Masters of War - Viewer Discretion Advised

Deb and I have always tried to balance what our kids were exposed to in terms of the media, especially when it comes to sexually explicit or violent programming. We're not too different than many other parents, although I've always found it interesting to hear or see what other parents' threshold is. A good example of this is when Zachary had a few friends from the neighborhood sleep over. The three brothers were all relatively close in age and they used to run around our neighborhood in the heat of the summer dressed home made superhero costumes constructed entirely out of felt. I used to refer to the two older brothers as "Feltman and Ribbon."

We didn't know the parents particularly well at the time and when the mother dropped her kids off she said, "I know your son is really into Godzilla right now. I'd prefer it if you didn't show any of those movies while my boys are here. I sent them with a movie that's more appropriate for their age." Being a parent, I could certainly understand her wishes and I certainly respected them. I could defintely see th elong term damage that could be caused by exposing her kiddies to the guy in the rubber monster suit stepping on a paper paper mache model of Tokyo. I was, however perplexed by the movie she sent with her Caped Crusaders. Did she send over Thomas the Tank Engine, the Wizard of Oz, or a Sesame Street Compilation? No; she sent the Karate Kid. A movie where the main characters kick the living crap out of each other. I was particularly impressed by the scene of the kid smoking dope in the boys room. now it was clear why her boys were always painting the fence and waxing on and off and sanding the floor with each other.

A few things made me think of this contradiction. The first was my experience at the Bob Dylan Show I attended Friday night. The show took place at the beautifully designed but terribly named "Wang Center" (there's a ton of jokes I could stick in here, but it's just too easy and I'm sure you can think of your own.) Anyway, I had the good fortune of being relatively close to the stage and I was horrified to see the aged hippies trying to capture a small piece of their days of peace and love all the while being almost violently corralled back to their seats by the Nazi like security down front. They repeatedly wabbled out of their seats and wondered toward the stage only to be screamed at by the part time security team. Quite honestly the groovy and mellow character of these characters seems to have disappeared with age, this represented by the guy two seats over from me who was asked to sit down by the tie died gent just behind him. While "Bobby Mumbles" was singing about "the Answer Blowing in the Wind", this guy was blowing on the middle finger he was pointing at his neighbor.

The other thing occurred last night while I was at the gym. If your health club is like mine or the many others that are avoided by our obese society, the cardio room has an entire bank of flat screen televisions with various programming. The television directly in front of was showing CNN and had a story of the Tennessee Titans owner Bud Adams who was exchanging unpleasantries with a group of Buffalo Bills fans. I'm sure these two sides were intelligently debating the pros and cons of the current health care bill and the economic consequences of passing it or not. At one point in the exchange Mr. Adams was expressing himself by thrusting each of his middle fingers toward the group. The interesting thing is that the grainy video that accompanied the story, Mr. Adams' fingers were digitally blocked so any viewers wouldn't be offended, especially young kids, which seems appropriate when you think of all of the 7 year olds who love to relax with CNN just before bed time. I chuckled at the image and then glanced at the television to my right which was showing CBS and what I believe was one of the thousand or so CSI shows. At the moment I was watching the opening scene showed a bloody gun battle, digitally enhanced explosions, wounded and dead everywhere.

Is what we see on television a true reflection of our hypocritical values? They could be. I've seen Zach rough house with his friends and I've caught them using foul language. He's certainly broken more things around the house than I care to mention, and each time he was reprimanded accordingly, but if he ever gave me the finger, he'd be in real trouble.