Lesson Six
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\par Section One: News in Brief
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\par Tapescript
\par 1. The Senate has voted to override President Reagan's veto of sanc-
\par tions against South Africa by a decisive seventy-eight to
\par twenty-one. As the House has already voted to override, the sanc-
\par tions now become law. NPR's Linda Wertheimer reports.
\par 'American civil rights leaders, including Mrs. Caretta Scott King,
\par watched the Senate debate from the Senate family gallery as mem-
\par bers argued not so much about sanctions and the efficacy of sanc-
\par tions, more about the choice between affirming the bill already pas-
\par sed by Congress or supporting the President.'
\par
\par 2. American food aid to southern African countries could be cut off
\par if South Africa carries out its threat to ban imports of US grain.
\par Foreign Minister Pic Botha said if US sanctions were imposed, his
\par government would stop imports and would not allow its transport
\par service to carry US grain to neighboring countries.
\par
\par 3. The White House today denied that it planted misleading stories
\par in the American news media as part of a plan to topple Libyan lead-
\par er Muammar Quddafl. The Wtishington Post reported this morning
\par that stories were leaked this summer alleging Qtiddafi was resuming
\par his support for terrorist activities, even though National Security
\par Adviser John Poindexter knew otherwise. Today, White House
\par spokesman Larry Speakes said Poindexter denied the administration
\par had involved the media in an anti-Quddafi campaign but Speakes
\par left open the possibility a disinformation campaign was conducted in
\par other countries.
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\par \'0cSection Two: News in Detail
\par
\par Tapescript
\par The question in Washington today is this: Did the federal gov-
\par @ment try to scare Libya's Colonel Muammar Quddafl in August
\par by way of a disinformation campaign in the American media? The
\par 'Washington Post Bob Woodward reports today that there was an
\par
\par \'0c elaborate disinformation program set up by the White House to
\par convince Quddafi that the United States was about to attack again,
\par or that he might be ousted in a coup. The White House today denies
\par that officials tried to mislead Quddafi by using the American media.
\par NPR's Bill Busenburg has our first report on the controversy.
\par The story starts on August 25th when the Wall Street Journal
\par ran a front page story saying that Libya and the United States were
\par once again on a collision course. Quoting multiple official sources,
\par the paper said Quddafi was plotting new terrorist attacks and the
\par Reagan Administration was preparing to teach him another lesson.
\par The Journal reported that the Pentagon was completing plans for a
\par new and wider bombing of Libya in case the President ordered it.
\par That story caused a flurry of press attention. Officials in
\par Washington and at the western White House in California were
\par asked if it was true. " The story was authoritative" said the White
\par House spokesman Larry Speakes. Based on that official confirma-
\par tion, other news organizations, including the New York Times, the
\par Washington Post, NPR and the major TV networks, all ran stories
\par suggesting Libya should watch out. US naval maneuvers then taking
\par place in the Mediterranean might be used as a cover for more attacks
\par on Libya as in the past.
\par Today's Washington Post, however, quotes from an August
\par 14th secret White House plan, adopted eleven days before the Wall
\par Street Journal story. It was outlined in a memo written by the Pres-
\par ident's National Security Advisor John Poindexter. That plan called
\par for a strategy of real and illusory events, using a disinformation
\par program to make Quddafl think the United States was about to
\par move against him militarily. Here are some examples the Post cites,
\par suggesting disinformation was used domestically: Number one, while
\par some US officials told the press Quddafi was stepping up his terrorist
\par plans, President Reagan was being told in a memo that Quddafl was
\par temporarily quiescent, in other words, that he wasn't active. Number
\par
\par \'0c two, while some officials were telling the press of internal infighting
\par in Libya to oust Quddafi, US officials really believed he was firmly
\par in power and that CIA's efforts to oust him were not working.
\par Number three, while officials were telling the press the Pentagon was
\par planning new attacks, in fact nothing new was being done Existing
\par contingency plans were several months old, and the naval maneuvers
\par were just maneuvers. The Post says this policy of deception was ap-
\par proved at a National Security Planning Group meeting chaired by
\par President Reagan and his top aides.
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\par \'0c Section Three: Special Report
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\par Tapescript
\par @ Two new studies were published today on the links between tel-
\par evision coverage of suicide and subsequent teenage suicide rates. The
\par Now England J6urnal of Medicine reports that both studies suggest
\par that some teenagers might be more likely to take their own lives after
\par seeing TV programs dealing with suicide. NPR's Lorie Garrett re-
\par ports.
\par The first suicide study, done by a team from the University of
\par California in San Diego, examines television news coverage of sui-
\par cides. David Philips and Lundy Carseson looked at forty-five sui-
\par cide stories carried on network news-casts between 1973 and '79.
\par The researchers then compared the incidence of teen suicides in those
\par years to the dates of broadcast of these stories. David Philips says
\par news coverage of suicides definitely prompted an increase in the
\par number of teens in America who took their lives.
\par ,The more TV programs that carry a story, the greater they in-
\par crease in teen suicides just after-wards. "
\par The suicide increase among teens was compared by Philips to
\par adult suicide trends.
\par 'The teen suicides go up by about 2.91 teen suicides per story.
\par And adult suicides go up by, I think, around two adult suicides per
\par stor . The increase for teens, the percentage increase for teens is
\par
\par \'0c very, very much larger than the percentage increase for adults. It's
\par about, I think, fourteen or,fifteen times as big a response for teens
\par percentagewise as it is for adults.'
\par The TV news coverage appears to have prompted a greater in-
\par crease than is seen around other well-known periods of adolescent
\par depression, such as holidays, personal birthdays, the start of school
\par and winter. Philips could not find any specific types of stories that
\par seem to trigger a greater response among depressed teens. Philips
\par says it seems to simply be the word "suicide' and the knowledge that
\par somebody actively executed the act that pushes buttons in depressed
\par teenagers. Psychiatrists call this 'imitative behavior.'
\par " What my study showed was that there seems to be imitation
\par not only of relatively bland behavior like dress, dressing or
\par hairstyles, but there seems to be imitation of really quite deviant be-
\par havior as well. The teenagers imitate apparently across the board,
\par not just suicides, but everything else as well.'
\par In a separate study, Madeline Gould and David Shaeffer of
\par Columbia University found that made-for-television movies about
\par suicide also stimulated imitative behavior. Even though the movies
\par were intended to portray the problem of teen suicide and offered, in
\par some cases, suicide hot line numbers and advice on counselling, the
\par team believes the four network movies prompted eighty teen
\par suicides. One of the made-for-TV movies examined by the
\par Columbia University team was a CBS production. George Schweitz-
\par er, a CBS's Vice President, is well aware of this research. He says, 'It
\par is terribly unfortunate that any teens took their lives after the broad-
\par cast, but if they had it to do over,' says Schweitzer, 'CBS would still
\par run the movie."
\par " Studies, like these do not measure the most, what we think is
\par the most important thing, which I don't think can be measured, and
\par that is the hundreds and hundreds and probably thousands of teen-
\par agers who were positively moved by these kinds of broadcasts."
\par
\par \'0c Moved to call suicide hot lines, moved to seek counseling, and
\par 6wved to discuss their depressions with family members. Schweitzer
\par does not dispute today's studies: some teens may be moved to
\par suicide.
\par ' But ignoring the issue for fear of that, I think, would be far
\par more disastrous than addressing important social issues to help
\par create awareness and again to have a positive effect.'
\par But researcher David Philips suggests the media could decrease
\par the teen suicide problem by avoiding some suicide stories all together
\par and changing the way the others are covered. For example, says
\par Philips, " Don't make suicide seem heroic." He cites the story of 'a'
\par Young Czechoslovakian dissident who set himself on fire. But t
\par dissident action was taken to draw attention to government repres-
\par sion in Czechoslovakia. Should the news media really have ignored
\par such a story? 'I think it's a really difficult question. There are all
\par these goods on all sides of the issue. And thank God, I don't have to
\par be the one to disentangle that issue.'
\par One prominent expert in this field said the young people moved
\par .to take their lives, following a news story or movie, are particularly
\par vulnerable, suicidal individuals. In the absence of television stories,
\par some other events in their lives might well have triggered their ac-
\par tions. So while most psychiatrists agree there is an imitative compo-
\par nent to teenage suicides, that tendency, they say, should not lead so-
\par ciety to repress information. On the contrary, some say we are now
\par 'facing a major epidemic of adolescent suicide in America. We must
\par publicize and confront the problem. Last year some fifty-five'hun-
\par dred adolescents between fifteen and twenty-four years of age took
\par their lives. At least ten times that tried. Some estimates are that 275
\par thousand teens attempted suicide last year. The rate of teenage sui-
\par cide in America has tripled since 1955.

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