Anna Sheftel To all those who deny television's influence on the violence epidemic in North America, who call it a cop-out and a typical case of scapegoating so as to avoid facing the more difficult truth, who insist that well-adjusted human beings should not react adversely to what they see on television and that blindly following what one sees on a screen is indicative only of one's own mental problems, who get frustrated because they feel that there are bigger issues to deal with when it comes to violent behaviour than this, I must say: You're wrong. Television does provoke violence. I am a well-adjusted young woman, and I testify that watching TV is in fact making me a violent person. Let me point my finger at a typical culprit: Recently, while I was innocently flipping channels like one is prone to do when suffering from severe boredom, I came across an ad for breast implants. A television ad. For breast implants. It features your typical all-American sweater-setted young woman arranging flowers, discussing the life lessons that her father taught her and how they influenced her careful decision to get implants. Finally, she tells us how happy she is to have gone through with the process, and how she wishes she'd have done it sooner, and the commercial ends with the company's logo, encouraging us to choose their brand of implants. It's all very pastel-like and fuzzy and sweet, but what else would I expect? Aren't all dangerous medical procedures pastel-like and fuzzy and sweet? Now, my mom, who's a doctor, gets frustrated whenever she sees ads for medication on TV, because she's not exactly thrilled at the idea of people choosing what pills to take based on what some aging sitcom star recommends. She prefers that they make, you know, actual informed decisions, based on information that people who's job it is to know this stuff have given them. Having first-hand experience with pharmaceutical companies, it disturbs her to see medication peddled as a commercial product like any other. Somehow, which pills you choose to take seems like a slightly more important decision than where you buy your hamburgers. This transgression is even greater with the breast implant ads. There is enough pressure on women to conform to ridiculous beauty standards and to feel bad about their own imperfect bodies, do we really need to start blindly encouraging the somewhat dangerous processes by which they intend to change themselves? A woman's body is her own and she should be able to do with it as she pleases, yes, but to whitewash a process like breast augmentation and advertise it as if it is painless, risk-free and that it will make you feel better about yourself, is a wholly disgusting practice. If she's going to decide to do it, it should be her own decision, not one influenced by some sweater-setted actress. And, for fuck's sake, if she does choose to go though with it, she should discuss what kind of implants to get with a doctor. Not a television ad, a doctor. Note to the company who is responsible for these ads: You're cashing in on women's insecurities and encouraging irresponsible decisions regarding their health. Fuck you. So, I ask you, after a fiasco like that, can you really deny that television promotes violence? Sure, maybe it isn't all the murder and blood and dismemberment that's getting to me, but I tell you, when I see that ad, I get the temptation to reach for my Uzi and hit the road. Or at least I would if I had one. And if guns didn't scare the hell out of me. But you know what I mean.