Repressed-memory debate may unnerve PBS viewers
04/04/95
DENVER POST

   You don't have to be a psychologist to know about this hot
button. The argument over "repressed memory" is a media favorite.
   If you scan Oprah, Geraldo or the daily paper, you've heard the
scenario: After years of depression, anxiety or eating disorders, a
woman enters therapy - or past-life regression or hypnosis - and
discovers memories of having been sexually abused in childhood.
Suddenly, she says, everything clicks. Her phobias and nightmares
make sense.
   But the therapeutic community is split over whether repression
is even possible, whether the "memories" are real. In some cases,
the subject has retracted the charges. A national support group for
wrongly accused molesters has sprung up. And in laboratories,
scientists are proving that memory is an elusive, easily rearranged
commodity.
   Naturally, this being America, the obvious result of the
firestorm is a profusion of best-sellers and TV movies.
   A more serious outcome is bitter haggling between therapists
and, most wrenching, in families where the debate rages.
   Who can know for sure? Children accusing parents, lives ruined
by the mere charge of molestation, families denying allegations of
satanic ritual abuse, claiming the memories are not real. Lacking
evidence, it's impossible to judge.
   Nobody would voluntarily make up these horrors or the
accompanying symptoms, one side argues.
   Saying "trust me" isn't good enough, the other side responds.
   Come to tonight's "Frontline" documentary with an open mind.
"Divided Memories," a two-hour jolt that's the first of two, begins
at 9 p.m. on Channel 6. The concluding program is slated for next
Tuesday, 9-11 p.m.
   It's not easy television. "Frontline" rarely is.
   Journalist and documentary producer Ofra Bikel has earned our
respect through the years with numerous critical studies and
even-handed documentaries for public TV. Most recently, she won a
slew of international awards for "Innocence Lost" and "Innocence
Lost: The Verdict," a scrupulous study of the charges of sexual
abuse at a day-care center in a small North Carolina town.
   For her latest project, Bikel spent a year investigating the
furor over repressed memory. Offering credible arguments on both
sides, Bikel starts where Oprah, Geraldo and company leave off,
ultimately delving much deeper into the debate.
   In the end, you have to wonder about certain of the 225,000
licensed psychotherapists who practice shrinking techniques ranging
from the old-fashioned talking cure to past-life regressions. Some
of the play-acting mumbo jumbo is distinctly creepy.
   The first two hours are provocative but exhausting. We'll need a
week before tackling the next 120 minutes.
   KBCO (1190 AM) has split from its higher-powered musical FM
sister station, as expected, to pick up available talk shows. The
switch takes effect this week but the shows aren't locked in,
according to Dave Baronfeld, general manager of KBCO-AM and Noble
Broadcasting's other talk outlet, KHOW (630 AM).
   One unconfirmed possibility: the syndicated show by convicted
felon G. Gordon Liddy may join the lineup. If bought by KBCO-AM,
Liddy would air 9 a.m.-1 p.m.
   Jim Rome, a sports talker who was in a brouhaha on ESPN2 last
fall, is running 1-4 p.m.
   The switch to talk at KBCO-AM is intended to exploit recent
changes at KNUS (which is now all-news in conjunction with KCNC-TV)
and KYBG-FM (which, as 92Z, is grunge-rock, a.k.a. the Seattle band
sound).

