>From: "Peter McWilliams" >Subject: Melt! Melt! Melt! Melt! >Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2000 16:49:12 -0800 >X-Mozilla-Status: 8001 >X-Mozilla-Status2: 00000000 > >Pubdate: Mon, 17 Jan 2000 >Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA) >Copyright: 2000 San Jose Mercury News >Contact: letters@sjmercury.com >Address: 750 Ridder Park Drive, San Jose, CA 95190 >Fax: (408) 271-3792 >Website: http://www.sjmercury.com/ >Author: Joanne Jacobs > >DRUG OFFICE SNEAKS MESSAGE INTO PRIME TIME > >TROUBLED LOSER: ``Want to try some illegal drugs?'' > >SERIES REGULAR: ``I'd rather play sports and perform community service. > >TROUBLED LOSER: ``Oh no! I've just flunked out of school, gone to jail, >lost my friends, hurt my family and wrecked my kitchen due to my illegal >drug use.'' > >SERIES REGULAR: ``I see that drug abuse has bad consequences. I'm going to >have a heart-to-heart talk with my parents.'' > >SERIES DAD: ``Your mother and I think that drugs are wrong.'' > >SERIES MOM: ``Your father and I think that drugs are dangerous too.'' > >SERIES REGULAR: ``Drugs are for troubled losers.'' > >THIS is your favorite TV show. This is your favorite show on anti-drug >money. > >This is ``Beverly Hills 90210,'' ``ER,'' ``Chicago Hope,'' ``The Drew Carey >Show,'' ``Seventh Heaven,'' ``The Practice,'' ``Home Improvement,'' >``Sports Night,'' ``Promised Land,'' ``Cosby,'' ``Trinity,'' >``Providence,'' ``Sabrina the Teenage Witch,'' ``Boy Meets World,'' >``General Hospital'' and others. > >But when the credits roll at the end of the show, something's missing: >White House drug czar Barry McCaffrey, the secret scriptwriter, won't be >listed. > >After a six-month investigation, the online magazine Salon (www.salon.com) >has reported that the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy is >financially compensating networks for inserting its anti-drug message into >prime-time programming. It's payola for propaganda. > >In late 1997, Congress funded a five-year, $1 billion anti-drug media >campaign, demanding that broadcasters provide one free ad for every ad paid >for by the government. Regular ad sales were slow, so the five major >networks -- ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and WB -- went along. > >But the buy-one-get-one-free deal quickly soured when e-commerce exploded, >writes Daniel Forbes for Salon. Dot-com advertisers were willing to pay >full price for the time networks were giving away to community service ads. > >In the spring of 1988, a payola deal was struck: The networks would turn >selected sitcoms and dramas into anti-drug commercials. In exchange, they'd >get back some of the ad time they owed the government and be able to resell >it. > >Most networks have been sending a copy of anti-drug scripts to the drug >czar's office for approval or rewriting, according to Salon. In most cases, >writers and producers didn't know their network bosses had sold script >control. > >The May 19 episode of ``Smart Guy,'' a WB sitcom about a 10-year-old genius >in high school, is an example, Forbes reported. > >A WB executive requested a drugs or drinking script, so the producer >revived a previously rejected script in which the main character, T.J., >drinks beer to impress two popular older boys at a party. It showed T.J. >getting drunk, acting stupidly, spilling soda on a girl he wanted to >impress, suffering a hangover and getting in trouble with Dad. > >The drug czar's consultants insisted that the older boys couldn't be >portrayed as popular or cool. They were turned into clownish losers; T.J. >recalled one was in the ``slow reading class.'' > >Their beer drinking was moved from the main party to a utility room to >suggest shameful secrecy. > >T.J. was required to take a dose of the ``anti-drug,'' a heart-to-heart >talk with his father. > >By contrast, no deal was struck with ``Buffy the Vampire Slayer,'' which >features a college freshman who battles adolescent angst and the ubiquitous >spawn of Satan. > >The drug message wasn't ``on-strategy,'' according to a drug policy officer >who nixed the script. ``It was otherworldly nonsense, very abstract and not >like real-life kids taking drugs.'' > >Buffy's struggle against the soullessness of her peers is very relevant to >the choices young people face. But subtlety is not the strong suit of the >anti-drug campaign. > >While the drug czar's office claims to want realistic portrayals of >substance abuse, they really mean 100 percent negative portrayals, even if >those don't ring true. > >In real life, drinkers are sometimes popular and cool, and don't hide in >the utility room at parties. Fast readers experiment with drugs out of >curiosity -- they've heard so much about it in drug ed -- and usually don't >become addicts. > >The reasons people use drugs and alcohol are complex; the consequences vary >depending on the person and the drug. ``On strategy'' is off reality. > >Prime-time TV isn't promoting drugs, according to a Mediascope study >released last week by the drug czar's office. Only a few episodes show >illicit drug use, and nearly all show negative consequences, the study >found. Underage smoking and drinking also is rare, though adult drinking is >often portrayed as -- horrors! -- ``a positive experience.'' > >I don't mind if TV writers and producers choose to send simple messages >through their shows: Say no to drugs. Talk to your children. Fasten your >seat belt. Love thy neighbor -- but use condoms. > >It violates the movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn's advice: ``If you want to send >a message, try Western Union.'' But it's only TV after all. > >What's alarming is when the government becomes the scriptwriter, >manipulating public opinion with the public's money. The secrecy makes it >more sinister: If it's OK to have the drug czar approving scripts, how come >nobody knew about it till Salon broke the story? > >``Big Brother is watching you,'' George Orwell warned in ``1984.'' > >As it turns out: You're watching Big Brother. > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Pubdate: Tue, 18 Jan 2000 >Source: Chicago Tribune (IL) >Copyright: 2000 Chicago Tribune Company >Contact: ctc-TribLetter@Tribune.com >Address: 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611-4066 >Website: http://www.chicagotribune.com/ >Forum: http://www.chicagotribune.com/interact/boards/ > >JUST SAY 'NO' TO BIG BROTHER > >The failing war on drugs has caused so much collateral damage to America's >precious constitutional safeguards that it may have been unrealistic to >think our most precious one would go unscathed. > >What really hurts, though, is the way media executives sold the First >Amendment so cheap. > >No sense blaming the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy for >doling out millions of dollars in regulatory relief in return for oversight >of network television scripts. Or even blaming Congress for the 1997 law >that requires media outlets to sell ad time to anti-drug campaigns for half >price. > >It is in government's nature to be invasive. That's why the first Americans >insisted on a Bill of Rights. > >What the Framers did not reckon on, however, was a multimedia oligopoly in >which corporate profitability would so readily override good judgment. > >So it did not take long for sharp minds in advertising to come up with this >modest proposal: Instead of forgoing millions in ad revenue to accommodate >federal public service announcements, why not include an anti-drug message >in the shows themselves? Of course, someone at the White House would have >to decide how much of a dispensation each script was worth. But we're all >on the same side in the war on drugs. What's the harm? > >The harm, of course, is the awful precedent set by any arrangement in which >government confers financial favor on selected media based on content. > >This isn't the River Rubicon being crossed. It's the Atlantic Ocean. > >If it's OK for "Beverly Hills 90210" to claim a credit for an anti-drug >script, why not extend the courtesy to "7th Heaven" for promoting >Judeo-Christian values? Or whatever values happen to be in vogue at 1600 >Pennsylvania Avenue. > >One can forgive media middle-managers for a certain amount of confusion on >these matters. Traditional distinctions are fast fading between news and >entertainment, fantasy and reality, art and commerce. Advertisers are >paying big bucks to have their gym shoes, soda pop and sport-utility >vehicles used as props. Dan Rather, the news anchor icon, recently gave his >Millennium report in front of a live shot of Times Square in which another >network's neon logo was electronically replaced by the CBS eye. > >Reality or promotion? Artistic freedom or government bribe? The new giants >of Big Media each need to assign someone who can determine and patrol the >difference. > > >================================================================ > >This message is sent to you because you are subscribed to > the mailing list . >To unsubscribe, E-mail to: