Almost everyone, it seems, blames the mass media for the increasingly violent nature of American society. And for the corruption of our children. And for our rampant materialism and consumerism. And for the increasing sexualization of our culture.
Just look at the headlines:
"Violence as Entertainment Is Destroying Our Children."
"Today's Crudeness, Like Our Movies, Corrupts Our Foundation."
"Filth Is Everywhere, in Books, Movies, TV"
"Doctors Link Kids' Violence to Media."
But Karen Sternheimer, a 34-year-old sociologist at USC, thinks we've got it all wrong.
In her newly published book "It's Not the Media: The Truth About Pop Culture's Influence on Children," Sternheimer argues that while the media are a "central force" in our society, "media culture is not the root cause of American social problems."
"Fears about media and children date back at least to Plato, who was concerned about the effects the classic Greek tragedies had on children," she says.
Today, violent video games, misogynistic rap lyrics, sexually oriented advertising and local TV news shows filled with mayhem are all, Sternheimer says, unfairly seen as contributing significantly to the decline of our culture and the ruination of our children.
I think Sternheimer overstates her case. The media do deserve some blame for the pervasive violence, sexuality and consumerism in our society, especially among children. But I agree that the media are not the sole or even the primary cause of those problems, and I think she's absolutely right when she says, "Blaming media for changes in childhood and social problems has shifted our public conversation away from addressing the real problems that impact children's lives."
"The most pressing crisis facing American children today is not media culture but poverty, she rightly says.
In her view, the other "big bad wolves of childhood" are family violence, child abuse and neglect, inadequate health care and the under-funding of education.
But it's easier for politicians to blame the media than to budget the money -- and spend the political capital -- necessary to address these problems.
Sternheimer exposes the poor methodology in many studies purporting to show causal connections between, say, video games and aggressive behavior, and she adduces volumes of evidence to demonstrate that, media scare headlines notwithstanding, "Young people today are less likely to be violent, sexually active, smoke or use drugs compared with their parents" when they were young.
