The PTC's endless whining...

...is now aimed at ABC TV for not censoring Adam Lambert's homoerotic performance adequately enough on Monday night's American Music Awards.

The Parents Television Council's bitching session is in its full glory on their web page. As usual, though, organization head cheese, Tim Winter, is long on colorful words and short on any actual substantive arguments as to why anyone seeing Lambert's performance might be harmed and why television should be censored and fined by the FCC.

Oh, wait a minute, I guess Winters' previous article about what research proves and does not prove about media effects (just scroll down on the PTC web page and you can find their "study" of violence toward women in the media) is supposed to answer any lingering doubts about effects. It's an interesting article, although one that might make anyone who passed a basic statistics class in high school howl with laughter. The article, explaining that correlations in statistical research amount to a causal effect, is sort of like someone publicly arguing that one can, in fact, travel faster than the speed of light.

I've come to believe that the average PTC "concerned activist" member might have a broad masochistic streak. These people somehow get off on completely humiliating themselves in public by saying and writing some of the most embarrassing foolishness one can possibly think of.

So, since these folks seem to enjoy abuse and like complaining, I still encourage people to complain to them. Various e-mail addresses may be found on their web page - and those of their adjunct organizations like the Culture and Media Institute or the Media Research Council. But here they are for your use and enjoyment:

grassroots@parentstv.org
editor@parentstv.org
contact.cmi@mediaresearch.org

A rocky "Road" to Christian audiences?

There is a fascinating article in the current issue of Entertainment Weekly magazine about the marketing of the apocalyptic film, The Road, to Christian audiences.

Since the film is dealing with end of the world issues the readers of Revelations often contemplate, the makers of the film are attempting to lure in the Christian faithful. It makes enough sense, right? But what is interesting to me is the article's quite true statement that The Road's marketing to conservative Christians might be "counter intuitive." The Road, you see, is rated R.

What this has made me wonder about is the general state of faith-based entertainment. There is huge money to be from fundamentalist Christian entertainment these days, although the nature of this entertainment has often left me scratching my head. I have seen a number of films made for the Christian audience and I've read a few faith-based books as well. The most notable for me was Left Behind (only seen the film and haven't read the book) and The Shack. Both of these stories, as well as a few others of their kind struck me as a bit...well, sorry to say, lame.

OK, maybe Left Behind was a little better than the rest. At least there was some violence and killing there. I always enjoy violence and killing. If there would have been a little sex, it would have been even better. The flick, after all, was about the impure and the sinners "left behind" at the Rapture. So wouldn't these sinner commit, you know...sins? Maybe say a few curse words? Have a little sex before marriage?

Which again brings me to contemplate the state of "Christian" entertainment.

And let me pause here for a second and explain the quotes around Christian. "Christian" these days seems to exclusively refer to fundamentalist, ultra-right-wing conservative Christians. These are the ha-ha-you're-going-to-hell-and-we're-not (to steal a phrase from Stephen King's Under the Dome) evangelical Christians. "Christian," it seems, no longer refers to Catholics or Methodists or Episcopalians. Only to the folks who think Harry Potter is teaching witchcraft and devil worship, the folks who want to ban Halloween, who think the Catholic church is a cult and the Pope is the Antichrist, who believe that dinosaurs never existed but God, the great cosmic prankster, just littered the planet with big bones to mess with people and test their faith.

But what I wonder about is why can't there be any "adult" Christian entertainment? Religion, at its most effective moments, helps people cope with the worst the world can sometimes throw at them. Sure, organized religion can often offer circular, contradictory, or just plain illogical and impenetrable answers to the big questions of human existence. I think the best summary of what the Bible is all about came in the Arnold Schwarzenegger film End of Days. The Bible's message, according to End of Days: "Shit happens." Read the Bible closely and you'll realize that that really is what the good book boils down to.

But why can't "Christian" entertainment deal with issues like this? Why can't "Christian" fiction contemplate the rougher, the harder, the more difficult, ugly, unjust, and cruel aspects of existence, even if the only answers it might come up with is "shit happens"?

If one were to make a truly faithful film adaptation of the Bible, after all, it would probably be X rated. I would really love to see those scenes of Lot's daughters seducing him after the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

But in the meantime, "Christian" entertainment remains little more than simplistic, shallow, singing-birds-in-a-flowery-meadow type of pabulum. And if this is the sort of things "Christian" audiences want, it sounds like they will be sorely disappointed by The Road.

Hitler is sending Seth MacFarlane hate mail again

Well, there's something new and interesting to see again on the web page of the Parents Television Council.

And I really do enjoy visiting their web page a lot and I get excited every time they post something new there. I guess I enjoy their postings the same way most fans enjoyed watching The Jerry Springer Show. The PTC can make you feel good about yourself even on a bad day. They can make you glad that your mother and father weren't brother and sister and that you weren't born with an IQ lower than your belt size. That you're not slow-witted enough to be eligible to join the PTC.

The same goes for the pages of such PTC adjunct organizations as the Media Research Council and the Culture and Media Institute. I highly urge all to check them out and leave them some feedback.

But this time the PTC is calling for Microsoft to boycott all of TV writer/producer Seth MacFarlane's shows. According to PTC grass roots activist Gavin McKiernan, who certainly seems to have all the IQ qualifications to be a member of the PTC, all the MacFarlane cartoons like Family Guy and American Dad are guilty of purveying all the worst sort of civilization destroying content one can see in the media today. Why Seth MacFarlane shows, McKiernan whines, have jokes about feminine hygiene!!!! The horror!!

But it's unfortunate that McKiernan's harangues are sort of flabby and half-hearted this time. He doesn't even try to justify his censorhip-through-economic-thuggery with any sort of an effects argument. Seems he hasn't looked at the PTC's effects "research" lately (even those studies they post that proves the exact opposite of what the group is trying to argue)

However, I suppose MacFarlane's real sins are the way he spoke about the PTC, rather than the sophomoric, school yard "feminine hygiene" jokes on his cartoons. In MacFarlane's interview to The Advocate magazine, he said about being crticized by the PTC: "Oh, yeah. That's like getting hate mail from Hitler. They're literally terrible human beings. I've read their newsletter, I've visited their website, and they're just rotten to the core. For an organization that prides itself on Christian values—I mean, I'm an atheist, so what do I know?—they spend their entire day hating people. They can all suck my dick as far as I'm concerned."

Three cheers for Seth MacFarlane!

Don't let the door hit you on the way out!

Well, it looks like something positive can be said for a bad economy after all. According to this article, the bad financial times drove one of those busy body do-gooder pro-censorship family groups out of business.

Yessssss!!!!!

The National Institute on Family and the Media has closed up shop because of the bad economy. Of course I'm completely enjoying this because this is a group that's even more ignorant of basic social science research than the Parents Television Council and more insane than the Family Research Council (they, the supporters of Carrie Prejean and all things wholesome, homophobic, and holy until, at least, their wholesome media darlings start masturbating on sex videos).

Yesssssss!!!!!!!

These folks have been almost exclusively obsessed with video games and, as the article discusses, at one point seriously argued that the video game industry tries to persuade America's children to become cannibals.

To the concerned parents and activists of the National Institute on Family and the Media: Good riddance! We won't miss you!

Or wait a minute, maybe we will. People this nuts are just too entertaining.

Whoa!! The world is still here...

Well, after a short hiatus for a trip to the National Communication Association conference, I am stunned to realize that I get a chance to sit here and add to this blog. The world did not end exactly a week ago with the CW Network's broadcast of Gossip Girl. The Parents Television Council's fears and panic were in vain. I'm stunned.

Of course, on their web page they warn that they will keep an eye on the unfolding threesome storyline. I'm certain that the CW is very nervous.

I do still encourage folks to check out the PTC's page and decide for themselves just how much of a self-parody this group is. Then if you don't think their analyses of the evil threats TV poses are funny enough - including group head-honcho Tim Winter's assault on science, logic, rational thinking, and sanity in his essay about the "link" between teen depression and Internet use - check out the parody of PTC outrage in the new edition of Entertainment Weekly magazine.

Maybe the PTC will now look for new targets to pressure and harass. They might try and threaten the donors of colleges again.

Watch TV for a good cause!

Monday 9/8 c is the time to get in front of the TV and watch the CW network…if only for a good cause!

Tonight is the airing of the Gossip Girl episode that will supposedly depict a threesome among college age characters. THE DOWNFALL OF HUMANITY IS AT HAND!

Or so the Parents Television Council will have us believe. This, by the way, is the organization that identifies shows like “Lost,” “Heroes,” “Fringe,” “Law & Order,” and “Ugly Betty” as “indecent,” “pornographic,” and “obscene.”

A mainstream group of parents they are…SURE!

Of you don't believe this nonsense, watch the Gossip Girl and support free speech!

Or better yet, go to their web page here and talk back yourself. Send them messages and tell them what you think of the PTC.

PTC loons urging censorship...again

As we discussed on the last episode of Culture Wars, available for podcast download here, the regressive nutcases of the Parents Television Council are gearing up for yet another fun activity: "let's try and censor television again." They, most likely, couldn't find any small colleges to threaten with pressure tactics and letter writing campaigns to force donors to withhold money. Those good folks of the PTC tend to do that when college radio stations air opinions the organization disagrees with.

This time the target is the CW network's Gossip Girl TV show because America's impressionable young children are in dire peril yet again. The group is trying to pressure CW affiliates to pre-empt the show, scheduled to air on November 9. America's children need to be protected at all costs, they scream their shrill paranoia on their web page (and the web pages of other fringe extremist anti-media organizations).

The scientifically-illiterate buffoonery of this group has been discussed on this blog a number of times before. For example, the fact that they are incapable of understanding or explaining why a content analytical study does not prove a causal chain and neither does a statistical correlation. Or the fact that they post links to studies on their web page that prove the exact opposite of what the PTC is trying to argue.

These people are not just incompetent clowns but, unfortunately, a collection of bullies and thugs, a gang of home invaders that tries and muscle its way into your living room and control what you watch, what you listen to, how you raise your children, and manage your family. But if these people like to push broadcasters around and lobby the FCC to trample on the First Amendment, it's about time for level-headed, clear-thinking Americans to push back a little and let them know how they feel. The PTC can be contacted through their web page and on those of their various "grass roots" members and supporters. I would urge those who support the freedom of speech and free expression to do so.