OTTAWA – A promotional spot for the police drama Flashpoint did not contain graphic violence and therefore could air before the Watershed hour of 9:00 pm, the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) has found.
Flashpoint is a Canadian series that follows the members of Toronto’s Strategic Response Unit as they deal with high risk crime situations. The promo, which was broadcast multiple times during afternoon NFL football games on January 10 and 11, 2009, included images of a stand-off between two women, one of whom was brandishing a large kitchen knife.
A viewer complained that his children had been watching the football game with him and had been frightened by this promo. The CBSC’s national conventional television panel examined the complaint under Article 3.2 of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Violence Code, which states that promotional material that contains scenes of violence intended for adult audiences shall not be telecast before 9:00 pm.
The panel concluded that this particular promo did not contain any scenes of actual violence that would constitute material intended exclusively for adults and therefore CTV did not violate the Code. The Panel made the following comments about the promo:
The Panel finds that, although the challenged promo was suspenseful and scary, there was no actual element of violence included. Nor was there any depiction of the consequences of off-screen violence. There were screams, guns (although only in the hands of law enforcement personnel), exploding glass, and several appearances of knives, but no violence at all. This is not to say that the Panel disputes the frightened reaction of the complainant’s child. It is only its analysis of the characterization of the elements of the promo itself. It finds the promo free of the adult violence that would force it into a post-Watershed broadcast period.
