Leonard Eron, TV and Aggression

Leonard Eron is the guy who did the Landmark Psychological Study which linked violence in Children to the violence they see on Television. He passed away on May 3 from Congestive Heart Failure at his home in Illinois at the age of 87.

This was supposed to be a quickie where I locate Mars and Sun in his chart and be done with it. After all, violence isn't complex. Kids aren't complex either. Woof. I get the birth data from his obituary in today's San Jose Mercury News. Another Taurus.

Leonard Eron
b. Apr. 22, 1920 Newark, NJ

Sun 3 Taurus; Moon either Gemini or Cancer; NN 16 Scorpio.

So, yeah, if you look at his chart you go GAW! Leo & 5th house rules Children and Mars rules violence, little boys, and puppy dog ears. Eron had Sun opposite Mars. Bingo. His Mars is in Scorpio, sign of its traditional rulership and it's Retrograde. So aggression is right up this guy's alley. It goes further though. The Sun-Mars opposition actually expands out into a Kite where Mars is involved in a Grand Water (Feelings) Trine with Uranus 5 Pisces and Pluto 6 Cancer. Sun-Mars-Pluto-Uranus. You mention that combination in hard aspect to any garden variety astrologer and they just slant their eyes and ask "Who did he kill?"

Mars (in Scorpio, geead I gotta repeat that) is also handle to a Bucket Chart which puts so much more energy on it. But the Bucket Shape starts to show a gentler story because it is made up of a Boat Shape: opposition of Uranus in Pisces to Saturn R Virgo strung together by sextiles. Sextiles give talent and flow and depend on some action oriented trauma from Mars in order to get some locomotion. So, Uranus sextile Sun sextile Pluto sextile Saturn. You mention Uranus-Sun-Pluto-Saturn to your garden variety astrologer and he/she still asks "Who did he kill?". Remember though that the signs the planets are in are all feminine & receptive signs and Mars is Retrograde so it's influence is stifled or slowed in some way.

So where's Venus? Sweet, charming Venus who wouldn't harm a fly? Venus is in Aries conjunct Chiron and Mercury all dispositing to Mars. The conjunction is trining a conjunction of Jupiter and Neptune at 9 Leo (kids) and squaring Pluto in Cancer (parents). In addition to being conjunct to the degree, Jupiter and Neptune are Parallel which doubles and triples the power of this conjunction. Kind of a magical combination involving entertainment and kids.

I'll also add that all Eron's planets strongly aspect, or interact, so the energies between them flow and don't get stuck. Maybe this is something to look for. Unaspected planets can come on real strong during difficult transits and progressions. Also, there are no Out of Bounds planets.

Eron did his first study in 1960, was commissioned to do a follow up study in 1969 and then continued followup studies until 2000. Originally 875 3d-graders were studied in Columbia County, NY. The San Jose Mercury News includes an interesting description from his son on how the results were discovered by accident (Mars-Uranus). The original study was trying to connect child rearing habits with aggression. Apparently everyone was afraid of Communist Plots in 1960 and got paranoid that psychologists were commies out to perform mind control experiments. So, in order to defer the paranoias, questions about Television viewing habits were casually asked in order to relax the parentsand make the study sound like "Ladies Home Journal" questions. Eron's got Scorpio North Node so dealing paranoia was right up his alley along with psychology, research and hidden meanings. He excelled at all of these. Psychologists must perform better when accused of being a Communist. I'll have to remember that for next week's session.

So, I'm coming back to Eron's Mars for one final note: the movement of his Progressed Mars is linked up with his research to the year. Natally, remember it's Retrograde. It progressed back from Scorpio into Libra until 1960 when it went direct. This is the year he started the study. Then it returned to it's natal position at 1 Scorpio in 2000 the final year of the study.

Pluto and Chiron were also opposing each other in 1960 and conjunct the Saturn-Uranus opposition in his chart (border of the Boat).

I'm not even sure what rules Television. I'm assuming Mercury and Uranus, maybe Neptune? Where did I put Bills? In 1960, Eron's Solar Arc Mercury was probably close to conjunct his South Node. Progressed Mercury was squaring the transiting Nodes. And Venus and Sun were also progressing through Gemini.