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<title> Violence on television </title>
Television has become a source of violence and parents are worried how to protect their children from it. One way to protect the children is to use the V-chip. The V-chip allows parents to lock out programs with a certain level of violence. This enables parents to get control of what their children are watching when they are not at home. Some critics say the V-chip is a smack of censor-ship and it won't be able to separate different kinds of violence. President Clinton thinks that the V-chip is not about censor-ship, it's about a parental responsibility. 

We are living in a more violent society today in Sweden, compared to the society 50 years ago. The violence has become coarser and it's more young persons involved. It seems easier to many people to use their hands and legs to solve a problematic situation than to use words to reach a solution. There is not fair fit-fights between two persons any longer and very often there are several persons against one. Usage of weapons has become more common today. There are knives, guns, knuckle-dusters and even special boots used in fights. There also seems to be a movement from men-to-men violence to men-to-women and adults-to-children violence, but also more children-to-children violence. The reasons to this development are of course many different, but, I'm sure, one reason is the high frequency of violence on the television.

On the television there is very much violence of different kinds and you can watch it at every time of the day. There is a huge offer of channels with different contents: news, sports, movies, documentaries. At homes it's very common that you have more then fifteen channels. Some of the violence on the channels is "necessary violence" that children should watch. This necessary violence is for example news from around the world and documentaries. This violence is necessary because it helps the children to create a realistic picture of reality. Children should, to a certain level, be aware of the cruelty and injustices in that exist in the world to grow up as conscious adults. The "unnecessary violence" that is shown exists mainly in movies. This violence is often unrealistic and exaggerated: if you shoot a person five times, the result is most common that the person dies. The person does not continuing fighting covered with blood. Of course you have to see to different kinds of violence in movies, for example the difference between "Heaven and earth" and "Natural born killers". Some of the movie-violence is realistic and necessary too.

Children don't only get exposed to violence on the television. There is a large offer of different things containing violence directed to children. One of these things are the very popular computer games. In these games children can create fights and fight against each other on the screen. There are even sound effects and "blood effects" in these games. The winner is the one who kills the other first. It's very hard to see the purpose of these games. Another thing that provides children with violence is the Internet. Here the children can see fights and violent pictures and it is also on the Net that they can get in contact with sex-violence, which is wide spread on the Net.

What you are watching on the television is always a choice. There is an off-button. There is also a choice what kind of offer you want on your television: how many channels and what they should contain. The problem is of course that children not always can make a decision that is best for them. The parents have a choice to affect what their children are watching. As long as they are at home, they can always turn the television of. The can also prevent the flow of violence by not having so many movie channels and few foreign channels. The broadcaster has a responsibility too to chose what should be broadcast or not and at what time in the day. Even the moviemakers should take their responsibility and choose not to do movies with to unrealistic and over exaggerated violence. Society has to make a choice too and not accept that too much violence is exposed to our children.
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