Untouchable, Vast...
Why did a Senate Subcommittee, led by Senator Thomas J. Dodd, hold years of hearings on violence in television in the early 1960s, according to William Boddy? What was the ultimate result of these hearings, for network programming and for Senator Dodd? How did concerns with violence on television contribute to the notion of TV as a "vast wasteland." Take a look at the opening of an episode of The Untouchables from this time period and compare the action sequence to those that appear in crime shows today.
According to Boddy, the reason that the Subcommittee was formed was to provide surveillance and reform to American television that could be deemed as immoral, or more specifically, violent. The Untouchables was the prime example of a telefilm that was under much scrutiny by the subcommittee and Sen. Dodd because it appeared to glorify the lifestyles of gangsters like Al Capone. What was interesting about this subcommittee, as Boddy states, was that while they never provided any actual reform, they provided an incredibly detailed "documentary snapshot" of the transition of American television from single production products to Hollywood-style production networks that have a newfound influence on the American public.
ReplyDeleteLooking at the action sequence from The Untouchables, one can see many differences from that of contemporary television. Today, fight scenes are rare in that they are usually climactic events that require much lead-up from previous episodes in order to keep the viewer coming back in order to finally see this event. However, I found much similarity to today's television when looking at the aspect of beginning a show with violence to set the tone. Hawaii Five-0 is a show that always begins with a violent crime in order to set up the narrative before cutting to the intro music and credits. In this way, both The Untouchables and Hawaii Five-0 use violence to lure the audience, something Dodd and his subcommittee would disapprove of.
When Chairman Minow first uttered the words, “vast wasteland” in his 1961 speech, many speculations about the function of television in modern society became abundantly prevalent. This is where Senator Dodd’s senate subcommittee comes into place, according to Boddy’s piece, “Senator Dodd goes to Hollywood”. The purpose of this Subcommittee was to assess and hopefully saturate any television that could be deemed as too violent; this content would be seen as immoral to show to the American people thus adding to the “vast wasteland” in which Minow speaks of. Consequently, the committee was taking the first look into whether violent media can be linked to juvenile delinquency. Boddy states that Dodd used the ABC show, “the Untouchables” to show the detrimental violence that could be seen on television understanding that the show’s depiction of the exciting life of a gangster could lure the American people in the wrong direction. After watching the opening sequence of “the Untouchables”, I can see why this would have worried officials who were already unsure about television and society’s relationship because this has been the most violent clip we have been shown so far. However, I feel far more jaded when I compare this clip to crime shows of today. I agree with Blake McCourt’s Hawaii 5-0 example where a show starts out with a violent crime seen in order to set up the narrative of the show. I also see this in shows like Law and Order SVU, where the opening scene can be considered especially heinous. By the end of this era , Senator Dodd’s committee made no extreme progress in terms of network programing but unearthed a new fear surrounding the total autonomous power network’s have over the content distributed on television.
ReplyDeleteAfter the famous quiz show scandal, people began to look more critically at television and its influence. It seemed at the time that many different ranks of people were upset with television, especially the immoral content. This frustration was what led Chairman Minow to state that commercial programs were a “vast wasteland.” So, senator Dodd targeted the television world’s violent shows to fix the problem. Furthermore, the rough, immoral content was further criticized because of the Cold War tensions, which made people on a global scale argue that the Communist party could use American programming against them. Because of these hearings, there has been a fascination with the effect that television has had on viewers, something that is still studied today. However, the story didn’t end so well for Dodd as he became censored for his own immoral acts regarding the investigation. Lastly, the opening sequence of The Untouchables did involve lots of gun shooting and a car explosion, things that are still included in crime shows. Yet, the execution of the music now is more intense and not as theatrical as it had been that opening sequence. Still crime shows use violent sequences to advance their plots. What was being made and questioned in the 1960s is still relevant today that people complain of the violence on screen, and shows with actions still have a large following.
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ReplyDeleteJust like the censorship of movies previously, social anxieties started to revolve around violence and taboo subjects in TV corrupting the country's youth. This was especially heightened after the cases of fraud in many quiz shows in the 1950s. His main target was the ABC program The Untouchables. Although there were many long, arduous, and basically hostile trials, Dodd's crusade eventually fizzled out, according to Boddy. However, the pressure didn't end there.
These trials opened the door for criticism from many sides. Internally, the writers and producers gave them hell, as did the FCC, under new leadership. Everyone just thought TV was junk.
Senator Thomas J. Dodd’s crusade against violence in television in the early 1960s was largely a political ploy. Dodd was an “’anti communizet zealot’ … a ‘bargain basement McCarthy.’” (Dodd, 170). The hearings of the Subcommittee were allegedly designed to pass legislation to protect the American populace from the influence of violent television; however, the Subcommittee failed to produce any meaningful legislation. Part of this was because Dodd’s crusade was in part merely an attempt to gain the political spotlight, harkening back to the scare tactics of the McCarthy era in the 1950s. Additionally, there is the fact that Dodd ended up being compromised by television network executives. Dodd received “contributions” from certain networks, such as NBC, and in return, Dodd would not pursue those networks in his investigations- he would close down any probes into these networks and increase pressure on the other ones (ABC took a considerable hit.)
ReplyDeleteThe hearings may not have led to legislation, but increased public panic and campaigns against violence in television did lead to fewer shows depicting such violence. Situational comedies began to become more popular instead. This was also in part because Dodd and others devoted to his cause began to raise concerns about how the American image was being represented to international markets through the violent programs- did foreign nations consuming our television assume America was a land of violent gangsters?
All of this could lead to different interpretations of the “vast wasteland” that was television. Were violent programs such as The Untouchables depicting too bleak a world? Today’s crime shows may show a grizzly murder, but not in the same multitude as depicted with the gangs in Untouchables, and often without the same historical backdrop. (Tony Soprano may be influenced by a number of historic gangster figures, but is not directly tied to one.) Or was the “vast wasteland” of TV referring to a lack in creative control? Advertisers controlled what images should be displayed on TV to best support their products, and the Dodd investigations led to sit-coms with simple values and story structures, so as not to disturb any moral compass.
The argument about violence on TV in the 60s is still relevant today in the form of the (fairly recent) court hearings and arguments about video game violence. In both cases, nothing concrete really emerged aside from a narrative detailing the pros and cons of a growing new media. The thought behind it was (and is) that the media is easily available for everyone, especially children. At an impressionable age, watching violence like in the opening of The Untouchables can desensitize kids to the horrors of reality. This lives on in the thoughts of parents watching their children play violent video games and especially first person shooters or graphic games like Mortal Kombat. The argument there is that exposure and desensitizing kids makes them more prone to commit violence in real life because the consequences aren’t fleshed out. As we now know, it really isn’t a causation but more of a symptom of the societal standard of normalizing violence particularly in young males.
ReplyDeleteThe hearings on violence in television were another example of a continued pattern in film and television history: the industry would attempt to monitor itself and limit what it was exposing to the public. The hearings were reminiscent of the criticism that preceded the establishment of the Motion Picture Production Code that existed from the 30s until the end of the 60s. It is interesting that the MPPC ended shortly after the trials, showing that not only did the trials fail, but they also marked a shift in the mentality of what was acceptable to be shown on television and film. Comparing the Untouchables to contemporary action shows, this level of violence is nothing.
ReplyDeleteOstensibly, Dodd's goal was to censor violent content that might have a corrupting influence on young Americans. His hearings sprang from a few earlier hearings, including the 1952 House hearings and 1955-56 Senate hearings which both tried to get television to produce more "moral" content by decreasing violence or adopting a code similar to the film code (Boddy, 163). However, Boddy also gives evidence that Dodd may have had ulterior motives (at least after the initial round of hearings). Dodd received contributions from television companies, likely as a bribe to keep his final verdict mild. Eventually, news of Dodd's mishandling of funds reached the press, and he was censured by the Senate (Boddy, 170).
ReplyDeleteThe end result of Dodd's investigation was a weak report that didn't pass through the subcommittee, and no legislation was ever created (Boddy, 173). I would guess this "toothless" result was because of the funds Boddy had received from television networks.
Of course, the Dodd hearings weren't entirely fruitless, or they would have never caught on in the first place. The FCC's characterization of TV as a "vast wasteland" struck a cord with Americans discontented with the homogenization of television programming, especially on ABC, where the majority of prime-time programs were action oriented (Boddy, 164). The scene from The Untouchables above was criticized heavily during the hearings, and scenes like that today are rare. Usually when a crime is portrayed, the lead-up to the crime is shown, then a cutaway, and then the aftermath (or the investigator finds the body). Shootouts on TV are rarely shown. (Admittedly, I don't watch many crime-dramas, so I could be totally wrong about that, but that's my impression from what I've seen.)
In the earlier years of Dodd's rallying against the television networks, there were many different sides already scrutinizing the medium. There was the quiz-show fraud scandal that had many questioning the reliability of the networks. Newton Minnow's claim that violent shows contributed to the belief that t.v was a "vast wasteland" encouraged other commercial t.v critics to join in the conversation. David Davidson, a Writer's Guild of America chairmen, believed that mostly all television writing was inherently bad and the writers were being paid a lot to write this way. Boddy also hi-lighted the social, moral, and societal changes that prompted the anxiety over programs. The shifting belief that t.v. could corrupt youth was a growing fear. The networks faced the issue of "narrow gauge" programming and pressure from public scrutiny. However, the network's commercial sponsors saw better opportunity to advertise during action-adventure telefilms and the medium began to produce and exploit more of these in the U.S. and abroad.
ReplyDeleteThis led to the networks profiting more from these shows which hurt Dodd's campaign. He was ineffective in changing the FCC regulation to sensor or limit the content shown. After almost 3 years his arguments were falling short and his reputation was diminishing. He failed to bring about a credible argument that these shows were inherently bad for children. He got network executives involved without the means of social scientists to back up many of his claims. His arguments were no longer credible to many and it did not lead to a regulation change.
The show opens with hi lighting the product being woven into the program. I remember Candace saying how the bad guys were never seen smoking the cigarettes in the program. I think it goes hand in hand with the fact that companies often exploited their products in a way that made them seem cool. The good guys would only smoke the cigarettes, thus it encouraged more people to potentially buy them. The Untouchables, in comparison with action shows today, is overtly more dramatic than most shows today. It still taps into what the human conscience might believe is dramatic but the over acting, loud dramatic music, stark light contrasts, and odd screen wipes, makes it seem very over done now. There were effects present that we might see in a modern day action show, yet the expectation that a modern audience has of how real a show should appear is a major factor in the overall aesthetic of an action drama.