On this recently passed Veteran’s Day, a lot of Americans were denied the opportunity to see – on network television – Steven Spielberg’s film “Saving Private Ryan.” This was after a number of ABC affiliates were scared off by threats from the American Family Association (and it’s affiliate groups OneMillionMoms.com and OneMillionDads.com) that they would complain to the Federal Communications Commission in an effort to stop “the exploitation of our children, especially by the entertainment media.” This was, mostly, on account of all the cursing. Oh, and maybe the violence, but mostly the cursing.
This raises some questions for me, which I will rhetorically direct at the two million “parents” (a term I use lightly, since this group seems to leave the actual parenting to the government).
What I want to know first, is, if you’re so uptight about raising your kids in such a strictly traditionalist “Christian” (another term I use lightly, knowing many calm, reasonable and understanding Christians) household, why do you have a television in the first place? Obviously, no good can come from having that evil box in your house. All that comes through the thing is filth at all hours of the day. Certainly there are some exceptions – but who has time, in this hectic world, to find them? To you two million “parents,” I say: Banish the devil-screen, or at least disconnect it from the cable service and use it only in conjunction with a VCR or a DVD player – through which you can really filter the world for your children.
Barring cutting of the cable I wonder: Why doesn’t the “off” button work on your remote? Surely this must be why you can’t just stop your kids from watching programs that don’t mesh with your value system. Certainly, your parenting skills – which are so legendary they permit you to tell other people how to raise their kids – aren’t so lax that it allows your child to watch whatever he pleases, whenever he pleases, right?
I also want to know how you can claim to be an organization devoted to parenting when you are trying to get the FCC to do all the work for you? Maybe if you stopped trying to destroy every “negative” influence of pop culture and instead focused on raising your kids, you wouldn’t have to worry about them growing up or having sex before marriage or learning some curse words behind your back. You could take a pro-active role and raise your kids directly, to ensure they come up just as culture-phobic and self-righteous as you.
Ah, but who has time for kids, when you have to fight so many petty crusades? Perhaps it is time to put down the petitions, pick up your kid and hug it.
On second thought, maybe you shouldn’t. Because if you raise the little tykes the way you want to, they might grow up to be the same as you – trying their hardest to make everyone in America (and, tomorrow, the world) to follow the same standard of morals, thinking that cultural homogenization is a keen idea.
This fundamentalist take on “parenting,” which is the art of destroying negative influences instead of surrounding a child with positive influences (or even protecting one’s child from negative influences), is, as far as I can tell, a far more corrupting and evil influence on our society than mass media could ever hope to be.
Matthew S. BondyJuniorJapanese
