An Armenian TV and radio regulator is taking a harder line on what it sees as “an abundance of vulgarity, horror and brazen violence” dominating serials, films and programs on Armenian television. The National Commission on Television and Radio (NCTR) has developed a set of criteria that it says will improve the quality of prime time TV.

According to draft criteria developed by the commission, TV companies should not allow on its air programs that have a negative effect on the health, intellectual and physical development and education of minors. (Programs will be monitored against including drug addicts, parodies on drunkards, materials disparaging of spiritual, cultural values, of highly merited persons of the nation, discrediting parents and educators, romanticizing criminals and gangsters or making heroes out of them, vulgarity, obscene language, etc.). Films of erotic nature and horror films should be shown only during late night hours (specific time is yet to be determined).

The draft is included in Article 24 of Armenia’s Law “On Television and Radio”. The amendments to the law are on the agenda of the National Assembly’s spring session that opened on February 1. A working group involving intellectuals, artists, pedagogues and psychologists has been set up at the NCTR to elaborate the draft criteria.

On February 4, members of the NCTR presented the draft criteria to TV companies based in Yerevan. NCTR Chairman Grigor Amalyan said that the guiding principle for the members of the working group in setting the criteria was what they would not want their own children to watch on television.

“We had a task to get the criteria that are the demand of our society,” said Amalyan.

Teachers and psychologists voiced their sharp criticism of television through the press when a 16-year-old boy brutally murdered his 13-year-old neighbor in Yerevan late last year. Many think that particular cruelty observed among minors is the immediate result of influence of Armenian serials depicting gangster life where murders and criminal showdowns take place nearly every episode. Besides, according to the Aravot daily, the TV companies were criticized even by President Serzh Sargsyan during his end-year meeting with heads of TV companies. In particular, according to the paper, Sargsyan said that in pursuit of popularity ratings TV companies have flooded the air with low-quality programs, films and shows.

During the Thursday discussion heads of TV companies mainly were asking the NCTR to introduce clarity in the criteria, to make them more precise. Amalyan asked the heads of TV companies to present their observations and submit proposals to the NCTR until February 8.

NCTR member, filmmaker Zhirayr Dadasyan told ArmeniaNow that no matter what criteria are set, nothing will change in the Armenian air until genuine professionals are recruited in TV productions.

“Now everyone without an appropriate education thinks that they can write scenarios, produce shows,” says Dadasyan.

Actor Artur Mkrtchyan, who was involved in two serials and acted as a representative of the underworld, says that his characters on TV can be met in Armenian reality. However, he thinks that in the same reality it is difficult to determine who represents the underworld and who doesn’t.

“Criminals today are both in government and in business. How will they distinguish who represents the underworld and who doesn’t?” says Mkrtchyan, who now plays the character of a representative of law in another serial.