Primetime Prejudice: SAG survey says that TV is not plugged into realities of the poor and...

America's poor and underprivileged are "virtually invisible" on primetime dramas and daytime soaps, while "foreigners" and mentally ill characters are more likely to be portrayed as villains, according to a survey commissioned by the Screen Actors Guild. The survey, titled "Casting the American Scene," found that "by and large, the world of television is frozen in a time warp of obsolete and damaging representations."
"Market-driven media have little use for poor people," the survey concluded. "They are still virtually invisible in primetime, or any other time."
According to the survey: "The U.S. Census classifies more than 13 percent of the population?and one-third of blacks?at or below the poverty level, and many more as low-income wage-earners. But among characters playing major roles on television, such wage-earners make up only 1.4 percent of the major characters in primetime, 1.2 percent in daytime, and 0.6 percent in children's programs, concealing crucial realities in American life and society."
The survey, conducted for SAG by George Gerbner, Bell Atlantic professor of telecommunication at Temple University, sampled 6,882 characters on 440 episodes of primetime dramas from 1994-'97, and 2,137 characters who appeared on 205 episodes of network daytime soaps from 1995-'97. Gerbner did similar studies for the guild in 1979 and 1993.
"The marketing imperative rules television," the survey concluded. "Advertisers seek novelty, but not change. They have no incentive to sponsor programs that undermine the existing structure of power, expose glaring inequities, or feature less powerful, less wealthy, or less healthy customers?except, perhaps, as anomalies or threats."
The only characters who fare worse than the poor on TV dramas are mentally ill characters and "foreigners."
"Characters portrayed as suffering from mental illness are depicted as the most dangerous of all demographic groups, with 60 percent shown to be involved in crime or violence?three times the average rate?perpetuating a stigma of the most damaging kind," the survey said. "The second most dangerous characters on primetime television are those of foreign origin."
The survey also found that older women tend to be cast disproportionately as villains. "In primetime, one-third of all female villains are over 44 years old, but only one-sixth of all female characters are older than 44," the survey found. "This increasing villainization of age is confined to women, reversed in men."
"A disproportionate number of ill-fated characters comes from the ranks of poor, Latino and foreign men, both young and old African Americans, and poor women," the survey found. "At the bottom of fate's "pecking order' are characters portrayed as old women and as mentally ill, perpetuating stigmas of the most damaging kinds."
Americans with physical disabilities also remain virtually invisible in the world of dramatic television. "As the 43 million disabled Americans gain legal rights of equal access and employment in real life, physical disability is visible in only 1.9 percent of characters, and mental illness in only 1.2 percent of primetime characters," the survey found. "Mentally ill characters are portrayed as bad people who fare badly in all types of programs."
The survey accompanies an employment report on women and minorities released by SAG on Dec. 18. Like the SAG employment report, the Gerbner survey found that "Latino characters are represented at less than one-third of their proportion in the U.S. [population]."
Black males?but not females?are cast in higher numbers than their share of the U.S. population, but the survey found that "Asian/Pacific characters are still less than one-half of their proportion of the U.S. population."
Dr. Patricia Heisser Metoyer, SAG's executive administrator for affirmative action, said: "While we have made some strides?particularly in the employment of African-American performers?our report shows just how far we have to go before Hollywood's vision matches the actual diversity of the American scene."
SAG president Richard Masur agreed. SAG, he said, "is dedicated to improving job opportunities for groups that have traditionally been under-represented on television and in films. Part of that effort is educating our industry about the differences between the fictional world created for television and film, and the real world audience that watches those fictional creations."
David Robb writes for The Hollywood Reporter.