Thanks again, but I must very respectfully disagree. I do agree on many points, and maybe more than agree with the point that knowing the difference between fiction and reality is the big deal. I love some pretty horrifying lit, and wouldn't return a book of fiction because it turned out to be full of lies.

   But I think blaming any aspect of entertainment for violence is too easy--it's mostly a spurious correlation. In general, I think senseless aspects of our culture drive people to violence, and drives senseless junk entertainments along as a side-car-- the latter doesn't cause the former. Sneering luxury, self-righteous materialism drives desperate people nuts. Tidy white-collar crime causes messy blue-collar crime. If we had a maximum wage we wouldn't need a minimum wage. Sure, strong, interconnected people don't have to react that way, but weak and lost and beaten people probably do. Grotesque glitsy ads are probably as harmful as grotesque violence. Cute romantic comedies that dramatise a woman as a prize or reward are probably as harmful, if not more, than dumb porn that supposedly "objectifies" women. Early Shakespeare was gross, sensational, tabloidy and gratuitous--it's not such a big divide, after all. This is just my two cents and then some, but I think it's too easy just to blame the t.v., too easy to just turn it off and pretend you're somewhere above it. Yikes! I guess I must feel strongly about it, huh?