Cause and effect does exist. So does the slippery slope logical fallacy. Listening to violent lyrics does not make a person violent. Training someone for war probably does.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/inside-the-criminal-mind/201202/watching-violence-in-the-media-does-not-cause-crime

Do you think sex, drugs and violence first appeared in art and literature in the 21st century? Check out Coleridge, Shakespeare, the Bible, Robert Louis Stevenson, Aldous Huxley, Grimm's Fairy Tales, Aesop … Many parents nowadays don’t read traditional fairy tales to their children because they are too violent.

To David F

Statutory authorities limiting freedom of speech, and freedom of expression, already exist in Australia. No society on planet Earth has any absolute freedom of speech, or freedom of expression. So, it is not about whether we should have censorship or not, but where we draw the line.

The classification of media into age group suitability is a fact of life, and an example of positive censorship which takes it for granted that inappropriate media can damage children. Libel laws, laws against hate speech, and laws against child pornography are "authorities which decide which is proper expression", and I am sure that you agree with them. So too, laws preventing the media from giving criminal or terrorist instruction also "decide which is the proper expression."

If you disagree that the media should have any constraints placed upon it, would you agree to the tobacco and alcohol industries putting advertisements into children's magazines and television programs?

If you object to violent criminal behaviour, why do you oppose preventing the media from glamourising violent criminal behaviour? If you object to violence towards women, why do you oppose preventing the media from glorifying and thereby legitimising violence towards women? If you object to youth gang violence and graffiti, why do you oppose preventing the media from glorifying youth gang violence and graffiti? If you object to illegal drugs, why do you oppose preventing the media from glamourising the ingestion of illegal drugs? If you object to your mother being raped, why do you oppose preventing the media from "creating" pop songs extolling the virtues of raping mothers?

If you came home from work one night and found a man in your house who was trying to sell your kids products, while at the same time telling them to take drugs, use violence, call women "hoes", and rape their mother, you would grab the bastard and throw him right out of the house.

But you come home, the TV is on, the radio is on, the kids are listening, and you don't think twice about it.

LEGO

“If you object to violent criminal behaviour, why do you oppose preventing the media from glamourising violent criminal behaviour? “

… There goes Robin Hood, Ned Kelly, and Dirty Harry.

If you object to violence towards women, why do you oppose preventing the media from glorifying and thereby legitimising violence towards women?

… The Wizard of Oz (“ding dong, the witch is dead”)

If you object to youth gang violence and graffiti, why do you oppose preventing the media from glorifying youth gang violence and graffiti?

... West Side Story, The Warriors, Boyz in the Hood

If you object to illegal drugs, why do you oppose preventing the media from glamourising the ingestion of illegal drugs?

… the Big Chill, Trainspotting, Airplane, American Beauty, Lost in Translation

I really don't want you deciding what I can watch, read or hear.

A far bigger problem contributing to family violence is that the male role in our society has become so devalued that it has created a group of men who feel they are simply not wanted, either in the home or at the workplace. They are constantly told they are violent, whatever they might do is characterised that way while female behaviour that is identical is ignored and the women portrayed as victims.

Is it so hard to see where this sort of constant conditioning is likely to lead?

The fact is that, as Eva Cox points out, the rise of the femocrats under Hawke has seen a deliberate attempt to split families and to reduce men to economic dependency on the state. The people who informed the policies to achieve this are psychologists and sociologists. The messages are carefully tailored to produce just the outcome that has occurred. In the warped world that such people inhabit, there is a need for victims to stand beside and the best way to ensure a supply of victims is to goad men into making them.

There is nothing respectable about the parasites who infest the feminist industry or the political, media and academic players who enable their existence.

I do agree with part of the message. Overall I'm with the anti-censorship approach but I wonder how far that goes where there does seem to be encouragement of hurting others. I've not listened to the "artist" described in the article but if the lyrics are as described is their a spillover to audience attitudes? On the other hand a lot of the evidence around the viewing of porn and violent film suggests a drop in assaults, seemingly with people getting it out of their system.

I'm not sure the evidence is all that clear either way yet on what the outcomes are.

I've been considering much of the commentary around "The Biff" in professional football. A topic much on the radio after the first state of origin match.

The general opinion seems to be that a bit of biff on the field is a good thing or at worst a minor infraction when passions are high. The official response is a bit tougher, take a 10 minute time out then get back into the workplace, maybe later miss a game or two.

This in a profession with a relatively small highly paid workforce where seemingly weekly one of them is in the news for an offence in public involving violence. The sport also seems to enjoy a level of taxpayer support with as I understand it state government involvement in the construction of stadiums and at least some federal money towards the ARL headquarters http://www.rugbyleague.com.au/commission/rugbyleaguecentral.php

In my workplace it does not matter how emotional I may be feeling punching someone would cost me my job and quite possibly have someone considering if I should be spending time in jail.

If they want to add boxing to the rules of the game fair enough, no one has to play but while it's not part of the rules I'm bothered by the message that it's sort of Ok to punch someone if you are emotional enough. That looks like assault to me.

R0bert

Hi Rhian.

The community already decides on what you can watch, read or hear, according to the social impact of the media. Soon, the government will probably ban fast food advertisements on children's TV, in order to help control childhood obesity.

But as well as childhood obesity, the fastest growing crime statistic in the western world is juvenile homicide, much of it gang related. The graffiti plague on Sydney trains caused primarily by adolescent gangs, was not invented in Australia. It was culturally transmitted from the USA by the media in movies. There are even books being sold in Dymocks extolling the glamour of being a "tagger" and the virtues of indulging in criminal behaviour. And then we wonder why there is so much grafitti?

If your kids are running off the rails and engaging in behaviour that no other generation has done before, you had better figure out what is causing it. TV was once hailed as "the greatest educational tool ever invented". It is. But we had better watch what values it is educating our children with.

I would love to critique all of the movies that you mentioned, but space prevents me. But "Robin Hood" is an English folk tale where the hero fights for the King (Richard) against a usurper (John), thereby validating his behaviour as a non criminal. Dirty Harry was an excellent moral movie which (among other things) investigated the justification of using torture in a ticking time bomb situation.

Finally, you were wrong when you said that singing rap songs in a concert would not cause young men to go out and attack women. It has already happened. On June 16, 2000, in New York, after a Puerto Rican festival involving a concert of misogynist rap music, gangs of men from the concert roamed the park attacking women and tearing off their clothes. 56 young women were assaulted. Here is the YouTube link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGPCIc4F26E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYKjQohCuJ8

As a woman, I hope that you squirm when you watch it. The clear connection between misogynist culture and violence towards women, is obvious to all.