I am appalled...

I hate to be cliche, but seriously, what is our world coming to? Violence & Money & Sex are glorified in the popular media to the point of complete saturation. I can't sit through a film or a commercial or even dare open a magazine that was not produced by the Church for fear of being scarred forever. In one thirty second ad at the theater tonight I saw it all - violence, nudity, homosexuality, language, drug & alcohol references. I almost walked out of the theater right then & there & chewed out the manager for showing such filth in a theater that was sure to be filled with impressionable preteens. How I hope that they don't think that this is what the world is really like.

Oh, it doesn't affect us, you know, because it's not real. In words of my Papa, "That's hog wash!" Doesn't affect us, my foot. If it's not affecting us, why is all of it becoming more extreme? Why are blood & sex & profanity becoming the norm? You can't tell me it was always like this. I watched The Cosby Show yesterday. I watched Full House earlier this week, shows that were so popular such a short time ago. Where is their equivalent today? Is it in House or Bones or Amazing Grace or Gray's Anatomy or Heroes? Where is it? I shudder to think what the norm will be when I finally get around to having children.

Here in "Happy Valley" I forget so quickly what the vast majority of people are being exposed to on a consistent basis, but it is here, even among us, all the time. The only way to rid ourselves of it is to avoid it completely, avoid it like the plague so that it doesn't kill us slowly & painfully.

"The entertainment industry cannot portray on film people gunned down in cold blood, in living color, and not have it affect the attitudes and thoughts of some of the people who see it…the desensitizing effect of such media abuses on the hearts and souls of those who are exposed to them results in a partial fulfillment of the Savior’s statement that ‘because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold” - M. Russell Ballard

"A diet of violence or pornography dulls the senses, and future exposures need to be rougher and more extreme. Soon the person is desensitized and is unable to react in a sensitive, caring, responsible manner, especially to those in his own home and family. Good people can become infested with this material and it can have terrifying, destructive consequences.” - Marvin J. Ashton