Parents, teachers blast ‘Meteor Garden’

A coalition of parents, teachers, and youth representatives urged the government and television networks yesterday to transfer the time slots of the so-called Chinovelas and cut down sex and violence on the boob tube.

The Alliance of Volunteer Educators (AVE) made this call as it raised concern over the "disturbing attitudes" of the four male leading actors in the popular soap opera "Meteor Garden" from Taiwan, which is being shown on prime time.

"Meteor Garden," which airs late afternoon to early evening or just when high school kids get home from school, shows explicit romantic scenes that are not suitable for young audiences, AVE said.

"We are not singling out ‘Meteor Garden’ but rather used it to illustrate the kind of drama programs shown on TV," said AVE spokesman engineer Percival Macapagal.

AVE specifically pointed out an episode last week of the most popular Chi-novela in the country, where the lead actors, who belong to an equally popular Chinese boy band the F4, are depicted as bullies in school.

Aside from "Meteor Garden," AVE also noted similar disturbing behavior shown in the local telenovela, "Tabing Ilog."

"While we respect their (networks’) views towards choosing the programs to air, we are concerned about the values that these TV programs impart to our school children," Macapagal also said.

"We do not seek any banning or scrapping of ‘Meteor Garden’ and the like. We only want perhaps a change in the time slot of its showing and tone down scenes that glorify power and materialism," he added.

He did not say if his group preferred the hit Chi-novela to be shown during the graveyard shift.

The AVE believed that the growing number of supposedly youth-oriented TV shows that revolve around sex and violence is alarming as it promotes pre-marital sex and may affect the values formation of children and adolescents.

"Pre-marital sex may be a sad reality among our youth, but should we dignify these and keep on depicting this as if the acts are normal?" the group asked.

The AVE has written to the two largest television networks, ABS-CBN and GMA-7, Education Secretary Edilberto de Jesus, and Movie and Television Review and Classification Board chairwoman Consoliza Laguardia, to initiate the toning down of obscenity, sex, and violence on television and appealing for help in educating the youth towards positive values formation.