TV and DVDs in Cars: Pleasure or Distraction?

 

Children have become so attached to seeing images on video screens, whether their computers of their own television sets, that sitting in a parent’s car requires focus on something beside the scenery outside. Television sets or DVD apparatus in cars now has become a “must” for far too many families. These can be considered luxuries not “musts” and therefore have spawned additional excesses for pampered children whose TV and video game and computer activities severely curtail their attention spans. Such attention to video screens in cars severely limits conversation and personal interaction among family members. Adults driving may now eliminate having to answer questions or react to their children’s comments.

Video screens were first introduced into vehicles to entertain children in the backseat and put an end to the ever-persistent question: ‘Are we there yet?’ The new feature was an instant success. For example, an estimated thirty percent of Oldsmobile minivan purchasers opted for video screens when the car maker introduced the feature in 1999″ (Wilson, 1001).

Ms. Wilson points out that car TV potentially causes distraction for both driver and those in other cars. “An overwhelming majority of states has imposed content-neutral legislation that governs screen placement. Specifically, thirty-six states have restricted screen location to address issues of driver distraction and to promote traffic safety” (Wilson, 1003). However, there are some states who seem to see a problem with in-car TV screens not merely as a distraction for the driver or as entertainment for child passengers, but also as a means of providing some sort of titillating, even obscene material for the amusement of the driver. “Tennessee, Louisiana, and Virginia now have measures in place governing in-car video screen content. Tennessee enacted a law effective July 1, 2004, that prohibits the public display of ‘obscene and patently offensive movies,’ including on video screens visible from outside the car” (Wilson, 1004).

In 2010 California, where more drivers use freeways as well as city streets, new legislation now allows TV screens in the front seat of a car as long as the screen faces the passenger and not the driver. Nevertheless distraction may cause accidents as drivers’ attention keeps them from looking straight ahead.

DVDs inserted into players that project images on in-car screens provide far more variety, and therefore may constitute that “obscenity” problem some states become concerned with. On the other hand, some car-makers aim in-car television to channels especially for children. Parents will pay a premium: “Chrysler is introducing the system as a $470 option, on top of the $1,750 rear-seat entertainment system, in its top-of-the-line 2008 Chrysler Town & Country and Dodge Grand Caravan minivans. Subscribers also must maintain a satellite radio subscription” (Moran, 36D).

One becomes do enamored by more and more gadgetry in the home and now in the automobile that neither expense or potential danger to driver and passenger keeps one from thinking twice about such installation. Americans become children at heart where entertainment and attention [;ay a role in daily lives. So, TV or satellite or DVD entertainment becomes available not to please children and keep them quiet during long drives, but due to peer pressure: the neighbors have one, so we must have an equal or better one in our cars.

“Necessity is the mother of invention” once meant that opportunity for innovation opened new vistas. Now, invention has little to do with necessity, but merely indicates marketing strategies that appeal to the American consumer’s need to have more or as much as their neighbor and, at the same time, soothes the increasing wants and desires of spoiled children, wanting to emulate their peers, or fascinated by advertising on their TV sets.

For broadcast and satellite TV, a bonanza has arrived. In 2012, some $2 billion dollars in revenue will come from in-car programming. Keeping screaming kids quiet may end up now as merely a small part of this profitable excursion of DVDs and television into American cars.

Even video game makers have their eyes on the in-car market. Investment in auto body shops now seems like a good idea.

References:

Moran, Tim: “Satellite TV in cars; it’s not just kid stuff”

Automotive News, 82. 6279 Oct. 27, 2007

Wilson, Kristina: “NO, WE’RE NOT THERE YET: A PROPOSED

LEGISLATIVE APPROACH TO VIDEO ENTERTAINMENT SCREENS IN

CARS” Northwestern Law Review, 100.2 Winter, 2006