October 5 1998

ARTICLE TOOLS

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* I had just returned home from visiting two teenagers recently sentenced to life in prison for murder when I found my issue of CT with the cover story "Trained to Kill" [Aug. 10]. It was a wise choice to include this informative article. I have often cautioned our church families to employ discretion in what they allow their children to watch on television, and I found this article by David Grossman to supply additional and factual evidence for what many of us have suspected for a long time.

Though the most productive role of the church in influencing culture lies in the proclamation of the gospel, the church should be proactive in directly confronting the negative influences in our society. I concur with the opening comments stating "that parents, the church, scholars, and the government must come together" to address this issue. As a result of reading this article, not only do I intend to share this information with our church families, but I have scheduled an appointment with our state senator to discuss how we can encourage limits to the "probing lenses" of the network news media. Thank you!

* Though I have spent many hours thinking about and discussing this issue with my friends and family, Lt. Col. Grossman shed new light on it. I have a much greater understanding of how violence specifically affects children (and the rest of us) and numbs them (and us).

* Grossman loses focus when it comes to charting a response to the problem raised. Curiously, after describing the dangers of extensive exposure to violence on TV, he minimizes the impact of an individual's decision to "just turn it off." If we agree that exposure to TV violence is a causal factor contributing to violent crime, it is obvious ...