Tv Violence In Cartoons Essay, Research Paper
On Saturday, The Cartoon Network showed two cartoons that both contained a great amount of violence. These two cartoons were BeetleJuice and The Adams Family. They were aimed to catch the eye of little kids and were specifically timed to attract waking teenagers. In BettleJuice there were approximately twenty violent acts committed by both the good character, BettleJuice, and the bad character(s), the kids. Some of the violent acts involved multiple threats to B.J., being hit with objects such as a spoon, being electrocuted by a car battery, getting his hand bit off, theft, and gangs ganging up to beat B.J. up. The kids killed the talk show host that was supposed to host the show BeettleJuice was hosting. In The Adams Family there were approximately twenty-one violent acts committed. Some of the violent acts in this cartoon involved numerous weapon incidents, weights falling on people, the kids flooding their basement and thrashing their room. The bad guys were tied up, eaten by alligators, beat up by about ten boxers, beat up in prison, and blown up. Nobody was killed in this cartoon though. In BeetleJuice both the good (B.J.) and the bad (Kids) characters inflicted the violence. In The Adams Family, the good characters, the kids, inflicted the violence on the kidnappers. Having the good characters inflict the violence on the bad characters is not good to do in social learning. This tells the kids to perform violent acts back on someone if they are performed on them. It shows them that two wrongs make a right and that is what society is trying to veer away from. In both cartoons, humor was always displayed to cover up the activity of violence. BeetleJuice cracked a joke about him still having the upper hand after the kid’s bit off his hand and it re-generated. In The Adams Family, the kid’s chores were to flood the basement and thrash their rooms. They asked Lurch if they could go and play now that their chores were done. Humor is good to use to show that that violent act was a mere joke but it could have a negative impact on a child. Instead of the message that it is fake, a child who doesn’t know any better could mistake them as reality. The child could think that they might be reinforced instead of punished if repeated because they see the characters not being punished.
There weren’t any toy commercials but there were two commercials that deal with violence in some sort of way. One of those cartoons was a cartoon advertising a boxing match between Tweety and Sylvester. The other was an advertisement for the U.S. Marines. They figured that if the kids and teens were pumped up with violence, then they would watch an even more violent boxing match or go out and join the Marines. During the taping of four hours worth of cartoons it was hard to pick out two because there was so many that portrayed violence in some sort of way. Watching and analyzing these cartoons really opened my eyes and made me realize that there is a ton of violence on TV. The overall morale issue of these cartoons was violence. They even had cartoons that displayed violence after the cartoons. Violence does attract the majority of the kids however. Are kids watching more PBS or more Cartoon Network? The Cartoon Network would be my vote and which one has more violence? There’s a lot of violence portrayed in cartoons, but this is not really realized by many. The affect is either positive or negative and the consequences are either lenient or harsh. TV violence ranges from moderate to very cruel. Kids interpret cartoons in many different ways and carry them out sometimes in their actions.