ABSTRACT
Nuclear energy advocates have paid no small amount of attention to the disparity between public views and technical estimates of the risks of nuclear hazards. The public consistently overestimates the severity of nuclear hazards, and at least one nuclear physicist blames journalists for this disparity. Thus, merely increasing the amount of media support for nuclear safety would not necessarily lead to changes in public perceptions. From a transmission perspective, the erroneous news stories limit American public opinion to a negative attitude toward nuclear energy. The Cold War and the possibility of nuclear attack were united not only in the public mind but also in films of the 1950s and 1960s. The military produced turns to indoctrinate military personnel on the need lor nuclear weapons. Military films, government and commercial, portrayed nuclear weapons and military technology as necessities. Stanley Kramer Onthe Beach dramatically, and directly, addresses the human agony of nuclear war.
