FOX reporter takes entertainment industry on with trivialized TV drug use
When you live and work in Hollywood, a town that depends on film and TV production for its mainstay bread and butter, it’s a head turner when you hold a big, fat mirror up to the 800 pound gorilla sitting in the sound stage.
That’s exactly what local Los Angeles FOX 11 reporter Phil Shuman did when he dared to pose questions about sliding standards to a large viewing audience on March 22, 2013. At what point does network television draw the line when it comes to trivializing pot, pills and alcohol use on prime time TV when children are most likely to be watching?
Last night, Shuman hosted Dr. Damon Raskin, an internist and addiction specialist and Richard Taite (CEO of Cliffside Malibu, and author of “Ending Addiction for Good” www.cliffsidemalibu.com), both of Cliffside Malibu residential rehabilitation, a prestigious center where the average stay for patients in recovery is closer to six to nine months than the common 28 days.
What did Shuman, Raskin and Taite have in common?
Each of them has several young children, and each expressed that they were genuinely concerned for where entertainment – programming meant for family broadcast in a specific time slot – seems to be heading.
The special, FOX 11 30-Minute Special: Drugs, Kids and the Media dove in to popular shows like “Two and a Half Men,” “Two Broke Girls” and “Family Guy,” where casual remarks and scenes involving pill usage and pot smoking are on the rise.
Emmy winner Shuman examined this in detail and revealed the negative impact these shows are having on kids – with the help of Dr. Raskin and Richard Taite – who shared cold hard facts about the what they see first-hand in their medical practice.
A former EXTRA reporter, Phil Shuman has been a news reporter and anchor in Southern California for almost 30 years. Since 2002 Phil has worked for KTTV FOX 11, in the investigative unit, early in the mornings for Good Day LA, in the afternoons for Studio 11 LA, late into the night for the Fox 11 News at 10, and on the weekends.
Has broadcast family prime time gone too far with the casual approach about drug usage in TV scripts?
