Special Issue: 2004's Most Consequential Clips

QUOTE: “The Passion [of the Christ] reminds viewers that Christianity was born out of blood, pain and tears—a far more gritty reality than a Thomas Kinkade painting or a Precious Moments nativity scene. This is no small lesson to a culture whose crosses are studded with diamonds instead of splinters. The Passion is the Sunday school flannel board lesson for a generation that grew up on violent video games, skipped church and stood in line to watch Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill: Vol. 1.” —Christian film critic Steve Beard, from his society-and-culture weblog thunderstruck.org [thunderstruck.org, 2/24/04]

QUOTE: “Things that everyone notices, like the Janet Jackson Super Bowl incident, tend to be overreactions to societal transformations that have already happened. But things that sneak in under the radar, deceptive events that not everyone pays attention to, can be unsettling signposts leading to unsavory change.” —Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times film critic, in his review of the R-rated comedy The Girl Next Door, which he describes as a “sanitized and exquisitely titillating portrait of the world of pornography in the cozy sheep's clothing of a teenage movie” [Los Angeles Times, 4/9/04]

QUOTE: "Excuse me while I vomit. [ABC's apology for its risqué Monday Night Football intro featuring Desperate Housewives actress Nicolette Sheridan] suggests that the wizards who decided it would be great fun to have a naked woman approach a player much like a randy dog approaches your leg had no idea that anyone in America would be offended. ... My guess is that ABC wrote the apology even before it filmed the spot and figured that all the publicity it would reap ... would be well worth any fines the FCC might decide to impose. ... If you want to talk about declining morals, that's where you start, with the cynical hypocrisy of the executives who knew exactly what they were doing. Their apology is as sincere as that of a man who hits another over the head with a two-by-four, then visits him in the hospital to say, 'I didn't know it would hurt.'" —MSNBC sports commentator Mike Celizic [msnbc.com, 11/17/04]

Immersive environments, sophisticated story lines and online game-play have resulted in what some observers have called the new "golden age" of video games. Two graphically violent blockbuster sequels (in particular) have sent the industry into overdrive. Global sales of Halo 2 (for Xbox) have already eclipsed the 5 million copy mark since the game's release in early November. And Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (for PS2) is on track to move 5 million units worldwide by year's end. Combined with a storm of other sequels (Metroid Prime 2, Doom 3, Half-Life 2, EverQuest 2, The Sims 2, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater), these games drove unprecedented holiday game sales. [usatoday.com, 10/26/04 and 11/22/04; gamespot.com/news, 12/03/04; reuters.com, 12/10/04; games.channel.aol.com/news, 12/17/04]

The American Medical Association (AMA) issued a formal warning in September regarding media violence, calling it a “public health threat.” Doctor and AMA trustee Ronald M. Davis told a congressional hearing that the “AMA has been increasingly concerned that exposure to violence in media is a significant risk to the physical and mental health of children and adolescents.” He also said America’s youth encounter ever-increasing levels of graphic violence, and he pointed to the evidence that such exposure leads to aggressive attitudes, values and behavior. In addition to increased parental involvement, the AMA is calling for the entertainment industry to “exercise greater responsibility in its programming content.” [AMA press release, 9/13/04]

The youngest set of Web surfers is the fastest growing demographic on the Internet, according to new data from Nielsen/NetRatings. Children ages 2 to 11 viewed 36% more Web pages in October 2004 than in October 2003, compared to a 2% increase for all surfers. Instant messaging is the top pick for girls, while boys tend toward entertainment sites. [MediaPost, 11/19/04 stats]

QUOTE: “I saw [a picture] in an open magazine at a hair salon recently. Of Jennifer Aniston. A gorgeous photograph—she was perfection. And they have these arrows pointing to what she could change with plastic surgery: How about this? Look at this thing, and look at this. It made my heart sink. What does that teach a girl who’s looking through the magazine? It teaches her that if there’s something wrong with this incredibly beautiful woman, then what’s wrong with me? It saddens me that I’m involuntarily a part of that.” —actress Renée Zellweger [Glamour, 11/04]

In what Sirius Satellite Radio dubbed "the most exciting and transformational event in the history of radio," Howard Stern is leaving AM and FM radio for the satellite-distributed, subscriber-based Sirius network. While the self-proclaimed "King of All Media" has remained the No. 1 talk-show host in most major markets around the nation, getting the boot from certain Clear Channel Communications stations and an increase in the FCC's willingness to fine him for his obscene behavior led to him signing Sirius' five-year multimillion dollar offer. Because satellite radio is currently not FCC regulated (and therefore uncensored), Stern will have free rein (starting January 2006), albeit in front of a limited audience. [Fox News, 10/6/04; USA Today, 10/6/04]

Poker mania swept the country this year, thanks in part to three popular poker shows on cable TV: ESPN's World Series of Poker, Travel Channel's World Poker Tour and Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown. Television exposure combined with Internet poker sites has dramatically shortened the amount of time it takes to become a card shark. Twenty-four-year-old David Williams, who scored $3.5 million on ESPN's show, says, "You can squeeze a few years of practice into a few months." Gambling counselors are concerned that the current poker craze will lead to more addicts down the road. [People, 8/9/04 c&e]

QUOTE: "I used to think that reality television was successful because of narcissism. Later I decided it was actually successful because of voyeurism. Later still, I concluded it was successful because of the way it changed our perception of celebrity. However, I've had another realization: People love reality television because reality television can save your life. It can give you a better job (The Apprentice), a better car (Pimp My Ride), an awesome house (Trading Spaces) that looks completely gay (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy), a drag queen's body (The Swan), and Kate Winslet's cheekbones (I Want a Famous Face). Reality television does what rock music once did: It gives us hope." —Chuck Klosterman, senior writer for Spin magazine [Spin, 7/04]

After tallying 2,344 treatments of religion over a one-year period (9/03 to 9/04), the Parents Television Council, in partnership with the National Religious Broadcasters, released the findings of its sixth study on television’s representation of religion. Researchers deemed one quarter (24.4%) of religious depictions negative, 22.1% positive and the rest neutral. The study pegged NBC as "by far the most anti-religious network" with 9.5 negative portrayals for each positive one. [latimes.com, 12/16/04; AP, 12/16/04 stats]

QUOTE: "American children are deeply enmeshed in the culture of getting and spending, and they are getting more so. The more they buy into the commercial and materialist messages, the worse they feel about themselves, the more depressed they are and the more they are beset with anxiety, headaches, stomachaches and boredom." —consumer expert Juliet B. Schor, author of the new book Born to Buy: The Commercialized Child and the New Consumer Culture [washingtonpost.com, 11/14/04]

QUOTE: "Your dirty laundry gets out of school at 2:30 every day, it's cursing and calling each other n-ggers as they're walking up and down the street. ... They think they're hip. They can't read; they can't write. They're laughing and giggling, and they're going nowhere." —Bill Cosby, speaking at the annual conference for Jessie Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and Citizen Education Fund [AP, 7/2/04]

Adolescent substance-abuse treatment admissions have increased for the 10th year in a row, according to data released by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Treatment for children ages 12 to 17 increased 65% between 1992 and 2002. Treatment for primary marijuana abuse rose 350%. “The youthfulness of people admitted for marijuana use shows that we need to work harder to get the message out that marijuana is a dangerous, addictive substance,” says SAMHSA administrator Charles Curie. [SAMSHA news release, 8/31/04; MediaDailyNews, 10/20/04 stats]

QUOTE: "I never felt like Friends was an 8 p.m. show. It is sexually open. With some of that material, I'm still shocked when a 7-year-old girl comes up to me and says, 'I love your show.'" —Lisa Kudrow, who plays Phoebe on the NBC sitcom, which ended its decade-long run on May 6 [People, 4/19/04]

QUOTE: "Little by little you change the landscape of the mind. And once you change the mind, you start changing the culture. And the personal is political. Pop culture is political. And one fine day, sexual orientation will be added to the federal hate crimes bill." —actress Jennifer Beals (of Flashdance fame), who stars as a lesbian character in the explicit Showtime series The L-Word. Beals is unabashedly evangelistic about the show's purpose: to reshape viewers' attitudes about homosexuality [CBS, 7/9/04]

Since 1979 the average age of gays "coming out" has dropped from 21 to between 14 and 16. [usatoday.com, 6/22/04 stats]

A study conducted by the Medical Institute for Sexual Health and funded by the Centers for Disease Control reported that teens are bombarded with sexual images from pop media. The average teenager watches three to four hours of TV daily and witnesses an average of 6.7 scenes in every hour of programming related to sexual topics. Researchers concluded that teens exposed to such sexual depictions are "more likely than other adolescents" to have more permissive attitudes toward premarital sex and "to think that having sex is beneficial." Likewise, teens listen to nearly 40 hours of radio a week (more than 25% of teen-targeted radio segments contain sexual content; 42% of top-selling CDs contain sexual content that is "pretty explicit" or "very explicit"). Nine- to 17-year-olds use the Internet four days per week (two hours at a time). Of those who use computers, 61% go online, 14% of whom say they see things they "wouldn't want their parents to know about." [Washington Times, 2/20/04 stats, c&e]

QUOTE: "Recent studies show that it's not uncommon for high school students to have sex with someone they aren't dating. A 2001 survey conducted by Bowling Green State University in Ohio found that of the 55% of local 11th graders who engaged in intercourse, 60% said they'd had sex with a partner who was no more than a friend. That number would perhaps be higher if the study asked about oral sex. While the teen intercourse rate has declined—from 54% in 1991 to 47% in 2003—this may be partly because teenagers have simply replaced intercourse with oral sex. To a generation raised on MTV, AIDS, Britney Spears, Internet porn, Monica Lewinsky and Sex and the City, oral sex is definitely not sex (it's just "oral"), and hooking up is definitely not a big deal." —writer Benoit Denizet-Lewis, in his comprehensive article on teen sex, "Friends, Friends With Benefits and the Benefits of the Local Mall" [New York Times Magazine, 5/30/04 stats]