
The Advocates
1991 · TV series · 2 seasons
Set in Edinburgh, the series contrasts the high powered and respectable world of the lawyers and advocates of the Scottish legal profession, with the sleazy and deadly existence of the city's pimps, prostitutes and drug addicts. When a young prostitute is murdered by a deadly drug overdose, only Doctor Joe Sangster, who has been treating her at the local health clinic, suspects foul play. In the growing climate of fear over drugs and AIDS in the city, his clinic faces closure due to a local campaign. He turns to Greg McDowell for help, and the young lawyer sees the chance to make a name for himself.
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1 comment on Hacker News
I am showing my age when I remember PBS having an entire show where two sides discussed an important issue of domestic or international concern. It was called "The Advocates"[0]. It ran for five years, and included a moderator and two teams that basically had a debate as a TV show. Michael Dukakis, who later was the Democratic nominee for president, was one of the moderators. (Dukakis' Wikipedia page has no mention that he was on national TV for years before running for president, which is pretty odd.) My understanding is that The Advocates was a result of the fairness doctrine, where television licensees had to show both sides of a subject. When the fairness doctrine went away, so did that show. At the end of every debate, viewers were encouraged to write in about which side they thought won. One reason I read for the demise of the show was that the letters received pretty consistently favored the right wing argument.
The modern spin on The Advocates is Intelligence Squared[2].
[0] http://openvault.wgbh.org/collections/advocates/full-program-video
[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11014804/
[2] https://www.intelligencesquaredus.org/