I've been traveling lately, and in various hotels and friend's guest rooms, have seen more TV than usual. This sojourn away from my usual ignorance of broadcast television has provided the following dubious delights:

• Fox's "Moment of Truth" game show, which really does turn real life into a game, and has apparently bribed at least one marriage into oblivion through paying for public confessions of adultery. (I expect the show's producers might try to tell us that the show teaches something else about personal responsibility, or that's all in good fun, or that the contestants are there by their own informed volition; or we may even discover that the show has been lying to us and faking it. But here's the real moment of truth: when the host says, "some of these questions are way over my line," and yet still asks them, has he himself not become the definition of insanity?)

• CNN rampantly advertising Larry King's exclusive interview with Jesse Ventura as if his non-campaign for the presidency was almost as important as Jessica Simpson's non-engagement and non-pregnancy.

• Various entertainment clip shows dedicated to matters such as Robin Williams' divorce, and the Tom Cruise birthday party video.

• And in the past week, major news networks hysterically talking as if the sad events surrounding a Texas polygamous sect are just waiting to happen to your children; and the ridiculous and over-the-top response to Senator Obama's attempt at explaining an utterly uncontroversial reality: that being economically disenfranchised can make you feel entrenched. This is amusingly accompanied by the absurd suggestion that there has ever been a U.S. President who did not somehow arrive in the White House linked to the economic 'elite'.

Most of us would like to believe that we have come a long way since the Roman circus – where human beings killed people for our entertainment - or even the Victorian circus - where we only abused the disabled and disadvantaged. Today's circus may look like it only mocks the powerful – with the fabulously wealthy being humiliated as they emerge drunk and bloodied from a nightclub, or photographed while getting an embarrassing haircut. But I think we're kidding ourselves if we think people are not harmed by the pornography of social humiliation offered up 24/7. Amy Winehouse's visible bruises and alleged substance abuse problem, and Britney Spears' obvious mental illness are not legitimate fodder for our entertainment, no matter how economically powerful these two women may be.

In Billy Wilder's amazing old film about the potential corruption of making the flow of information subject to commercial dictates, Ace in the Hole, the venal journalist played by Kirk Douglas says, "Bad news sells because good news is no news." But this is only believed to be true because the public appears to like it that way. Inasmuch as all violent political conflict has something to do with economics or economic power, so does all commercial broadcasting. The economics reside in the willingness of an audience – us – to consistently consume crap for every meal.

Tim Robbins' at times remarkable speech to the National Association of Broadcasters earlier this week invited the broadcast media to take their responsibility seriously – to recognize that they have immense power which could be used to inspire compassion and mutual respect. This stands in obvious contrast to the current addiction to seeing rare acts of violence as something just waiting to pounce on every one of us, or sex only as something tawdry and available for the laughter or prurience of others, or the transformation of absolutely vital conversation about the future of the nation and the world into something that is itself socially violent – and intellectually dishonest. The fact that Robbins uses brash humor to make his point, and that his other well-known political views are considered divisive by some, is irrelevant to whether or not his speech resonates: what he says is vital to anyone who cares about truth-telling in public life.

Science fiction author Philip K. Dick once predicted that the future would consist of each human being selling the same hamburger back and forth to each other. E-bay may have proven him more correct than even he would have feared, but the nutritional quality of what is served up by much of our entertainment and news media is not unworthy of the comparison to fast food. I could go on a rant here, and engage in the kind of generalised denunciations that would only make me look like a cynic, or boring, or both.

Instead, I'll say this: I love art and creative media. Television, the movies, the written and spoken journalistic word are capable of producing great beauty. And the best response to corruption is so often to make something beautiful in its place. However, when people's adulterous affairs are being played out, not only for our entertainment, but in a context where the moral failure is being rewarded with a cash prize, I have to wonder if we should not be organizing a campaign to switch off until the networks treat us – and themselves – with some respect.

Gareth Higgins is a Christian writer and activist in Belfast, Northern Ireland. For the past decade he was the founder/director of the zero28 project, an initiative addressing questions of peace, justice, and culture. He is the author of the insightful How Movies Helped Save My Soul and blogs at www.godisnotelsewhere.blogspot.com. He is also one of the judges of this year's Beliefnet Film Awards, which seek to recognise the best films with spiritual themes. Find out more at http://www.beliefnet.com/bfa/