ABC - FUROR OVER HIDDEN-CAMERA BEATING ON PRIMETIME

Viewers have flooded ABC's switchboards and posted hundreds of messages on the network's website complaining about Friday's Primetime broadcast about dysfunctional "step-families" in which a father was shown hitting his teenage daughter. Many demanded to know why the network did not show the tape to police and have the man arrested, pointing out that he appeared to be a menace not only toward the daughter but three other small children living in the house. In a statement on Monday ABC said, "This was the only scene of physical punishment in the hundreds of hours of footage." It noted that the girl, Kyle Nelson, moved out of the house shortly after the incident occurred in Dec. 2002. On today's (Tuesday) Good Morning America, three psychologists who appeared on the Primetime program agreed that after viewing the tapes they saw numerous incidents of "inappropriate parenting" but no safety issue. However, one of the psychologists, Dr. Patricia Papernow, author of Becoming a Stepfamily, took the program's producers to task for repeatedly airing the violent footage throughout the program. "When you expose viewers to a piece of violent tape over and over again, it's traumatizing to viewers," Papernow remarked. Dianne Sawyer, who hosts Good Morning America and hosted the Primetime special, lifted her right hand and replied, "I'm taking the pledge here. It won't happen again. It really will not happen again."

25/04/2006