It’s been a popular and lazy pastime in recent years to blame a lot of society’s woes on the media.   The arguments are easy to spot: just look for the ones that sound like an “All in the Family” rerun.  For school violence, it’s “obviously” the fault of the video game industry, because we all know that after a few hours playing “Doom 3” while listening to a Marilyn Manson CD even Beaver Clever will pick up an AK-47 and march into school with a box of ammo.  For divorce and the “breakup” of the family, it’s “obviously” the fault of the porn industry, because we all know that the only thing keeping Ward with June was his total ignorance of advanced sexual techniques and tattoos in wildly private places.  For “out of control” crime, we all know that it’s “obviously” the fault of shows like C.S.I., who have “taught” an entire generation of criminals how to be better baddies by outfoxing cops.  If you seriously believe all this stuff, well then you’re just the person I’ve been looking for.  Send me an email now, and I’ll send you my patented “Power of Attorney” form letter.  Just sign and return to me, ASAP please.  For security’s sake (can’t be too careful these days), make sure you mail me your bank account numbers in a separate envelope.

In 2005, by the FBI’s own crime statistics, a whopping 45.5% of all violent crimes were “cleared,” that is counted as “solved” because they arrested someone or otherwise reported the investigation as “closed” for whatever reason.  That’s the national average, so some communities were worse and others better, but that’s the average overall.  This means, basically that AT THE VERY LEAST 55.5% of the time the crooks got away with it, and this is probably conservative.  That’s right, it’s basically a coin-flip, and, pardon my skepticism, it can’t all be C.S.I.’s fault.  Their ratings just aren’t that good.

I know we love to blame problems on stuff that’s easy to understand.  It keeps us from getting wildly out of control and spending money on addressing the underlying causes of social problems, not just tossing money at surface consequences that make us feel better.  But, bear with me, isn’t it just the slightest bit possible that the reason why roughly half of violent crime isn’t resolved is because our law enforcement system is understaffed, under-trained, and make a lot of mistakes?  I know, too fantastic to believe, but stick with me guys just a little while longer.

[inset pos=right]The guy writing a C.S.I. episode wasn’t there at O.J.’s house swabbing up blood samples, was he?[/inset]I’m not trying to suggest that cops and forensics guys don’t care about doing their jobs or are incompetent.  Well statistically some of them must be, but let’s not quibble over percentages.  I’m just pointing out that a coin toss of success is a lot to blame on a bunch of shows written by professional Hollywood writers.  Do law enforcement professionals themselves bear any of the responsibility here?  I mean, the guy writing a C.S.I. episode wasn’t there at O.J.’s house swabbing up blood samples, was he?  Or lurking around Jon Benet Ramsey’s place screwing up evidence?  I mean, the guys on the ground actually doing the work that ends with dead-end leads, is that the fault of a mastermind criminal with fabulous shorthand and digital cable or because chain-smoking Sgt. Barney from homicide ground out his Marlboros in the perp’s footprints?  Remember what Occam's razor tells us: in most cases, bet on the bozo.

We’re talking about over 50% here.  When most criminals get caught for really stupid stuff, this seems to indicate that there’s a systemic problem here and not the fault of television.  But see, there I go complicating the real world again, how rude of me.  If you can’t boil the message down to something you can magic marker on a cardboard sign, it just must be wrong.  Like Yakov Smirnoff says, “What a country.”

It would be nice if I could believe that just by canceling shows like C.S.I. and shutting down CourtTV it would make it easier for criminals to get caught.  Unfortunately, I just can’t buy it.  This is like saying canning Emeril Lagasse and his damned Smoked Gouda Mashed Potatoes will solve childhood obesity.  It won’t do anything but make me whip up a protest sign and potentially stalk Food Network executives until they reverse their ruling.

Say what you will about crime, but those taters are yummy.