Hearing Set On Ftc Media-violence Probe

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will release the results of its yearlong probe Sept. 11 that concludes that U.S. record labels, movie studios, and video game companies violate their own voluntary codes and warning labels by advertising and marketing violent product to children.

A Senate Commerce Committee hearing scheduled for Sept. 13 will review the highly critical conclusions of the study. It couldn't be more high profile: The hearing is being called by its chairman, Republican former presidential candidate John McCain, R-Ariz., and Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn.

Lieberman, who with McCain has maintained that violence in the media has a deleterious effect on children, plans to attend and testify.

A non-detailed draft of the probe's general conclusions has been leaked to The Washington Post, and its Aug. 27 article reports that the FTC found that all of the entertainment industries have marketed violent product to children despite the use of their own rating systems designed to protect them from such content. It also found that a weakness in all rating systems is enforcement and compliance at the retail level.

A spokeswoman for the Recording Industry Assn. of America (RIAA) says the trade group will not comment on the probe draft's conclusions until its officials read and analyze the report. RIAA president/CEO Hilary Rosen has stated throughout the 18-month-long investigation that RIAA record companies have not been marketing records with violent lyrics to children.

"The music industry does not market violence to children. We market artists. And I think there's a big difference," she told Billboard last summer (Billboard, June 12, 1999).

Last winter, an RIAA source characterized FTC investigators as having a "presumptuous" attitude "that music is bad for children" (Billboard, Feb. 15).

President Clinton called for the probe in June of last year following the student shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado.

At the Sept. 13 hearing, McCain plans to put top movie, record, and video game company executives on the hot seat. His staff is making it clear that the chairman is not interested in hearing from Washington-based industry trade group representatives and lobbyists but wants the executives to attend and present their side of the story.

Says a McCain spokesman, "If in fact the [ratings] have been an exercise, if they haven't been used to protect kids but as a smokescreen, then these industries are going to have a difficult time. Their best opportunity is to come before the Commerce Committee in a spirit of cooperation rather than confrontation."

McCain and Lieberman have been among the most active lawmakers who have acted upon their belief that there is a relation between violent entertainment product and teen violence in the culture.

The senators have co-sponsored several bills both this year and last that called for either a task force to investigate violent product and teen behavior or standardized labeling designed to help parents monitor what their children purchase.

McCain and Lieberman had initially proposed legislation calling for the FTC probe before the Columbine tragedy occurred.

They also co-sponsored the 21st Century Media Responsibility Act, which would have required that products such as movies, video games, and sound recordings carry standardized warning labels about violent content. Retailers would have had to enforce age restrictions and would have received a $10,000 fine for each stickered product sold to a child. The bill never made it out of committee (Billboard, June 19, 1999).

The most recent McCain-Lieberman bill was introduced this May. It would require that products carry labels describing the nature and intensity of violence and that they have an age requirement for rent or purchase (Billboard, May 27).

"Because of this report," says the McCain spokesman, "this hearing will be fundamentally different from the questions asked in earlier hearings. This report makes clear that at the same time these industries have said their rating systems protect kids, they've spent hundreds of millions in advertising to lure kids to buy this violent product."

According to a source at the FTC, the report is planned for release Sept. 11 and "will be quite detailed and show that all of the industries have been aggressively marketing violent product to children." Other sources say that the probe found that music labels have not been as active as video game companies and movie studios because they don't employ advertising of such product on TV.

McCain's committee has potential subpoena power to gather label and studio chiefs into the hearing room to answer tough questions. "It's definitely one option, but we've never used it," says the McCain spokesman. "But the USAir and United Airlines execs showed up for a high-visibility hearing, and the Firestone tire CEOs say they will testify at another highly visible [House] hearing. One can only assume that the CEOs of these [entertainment] companies can find the time to come.

"Like I said," adds the spokesman, "the best thing these corporate CEOs can do is to testify in a cooperative spirit. Now is the time, and here's an opportunity to correct these business plans. Otherwise, their credibility with the public will surely be undermined."

Lieberman's family-values beliefs have also led him to a sometime partnership with Republican conservative William Bennett, an alliance that has concerned many in the liberal entertainment community who believe that violent media is a reflection of, and not a root cause of, violence in society.

But that perspective is hardly the only one adopted by critics of violence in media—particularly critics with a liberal political stance. As stated in a Commentary in Billboard ("Music Biz Has To Bear Social Responsibility," Aug. 5) by Lynne Brody, executive director of Respond Inc., a metropolitan Boston agency assisting battered women and children, "The influence of culture on violence is the reason I am so disturbed to hear music critics and record companies promoting artists whose lyrics promote the rape, beating, and humiliation of women. No, one violent song does not cause a previously gentle man to begin battering or raping his partner. But taken in a larger cultural context, violent songs reinforce stereotypes and behavior, give permission for violence . . . and allow those battering partners to minimize their behavior. Especially when we consider the target audience: young people who are still learning the boundaries of male and female behavior and who often emulate their favorite musical artists."

At the hearing, three things seem certain: Congress, in light of the FTC report, is growing exasperated with the marketing strategies of the entertainment industries, particularly the movie studios and video game business; the hearing room will be packed to the rafters with media; and George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and their handlers will be watching it all unfold on C-Span.