discussions in my family about whether Gen. Eisenhower or Adlai Stevenson would be a better president. Not long after, I was thoroughly captivated by television coverage of the Army-McCarthy hearings and Sen. Estes Kefauver’s investigation of organized crime.

When I wear my critic’s hat today, I also try to praise the efforts of industry leaders to be more responsible in their programming decisions. On a number of occasions, I have publicly commended CBS for its efforts to create more uplifting, family-friendly programming-- such as “Touched by an Angel,” “Promised Land,” “Cosby” and “Early Edition”--and did so again just two weeks ago at a press event here in Washington.

Last February, to cite another example, I joined with the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy to unveil a report underscoring the vast potential of television and the media as a whole to promote responsible sexual behavior among America’s teenagers. As part of that event, we honored the constructive work that NBC and BET already have been doing to help us reduce the number of children being born to children, and we urged others to follow the lead of these two networks.

I always try to put my concerns in context, to acknowledge that there is a lot of wonderful programming on the air to go with the garbage that the Jerry Springers and Howard Sterns dump into our homes, that I myself like to watch shows such as “Seinfeld” and “ER” (in addition to my predictable focus on news and sports programming) and that we critics can and should do more to point out what is right about television.

So the answer to Mr. Lowry’s question is an unqualified yes. I am more than willing to give producers and programmers the credit they deserve when they give us good programming. And I suspect that millions of Americans who are fed up with the rude, crude and lewd material that is increasingly pervading the airwaves would join me in cheering any move to bring television’s declining standards back up. The real question now is what is the industry willing to do to earn that applause.