irst lady dolley madison -- we will include your phone calls, comments, and tweets and monday at 9:00 eastern on c-span, c-span radio, and c-span.org. >> next, a look at violence in entertainment with "a variety magazine." pala by a look at education and transportation spending. then your calls, tweets, and comments live on "washington journal." host: on wednesdays at this time, we turn our spotlight to magazines. today, we look at variety magazine. they have a special report on violence in entertainment. here to talk about it with as from los angeles is friday magazine's chief international answer, tim gray. thank you for being here so early this morning guest: i'm very happy you asked me. thank you. host: you started this special report with a message of why you're doing this.

why did variety jump in? and maybe tell us what variety is for those of us who are not as corrected to the hollywood scene. guest: is a trade paper for the hollywood scene. it started in 19005. over the years, we have evolved and covered film, a digital, music, all aspects of it. it is not the red carpet coverage, but the dollars and cents. you ask why we would talk about violence. variety has always had a need to talk about social awareness, because people in the entertainment industry need to know what is going on in the world, because that is where their readers are. i wrote a book and you just showed a copy of the book called "variety illustrates the history of the world." that is how we cover world events, whether the sinking of the titanic or the arab spring and everything in between, because readers have to be

aware of more than dollars and cents. we're having a meeting and talking about moving forward because we have a new owner, jay kenduskeag, who bought as in october. -- j penske, who brought us in october. we were looking at what we're doing with their website and with the print version. and people were distracted by sandy l and a couple of the parents for talking about worrying about their kids at school. and he had this light in his eyes and said, let's do an issue on just the violence and we will cover it from every aspect and get everybody to weigh in on both sides of the issue. in 35 seconds, he bought the whole issue -- he evolves to the whole issue. jay wanted no advertising,

because he said he did not want this to be a commercial venture. he said he did not want people to think that we were capitalizing on this. i wanted to get people in the industry to think. the readers in the industry, they are responsible for content that goes around the world. and we want that to think about whether they were contributing to this violence. host: and your point out that the chairman and ceo conceived of this issue. there were more than 40 contributors from within the industry and without. five people on both sides of gun-control, as well as the video game industry working on this issue. every question led to forde -- further questions about domestic violence, mental health, pharmaceutical, censorship, and technology. many were eager to weigh in, others were too timid to go public. what has the conversation been like in the industry, in hollywood, in terms of violence? is this something you feel you

have talked about a lot? guest: it is talked about a lot. one of the goals was not to let people off the hook. entertainment is always attacked for its content. a lot of people say, it is not our fault, it is gun-control or it is mental health. i say in my introduction an old 1960's craze, if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem. maybe entertainment cannot be solely blamed for the problem, but this ask the question, are you contributing in any way? the american academy of child and adolescent psychiatry as these statistics that i find shocking. the average child every year watches 1500 hours of television, but only spends 1000 hours in the classroom. it is more television than classroom.

what does that affect? what are they watching? and what effect does that have on those lines? we wanted to raise a lot of questions. host: if you like to weigh in, you're the phone numbers to call. -- here are the phone numbers to call. who are some of the notable contributors in here, tim gray? guest: jay rockefeller was one of the notable contributors. he wrote a great piece. vince gill again, who created breaking bad, he wrote a piece. i was practically stalking him because that show has violence, but it is very thoughtful. he wrote an essay saying, of course you can detect violence, but there have to be consequences. a lot of times you will see the hero shoot somebody, they fall dead, and the hero makes a wisecrack and a walk on. awarenesss never any of whether it affects the hero by shooting people, and the victim, did he have a family?

he was saying there ought to be consequences to the violence. when you talk about violence in the media, you could be talking about the passion of christ, because that was a very violent film, or the three stooges, or video games. the longer we worked on this, the more complex it became. it was really interesting to work on. i host: what is the history of violence in his -- host: what is the history of violence in cinema? you talk about everything from fistfights' to some of the first images hundreds of years ago. this is a picture from the 1903 film, "the great train robbery." the film concludes with shooting at the camera and it was so realistic to audience, some -- to audiences, some doctors they had never seen anything like it before. -- some ducked.

they had never seen anything like it before. guest: guns in film have always been part of our history. nfl, there were reports of some pulling out guns -- in that film, there were reports of sampling of guns and shooting guard at the screen. i do not know if that is true, but it is a good story. a lot of these images of violence are just part of our culture. james cagney shoving a grapefruit in that woman's face. the wild bunch from the '70s, all of these movies are part of our heritage. what is that heritage? it is fascinating. i love jay penske for thinking of this idea.

host: let's go to the phones. gerald in newcastle is our first caller. -- cheryl in newcastle is our first caller. caller: i call myself no pta mom. many years ago i chaired -- an old pta mom. many years ago i chaired the pta council. at the time, the national pta had developed a wonderful national program looking at violence in video games and on television and in the movie industry. when sandy hook happened, and of course, for many years i've worked with children and for the last 25 years as an advocate in my job i work for children, so what happened at sandy hook especially touched me.

it was the most extreme case as far as what we have seen in our culture here in america. i talked to my friends and said, is no one listening -- was no one listening 25 or 30 years ago when we were talking about the fact that we were just becoming more and more accepting of the violence in our culture? i know joe lieberman and a few other senators for years sponsored a conference out and washington, d.c. on violence in video games. and the entire time is on television, they have something streaming on the bottom talking about how violent the content of what they are showing is. i have two young grandchildren. i'm very disturbed by what i see on television. even the promos for some of the movies, i put my hand in front of my face, because i'm 62 years old and the violence has

increased to such a place that it is something i cannot even stomach any more. i am concerned about our young people being fed a constant diet of this. and one wants to take responsibility. it is not the movies, the music, the television, the video games. it is maybe not one of those, but i believe in my heart that it is all of those. guest: i totally hear what you're saying. in the issue that we have, we printed an ad from 1968. a man took out a full-page ad after the assassinations of robert kennedy and martin luther king jr. and said, ok, we have to do something. i do not want to just be a voice in the wilderness and we ought to solve this. that was 1968. have we solve this? i don't know. we have people weighing in on movie, tv, video games, but also mental health, domestic abuse, child abuse. all of these things are contributing. i agree, the worst thing anyone can do is to not do anything, to just assume someone else will solve the problem.

and the second worst thing is to pinpoint one area and say, that is responsible, whether it is gun control or video games and to say, once that is resolved, everything will be solved. it is all contributing. and i said in my introduction, do something. i do not care what side you are on, but do something to make a difference. take action here. i do not wait for other people to solve the problem. host: let's look at the film rating system. we see this from filmratings.com, the way that i movies are rated so that families can know what to expect. how does this play a role in the making of movies, and also in the portrayal of violence? guest: the movie rating system was started in 1968 to prevent government censorship. because a lot of local boards have their own standards for

the local community. and the studios were trying to chase down -- because in 1968, a lot of things were changing. they could not be involved in 20 lawsuits at any one time. it is a standard, a guide for parents. it is helpful. i think it does help people. but for me, the question of violence in entertainment is the question of the pervasiveness. if you go back to the bible, or to greek plays, or to shakespeare, some of them are very violent. you see violence for three hours, maybe in one week in those instances. the american academy of

psychiatry says the average child sees 200,000 acts of violence by the time he is 18. even if it is only 10% of that, that is still 20,000 acts of violence by the time they are 18. again, if the child is loved and well adjusted, that will make a difference. we interviewed a man from the los angeles sheriff's department who said, look, there are no easy solutions, but it all starts at home. i think there's truth to that. host: let's hear from carl in danville, ky on the republicans line. caller: hello. what i wanted to comment was, i fear that your guest is spotting the old liberal line that exposure to violence -- and of course, the end game for these nice folks is disarming the public. but as far as exposure to violence, even tremendous amounts over and over leading to an individual become a violent individual, i think that you are really stretching the logic there.

for example, combat veterans are some of the most peaceful people if you have been exposed to an extreme amount of violence, you're probably less prone to violence than someone who has led a peaceful existence in their life in some ways. i feel like it's all politics, just to disarm the public, and they keep using these lines like, well, if you would just save one child's life. and if we would outlaw vehicles -- a good example of what i'm saying is the drunken-driving schools that they send a nice folks to when they get their dui's. they end up with little effect on these people out, even though they are exposed to all the films with horrible wreck on the people and they know that can happen. they go right out and it does not change their behavior at all. that is all i would like to say. i will go off line and this is your lovely guests retort. -- listen to your guest: lovely

guest's record first, thanks -- listen to your lovely guest's retorted. guest: first, thanks for calling, and thanks for calling me lovely. one of the things that my boss said to me is, don't let hollywood off the hook. and make them think and make them think about everything they do. we tried to get all sides of the issue. we could find a lot of people in hollywood that were in favor of gun control, but if we have five people in favor of gun control, then we need five people who are against gun control. sometimes it was hard to find those. the nra never returned any of our phone calls. this was run after santillo, and they might have been feeling vulnerable. -- right after sandy hook, and they might have been feeling vulnerable. but also, because we are a hollywood paper, they might have thought we were just.

to make fun of them. but there is -- we're just going to make fun of them. but there's a big range of what people in hollywood think. the person who wrote thelma and louise and is working on the tv series natural now, she said the myth about hollywood is not true. they will go wherever there's money. again, if i seem to be espousing a party line, i apologize. i'm trying to get people to think and be aware. one of the contributors is peter reagan. he talks about anti-depressant and young people who are described antidepressant and nobody monitors them and it changes their behavior. -- who are prescribed antidepressants and nobody maters then and it changes their behavior.

the young man in the shooting, was he playing video games? yes, he was, but he was also one antidepressants. we put this together in a month, and the more complex and more fascinating and upsetting it was. i did not sleep well for a month. i was having nightmares, because you just keep hearing these statistics and these facts. i'm trying not to espouse a liberal viewpoint, or any viewpoint. i'm just trying to get people to read it. go to variety.com/violence. you will see these 40 contributors and their pieces. if you have time, read them all. they all make interesting points. host: here is an example of what you will find in the report. you see here,. encounter. , -- you see here point and counterpoint.

ned in huntsville, alabama as our next caller. caller: good morning to you. the gun issue that we have at present, gun-control is not going to solve the problem that we have with violence in this country. but i'm not against it. it may do some good. the reason is, ours is a violent society. we live in a violent society where violence is glamorized. look at our sports. look at our commercials for the movies. look at the way we fight wars. our soldiers are really more like actors than they are soldiers and fighters.

i don't know what to do about this, and i do not know if i have a suggestion for you, but as i was the president and wanted to address this, my first visit would be to hollywood. i would talk to the hollywood community and talk about toning it down a bit. and violence in sports, we should do something about that. he could talk about that, too. host: let's get tim gray's thoughts on that. what is the role of congress? you mention that senator jay rockefeller to contribute to this publication. what about congress and the white house? guest: i think they need to study it and be aware of it, but i also said to the readers, especially in the entertainment industry, don't wait for congress to do anything. things can get bogged down in legislation. and first amendment rights, it is very difficult for them to

legislate what content a film or tv show can have. i would say to work on the community level. earlier, i said if you are not part of the solution to my your part of the problem, it is an old 1963, but i think it is true. the other one is, think global, but start local. work with the mental health facilities, do that. work with the sheriff's department. we had someone from the sheriff's department, paltz menachem. -- paul tenaka. i think that is the way to go rather than wait for congress because they will get bogged down in many cases, there are instances where the community took action years ahead of what congress did. i would say, follow the model. host: here is a twitter comment.

maverick writes in and says with a 24-7 violence and in many cases violence has been glorified. another tweet, yes, violence is a problem and should be eliminated. let's go back to the ozzie and harriet days. what do you think? guest: it sounds nice. i do not know that we can never go back to the r.t. and harriet days. but again, the thing with violence, the public liked it. -- go back to the ozzie and harriet days. but again, the thing with violence, the public likes it. after the issue came out, i got so much positive reaction, and yet the walking dead, which is the most popular show on television and has huge ratings, it is very violent and the public is watching it. django one change, which is a -- unchained, which is a very violent film, i think it is $350

million worldwide and it won an oscar. the public likes it around the world. it sounds nice to say, let's eliminate violence, but where do you draw the line? that new miniseries, the bible, you could not show that because it is violent. you could not show the passion of the cries. -- the christ. you could not show a three stooges episodes. they're very violent. there are many times that i wish we could go back to the old days, but i think it is not going to happen. we have moved. an actor, chazz palminteri, he says, and the audiences just can't wait for the big fist fight on the daytime talk shows on the jerry springers and the maury povichs. they just cannot wait for people to start swinging at each other. a lot of people watching this are probably against violence, but a lot of the audience does like it.

and that is a little distressing, too. host: you mentioned chazz palminteri and he writes an essay. he writes -- he ended up turning his witnessing a violent into a story about growing up in the bronx. do your writers differentiate between violence for greater good and violence that has another purpose or mission? guest: i will say that his peace was one of my favorites in that issue because we asked him about being an actor playing scenes of violence, what goes

through your body, what goes through your mind when you are building up to that. he was not interested in that question. he just wanted to talk about the the sensitizing of society in general because of entertainment. and he also talked about witnessing a shooting. his father took care of him and major he had a perspective and knew what that was about. also, ronald reagan's children talk about watching old westerns with their father, and he would always say, if that guy was really shot in the shoulder like that, he could not just get out and shoot the other guy. this would tear into his muscle. here is the effect of a bullet. it is good parenting. that makes a big difference. people in hollywood, there's a wide range. every day, i'm surprised at how smart and often some people in war -- in hollywood are, and every day, is horrified at how sensitive and selfish -- insensitive and selfish some of them are.

it is like any industry. there are some good people who really think about the effects of what they're doing. again, vince gill again with breaking bad and kurt sadr with sons of anarchy. they are very thoughtful about violence and its effect on people. other people are out for a quick buck. it is hard to generalize. does that answer your question? host: it does, thank you. two other contributors in here, patti davis and ron reagan talk about the violence they sought in television and movies. let's go to virginia, mark, republican caller. caller: good morning. as i look at the gamut of things i'm trying to solve here, the video games, the violence on tv, it is there.

and i do believe we did to sensitize children -- desensitizes children, because that is what they see. there are those family comedy shows on tv. at one time, we have for five films where they are showing bodies being autopsied on television. i do not really think that is what the american people want to see, but i believe when you flip channels and you are seeing on channel after channel after channel, that is what you get. and the music we see -- the music, we see kids coming from the get as and glorifying shooting or slapping a woman, and the next thing you know, this guy's a billionaire. when will we get real and see that these young minds out there -- i do not know exactly how to put it.

they are seeing this and they're acting it out. there is no normalcy to it anymore. guest: you're making an interesting point. again, people in hollywood, there's a wide range of reactions. i have talked to some people who say, ok, but violence in entertainment, it goes back to a dozen years at least. a little bit -- 2000 years at peace. -- at least. a little bit is inevitable. they would single out video games, because to them, look, you're sitting in a movie theater with 300 other people watching an act of violence. that is still a social setting. a video game, is pretty much one-on-one, and especially the first person shooter game where the person playing the video game gets points by shooting people. in theory, the person they are shooting is a villain, so in

theory, they are doing good. but several people i talked about -- talked to in hollywood said they worry about that concept because here is someone sitting alone at home, in the dark, maybe four hours, and the screens are very sophisticated and well done, so they look kind of realistic. they worry about the effect of that. but again, because we are a variety and we talk a lot about the entertainment industry and their role, i was also struck by a lot of the facts about mental health, for example. a woman named doris fuller was saying that in the past 50 years, 95% of psychiatric beds have been eliminated. we just do not give mental- health care to people anymore. and. tanaka -- and charaf tanaka also made that point. you want to get people off the streets of they do not harm

people. again, domestic violence, child abuse, all of that kind of stuff, it can be overwhelming when you think about it. when we started working on this issue, we had an idea of what we wanted to cover. when we started working on that threat it was like, oh, my god, this is widespread and pervasive and scary. host: we're talking about variety, a special report on violence and entertainment. you can find an online by going to variety.com/reilich. -- variety.com/violence. here are a couple of weeks for you. -- tweets for you. one writes, it is plain to see that violence is more in-your- face than ever. kids are impressionable. some kids think reality is video games. and another one said another way to look at it is the entertainment verses from the games. do they equal or not?

our guest served as editor and chief of this special report on violence in entertainment. his work also includes the book "rit" -- "rit: an illustrated history of the world from the most important magazine in hollywood." let's hear from herald in east st. louis on the democrats line. caller: good morning. i want to respond to the republican that was trying to blame ghetto people for the violence. as far as i can see, most of the people committing these -- this violence is a white man. -- violence is done by young white men.

i have been around violence and lived in the ghetto all my life. i've never had the impulse, or known anyone who wanted to go into a schoolroom and shoot anybody. we always want to put the onus on -- the onus on the wrong people the young -- the wrong people. the young white man who decides he wants to take a gun from his mother and go into a schoolroom and shoot a people, what does that have to do with laws? you can make a lot, but if you do not get to the right people and get them help, you will not change anything. i went into a sporting goods store yesterday, i went to three of them to buy some ammunition. all of the shelves were empty. there is something getting ready to go on. what i think it is is that people are fed up with the rich having everything in the port -- poor having nothing. there will come a time when the people will get fed up and tired of being without, and struggling, and being on the street. people are coming back from wars that they have fought for 10 years and there are no jobs and they're homeless.

you better wake up. host: you brought up a lot of issues there, but before you go -- i think we lost him. in terms of the economy and other aspects, feeling disempowered, and things are not about violence, but we lost in, so maybe you can reflect on some of the issues he was bringing out. guest: first, i agree with him. there is no easy solution. that is what a lot of people, including people in the entertainment industry and elsewhere are guilty of, looking for fast solutions to this. sandy hook happened after the iran shooting, and after, mind -- and after the aurora shooting had after columbine. let's get this fixed. it will take rethinking these things. and what he was saying about -- the thing that was scary about

people's anger and guns, i think on sales have gone up significantly since sandy hook. i think people are scared. but again, when you talk about gun control, a lot of people that we talked about in this issue made a very clear distinction between handguns, rifles, and automatic weapons. i personally have a lot of friends and relatives that own guns. you cannot say, let's eliminate guns in the same way you cannot say, let's eliminate violence, either on the street or the screen. but i would say to the caller, thanks for calling, and i hope it does not get as bad as he is predicting. he should get involved at the community level. talk to the police department, the sheriff's department, a mental health department, and say, how can i help stop the violence? you will not see results by the end of the month. you will see results hopefully

soon, but it could take years. host: let's hear from craig in o'fallon, missouri, and the republicans line. caller: good morning. i would like to make reference to the individual but spoke earlier -- who spoke earlier, when the reference our military soldiers acting more like actors than what they are really supposed to do. i am a former marine of eight years in the middle east. that could not be further from the truth. i think that we, as a nation, hold up a lot of our values. i grew up with a grandfather, great uncles, great hands that have served in world war ii. it was a very large family.

the support and loyalty that they had as americans was phenomenal. that was the basis for me entering the military, because it felt as if it was a duty and an honor to serve. host: one of our callers earlier said that he would actually be less inclined to engage in violence and see violence as fruitless unless they had actually experienced -- if they have actually -- as frivolous if they have actually experienced it themselves, do you agree? guest: caller: -- absolutely. caller: -- absolutely. all i can do is speak for marines. i cannot speak for anybody else. we take our oath extremely seriously. and that is, to defend and protect the constitution of the

united states. political correctness does not go well with us. we do not like to feel like we are pawns by any means. the rules of engagement that our marines and soldiers have had to deal with in afghanistan and iraq basically tied their hands. ically tied their hands. understandably, ey're going through serious things. coming back to the united states and start having been called potential extremists it extremely offensive. host: thank you, greg. any comments? guest: a lot of the callers are making interesting points. to me, they all underline the thing that people in general are you -- are looking for easy

solutions. if somebody shoots somebody and this person was in the military is like,h, that is what happened. their mind snapped and they're good with guns and that is what they all do people are looking for easy answers. that does not take into account the people who were not in the military when shooting. for me, this whole discussion today, some of the things that the colors are bringing out our evidence that this is a complex issue. there are no easy answers. i would encourage people to continue looking into this and not forget about it. like the person who wrote the letter in 1968 who said, let's hope i'm not a voice in the wilderness i want to call the person and say, you were a voice in the wilderness, but let's carry on with this and keep it moving and take action, and try to resolve this and not look for

easy answers. to alex on the democrats line in los angeles. caller: i want to comment on a lot of things that people have been mentioning with violence in society. much of the research shows it is a mixed effect with violence. entertainment has been shown to be -- to have a large effect on the youth, but what has been left out of the conversation is the lack of mental health resources, as well as the lack of influence is that can offset the violent influence, such as parents getting involved, such as schools doing better at addressing the balance. and much of the research shows that kinof involvement would help this violent culture that we have. host: alex, do you work in the

entertainment industry? caller: i do not. i am an undergraduate student in a kogod to sites. -- kogod to science. anything that has to do with the cognitive science. anything to do with the mind interests me. guest: there are several people weighing in on the mental health aspect, which i do not think it's the only solution, but a very important part of this. and in the discussion since sandy hook theaurora the discussion has focused on gun- control and video games, but the importance discussion on mental health, you cannotig