The Electronic Whipping Boy

Seventy per cent of children aged five to seven and 50% of all children were viewing Batman at the height of its popularity. The average child spends nearly two hours every day viewing television after 6 p.m. Television for children is transmitted before 6 p.m. The B.B.C. and the I.T.A. acknowledge a responsibility for what goes out on the air before 9 p.m. because they recognise that children may be viewing. Producers and executives know very well that violence and amoral behaviour must be tempered before 9 p.m. After 9 p.m., programmes are for adults and it becomes very much the parents' responsibility if their children view programmes deemed unsuitable for immature minds. Nonetheless, amongst sensible parents, responsible T.V. programmes dealing with adult subjects in a sophisticated way can be a useful adjunct in bridging the gap between the generations and making discussion possible. There may be a danger in less responsible, unstable homes, but television is a mass medium and the children in such homes are likely to lose out in any case, in which case television provides a useful scapegoat to spare the irresponsible from any sense of guilt. Any attempt to make television inoffensive, even to