Associated Press
LONDON — Former schoolteacher Mary Whitehouse, whose dogged 30-year campaign against TV violence and sexual exploitation made her a household name in Britain, died Friday. She was 91.
Whitehouse, a good-natured woman who became the scourge of British broadcasters, died at a nursing home in Colchester after a long illness, the home announced.
During the social turmoil of the 1960s, Mary Whitehouse believed relentless violence on television led to a violent society, and that the exploitation of sex was destroying Britain’s moral fiber.
Whitehouse tangled repeatedly with the British Broadcasting Corp., whose early evening sex-education program triggered her Clean Up TV Campaign in 1964.
Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey, head of the Church of England, said Friday that Whitehouse had made "an enormous contribution to public life.
"Her belief that standards and decency were important brought her into conflict with some of the accepted norms of her day," he said. "But, in her time, she spoke for many people who were disturbed at things they saw and heard."
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