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It is bad enough that the major U.S. television networks regularly broadcast copious amounts of programming about murder, violence, and various crude sex-based themes. Not content with doing this on each of the other 363 days in a year, they see fit to extend it into Christmas day and Christmas eve. Looking over the television schedule for Christmas night, little is changed from the usual. Shows like "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit", "NCIS", and "Bones" - all involving murder - were deemed acceptable for the holidays by NBC, CBS, and Fox. Local stations broadcast such heart-warming programs as "Cops", "Entertainment Tonight", and news reports replete with violence and crime. Some networks showed movies on Christmas and the days before it, but they generally had already been broadcast during the past year and were inundated with commercial advertisements; many of the TV series were repeats as well. It seemed that most channels were unwilling to alter their normal weekday line-ups. However, ABC and PBS deserve some credit for relatively holiday-oriented schedules. Christmas is only one day in each year; would it be so difficult for the television networks to offer something different, as they once did? It is not as if plenty of Christmas movies and shows from the past don't already exist. Perhaps they could even stop trying to sell us things (and politicians) for a single day... |