China Cuts 'Excessive Entertainment' From TV

An anonymous reader writes "Chinese broadcasters have axed two-thirds of popular TV shows in line with a government directive to curb 'excessive entertainment.' From the article: 'The rule, first announced in October, is targeted at what Chinese regulators have called "excessive entertainment and a trend toward low taste," to address the rise of talent shows, dating shows and other such programming aired by China's tightly regulated, but increasingly competitive, regional satellite broadcasters. Authorities also encouraged broadcasters to air more news and educational programming.' according to local media reports."

Comments

Its hard for me to critisize this move.

[Narcocide]

If I had my own country, I would make reality TV illegal too.

Re:Its hard for me to critisize this move.

[msobkow]

You have the right to hate any show you don't like and refuse to watch it. You don't have the right to tell other people what they like.

Re:Its hard for me to critisize this move.

[Quiet_Desperation]

I don't like reality TV, either.

However, I'd personally lead the rebel army that took down your fascist ass. :-)

Re:FCC Should take note

[kelarius]

TV doesn't make people stupid, it just keeps stupid people entertained and out of the public eye, so why is excessively entertaining media a bad thing?

Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things...

Practical arguments against?

[Cabriel]

Beside the obvious "OMGFreeSpeech" and "OMG1984" arguments, in the face of garbage programming like American Idol, Survivor, Dancing with the Stars, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, etc, what practical non-what-if arguments are there for this being a bad thing?

Re:Practical arguments against?

[Intropy]

Because being entertained makes people happy and being happy is better than not being happy.

Re:Practical arguments against?

[Anonymous Coward]

But watching most of these programs makes people miserable. Watching all the glamor and riches makes the dreary of reality impact all the worse. Unlike movies that are obvious fantasy these lie that this could be real. They have zero educational value, they will never make people feel better. They are just a drug that sucks people's energy and turns them into brainless trash.

Re:Practical arguments against?

[tsotha]

When the people are active in a society they question things, get involved in things, and yes challenge things they feel aren't right.

That's pretty condescending. What makes you think they can't watch a few hours of television and still be informed? When people refer to large groups of people as "sheeple" and wail they won't "wake up" it implies if only people were paying attention they'd think like I think. Well, and stay with me here, maybe they already question things, they're already involved, and they already "challenge things they feel aren't right." Maybe their vision of how things ought to be isn't the same as yours.

I'm guessing from the way your post is written you're not from the US. I'm at a little bit of a loss to understand why you think we in the US would make our country just like yours if only we didn't watch so much television.

Re:Practical arguments against?

[subreality]

I care when it's gotten to the point where there is literally nothing to watch that doesn't leave me feeling disgusted. I don't care what any individual is doing, but as a society it cannot be good that programming has gotten so low; filling our brains with this stuff is not going to advance us anywhere, so why are we wasting valuable spectrum on it?

Wipe it out and replace it with something intelligent.

Re:Practical arguments against?

[horza]

It's actually worse than you think. It's not just filling brains with mush and turning people into passive vegetables, it actually shapes the aspirations of society. Who wants to work hard and become an astronaut when you can just do nothing all your life then suddenly sing or dance on a stage and become the most desired person in the country? In the UK the contestants in this show "Big Brother" have actually become celebrities in their own right! It's ridiculous, they have contributed nothing of value.

Phillip.

Re:That's true

[Anonymous Coward]

That's true of geeks, but I wonder how true it is of most Chinese. We shouldn't underestimate how much the government can shift media consumption patterns by making access more difficult.

Re:All power to China

[MattBecker82]

No wonder over 500% of Slashdot users post hyperbole without anything to back it up.

Seriously, I don't know if you're joking or not, but your post is just false premises, non-sequiturs and made-up "facts". Analysis:

Excessive entertainment over the tube is one of the lead causes of the downfall of the Western nations.

You need to establish the premise of "the downfall of the Western nations" (whatever that means), then establish a cause-and-effect relationship between "excessive entertainment over the tube" and the former.

Turn on the tube if you don't believe me, flip some channels, see how many of the programs are of any value in the first place?

How are you establishing the "value" of TV programs exactly? By your own judgement as whether it's something you'd like to watch?

No wonder over 90% of the American high school graduates can't even pinpoint their own country - the United States of America - on the world map.

Citation needed. Or an admission that you just made this up.

They have been dumbed down by the entertainment industry.

Non-sequitur. Even if you establish two concurrent trends, it doesn't mean there is a connection or cause-and-effect relationship between them.

Re:Lucky Chinese

[tsotha]

Why don't you just turn your TV off?

Re:Right because if one place does it it is ok

[Anonymous Coward]

Difference is, America takes every-fucking-opportunity to say how great they are, that they value freedom and liberty, the "greatest country" in the world. Those hypocrites deserve all of it and more.

Re:Right because if one place does it it is ok

[KazW]

Seriously I get real tired of the America basing some people feel the need to do whenever anything about another country comes up...

2) Not everyone on the Internet lives in America. Maybe they are interested in news about other countries, ever think of that? Stop trying to steer everything back to your country. There are plenty of discussions on /. about the shit that happens in America. Don't hijack others.

You do realize the GP didn't mention America at all in his comment, don't you? It was only you who mentioned America. In essence, you're doing exactly what you said shouldn't be done.

I'm Canadian, and I had a similar sentiment as the GP. I think _you_ should stop steering the discussion towards America.

China is different. Don't you get that?

[msobkow]

The very fundamental ideals of Chinese society place family and the greater community at higher priority than the individual's wants or needs. I suspect the vast majority of the Chinese people actually don't mind this. Those that do can certainly access media from elsewhere in the world -- technology is wide spread in China.

You really need to get the image of rice farms out of your heads.

Re:China is different. Don't you get that?

[msobkow]

State run TV means it's going to serve the priorities of the state. It's not a commercial enterprise out to win the greatest number of eyeballs, but a tool of the government first and the entertainment of the people second.

It's not unlike the emphasis the CBC placed on their programming mix when state-run TV was the only option in Canada. I saw a lot of documentaries, docu-drama histories, and educational shows when I was young.

Re:All power to China

[Anonymous Coward]

Not so, Only people who are already dumb watch this crap

Re:All power to China

[MattBecker82]

I'm not looking for watertight scientific proof, but the GGP makes an extraordinary claim (i.e. that excess of "entertainment" TV shows causes the downfall of Western nations), and indeed it's possible this is right, just as it's possible the world is run by a secret society of reptilian fascists. However, the GGP presents it as fact, and with no supporting evidence and only an illogical argument and further extraordinary claims to back it up, I see no reason to accept the claim.

If he had presented it as opinion (which it is), and had omitted the ridiculous reference to the level of geography fail among US high school grads, then I wouldn't have had any cause to challenge it.

Re:All power to China

[Anonymous Coward]

most people are sheep, if sheep watch dumb stuff, they get dumber, if sheep watch educational stuff they get smarter.

The U.S. government already regulates what you can eat by banning or cutting back on bad for you foods (banning fast food places in ghetto's, getting rid of trans-fats etc..), why not regulate bad for you television. As much as it goes against freedom and democracy this actually sounds like a really wonderful idea.

Re:China is different. Don't you get that?

[gl4ss]

if the vast majority didn't mind, they wouldn't need banning as they wouldn't have any viewers, while in fact these bans are a part of a war for viewers.

And Yet

[d3ac0n]

We still see video of people falling over themselves weeping when Kim-Jong "mentally" ill dies. Not to say that those videos aren't at least partially staged, but some "undercover" video has leaked out of NK showing that at least some of the weeping, wailing and carrying on was genuine. (I apologize for not having a link ATM. Search on YouTube. It's there.)

Not to say that the new regime isn't weak, it certainly is. But not so weak that ipod clones are going to topple them anytime soon. We see how well "westernization" has "toppled" the communist Chinese government. (IE: Not at all) If Kim-Jong Un decides to modernize and westernize following the Chinese model, Korea isn't likely to see unification anytime in the next century.

Sadly, there really is only ONE way to absolutely topple a government of any stripe. That's with violent revolution. The only way that Korea will unify is if SK invades and defeats NK. With NK's recent round of sabre-rattling, that's looking more and more likely every day.

Re:And Yet

[ShieldW0lf]

China knows how to topple a civilization just fine. Give them free fish for years until they have forgotten what a fishing rod is and their children have never seen one, then withdraw the fish. That's how they're beating the west.

Re:And Yet

[AnonyMouseCowWard]

This is false. My parents were there.

They cried, because in a tightly controlled country with government media, the loss of your leader is like losing a family member. It's like losing the person the entire country, and you yourself, relied on. They cried because they were at a loss as to what to do. It's losing the person running the country, the only person capable of doing so (or so they believed), and having certainty replaced by uncertainty. If you're a believer, it's like losing your prophet.

That might not have been the situation for everyone, but for a big percentage of the population, it was entirely genuine.

Re:All power to China

[jpapon]

Personally, I don't give a damn if an autoworker can find the USA on a map, as long as they know how to repair my car.

While I can find the US on a map, I don't know how to replace a serpentine belt. Does that make me dumb?