Some of the things I wrote about yesterday sound like the Great American Dream, but how or why we might go about them would not mirror Hollywood experience.
*overcome evil with good*
can you name a movie that does that?
*encourage one another and build each other up*
any sitcoms do that?
*acknowledge God in everything*
but it’s politically incorrect to even mention G*d
*godliness with contentment is great gain*
now there’s an advertising gimmick
*guard your heart*
song lyrics are more about breaking hearts, aren’t they?
*do everything without complaining or arguing*
not on kids’ tv, they don’t
Thanks God, for giving direction (272)
3 responses so far ↓
katie and bulldog // March 31, 2008 at 5:19 pm
just off the tops of our heads lol
*c-r-e-a-k* (the sound of A Can Of Worms Opening)
*overcome evil with good*
can you name a movie that does that?
Bobby (just watched it yesternight)
Harry Potter
Star Wars
Lion King
Almost every Hollywood movie has this thematic tension of good vs evil, with goodness finally overcoming evil.
*encourage one another and build each other up*
any sitcoms do that?
Home Improvement
Little House on the Prairie (an oldie but a goodie)
The Simpsons (if you can get past some of the crass humour)
*acknowledge God in everything*
A secular media shouldn’t be expected to advocate God any more than they should be advocating Buddhism, Islam etc. It’s like asking a blind man to describe the Mona Lisa. He perhaps struggles.
*godliness with contentment is great gain*
Contentment is the antithesis of the Cult of Continuous Improvement, which is not an invention of Hollywood or the Great US of A. This same “Cult” has so infiltrated the Church (with significant Scriptural backing – such as Paul’s reference to straining towards the goal/prize (of perfection – implied in preceding verses)) .
Quite often the themes of “love movies” or “love triangles” where someone who is after the Dream Girl doesn’t realise that the one that he really wants (good character, pure heart, undesigner wardrobe) is actually right under his nose.
An example: “Bruce Almighty” – he gets two weeks of “being God”, and realises that he is better off being content with his previous lot!
“Cheaper By The Dozen” – Dad gets his dream job of Grid Iron Coach, but realises that family is more important. He learns contentment.
*guard your heart*
A lot of songs are are about “I’m going to love you forever!” too. So what does the Bible say about “love”? Love is constant (forever love), and all those attributes we know so well… many songs speak to these things, not just guarding your heart..
*do everything without complaining or arguing*
not on kids’ tv, they don’t
It’s a bit like all of our reality of days filled with tears and conflict (and smiles and diffusion of conflict). That commonality of experience is where we humans communicate, and tv reflects this. Perhaps tv does it excessively: perhaps that’s for reasons of humour or to draw our attention to something? I love it cos we can gently make comment or ask a question about it as we watch, it can be a great discussion starter: what did you think about that? etc. Having said that, it’s easy to just let our paradigm be formed by what we watch. Paul, in Athens, was quite familiar with local stories, legends etc of the pagan community, he was familiar with common culture (altar to an unknown god, the poet he quotes is actually the guy who was involved in the establishment of those altars which, by Paul’s time had fallen into disrepair.
should TV portray a perfect/ideal state or should it portray reality – and encourage us in our realities?
Humans are looking for a commonality, where we can relate to each other. everyone has problems and it’s rather refreshing to *see* that we can laugh at them/others have solutions. If we are designed for relationship, then we want to relate. We relate over shared experiences.
That’s a few of our thoughts as Bulldog lay on the futon and we tossed them back and forth while playing “medicine kits” with the kiddos (cos one of their close friends is in hospital today: reality meets fantasy again lol), hope your questions weren’t rhetorical!
Much love, as always X
Rach // March 31, 2008 at 6:04 pm
ooooh almost as good as sitting right in your kitchen!!!!!
agree with a LOT of what you write
my sputterings came after a week of actually seeing some snippets of tv - those were the ones foremost in my mind (not Little House LOL) and they were riddled with sarcasm and degradation and demons hiding under every bush
I’m NOT anti-tv, but I do find little to commend it. I agree that it CAN spark great conversations, but I think more often than not it just forms us.
We’re on the same cultural literacy page (I even watched Super Nanny once so I could form an opinion and enter into conversations about it - heehee…..now there’s another interesting thought - it’s all about our *opinions* these days, isn’t it……but I digress)
Now go pour yourself another cuppa!
katie // April 1, 2008 at 1:14 pm
yep, just pulling The Brownie outta the oven to feed to the troops, am gonna grab a tin of tuna myself lol. and an espresso to go with that.
as always, love throwing around the philosophy, i think i am more intertwined with culture these days than i used to be…
come on over to our kitchen anytime, love X
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