Posted on 12/15/2007 9:45:58 AM PST by wagglebee
Since my husband is facing a few days of enforced rest, I bought a couple of "two thumbs up" funny movies to keep him entertained and to distract us, two intense policy wonks, from the current political campaigns. Both films came highly recommended as hilarious, heartwarming comedies and we looked forward to some restorative laughter while we rested instead of engaging in the usual pre-Christmas shopping, cooking and decorating.
We also watched a couple of episodes of Comedy Central on Television. Any true wit or humor is buried under far too many layers of crude language, potty humor and infantile behavior. The characters are too overdrawn and the slapstick too pervasive. The ultimate incongruity is having a clean-cut, beautiful girl engage in the coarseness and become part of the vulgarity. To put it bluntly, both the movies and the comedy routines reveal the bankruptcy of the amoral modern liberal ideology -- the chaotic, absurd, impotent, libertine worldview of the Hollywood left. Some authors describe that worldview as "moral indeterminacy" and lament the "apolitical utopianism."
Sadly, that worldview permeates American culture.
When presidential candidates try to explain the connection between morality and politics, that culture is the audience. The people who laugh at today's comedies probably are not capable of understanding the importance of faith and morals in shaping history and enabling civil society to function effectively.
Liberalism is impotent in the face of the challenges of reality. For instance, one challenge is when an adolescent - previously preoccupied with sex and the excitement of the chase - starts to look for genuine love and runs smack into the demands for fidelity and love's inherent territoriality. Amoral modern liberals have no clue how to meet the demands of love. How can a person with a deep-rooted history of self-indulgence, who lives without restraint or accountability, possibly know what is the right thing to do, much less have the courage and character to do the right thing?
One valuable aspect of movies is that effective storytelling boils down to presenting a collection of events that allows us to see the individuals' personalities and character. The various events constitute a thread running through their lives that gives identity and a unique persona to the individuals. Each moment contributes to the whole and plays a role in shaping the entire lifetime. Ironically, in order to produce drama, the playwright has to address reality and its consequences. In that sense, life is like a tree, and our roots are our history. The consequences of the past are carved into our psyche. For instance, when a tree is cut, the rings of the trunk reveal the good and bad years - all the events of its lifetime are incorporated into the trunk of that tree. Similarly, all of the past is there in a person's life; the accumulated experiences mold and shape the personality and the character. When those experiences are negative and harmful to the person's development, we speak of that person as "carrying baggage." Sadly, many of today's young people are carrying an awful lot of baggage at a very early age.
So, how can today's presidential candidates communicate the importance of faith and morality for civil society in a culture that has repudiated the basic Judeo-Christian values? How can the candidates bring reality and common sense, much less character and integrity, into the chaotic state of modern thought and behavior?
If the conservatives win the 2008 presidential election, it will be as much a matter of the liberals losing as conservatives winning. In hindsight, the vaunted genius of Karl Rove in the two Bush victories is now questioned. Political analysts are reevaluating Rove's vaunted brilliance. They claim that if the left had been more competent, the left would have annihilated the Bush effort.
Politics, like life, is full of contradictions. The liberals, for all their so-called respect for privacy, rely heavily on opposition research. Note Hillary's information about Obama's 3rd grade essay about wanting to be President! The concept of privacy appeals to modern people whose narcissism and self-indulgence requires a veil of privacy behind which to hide and avoid accountability.
Can a moral leader appeal to today's amoral public? Probably not, unless reality intervenes. The British rejected Churchill's warnings until Hitler's invasion of Poland created a climate where realistic leadership was necessary. Then it became a fight for survival. Likewise, the American public won't embrace a moral leader without necessity demanding a "savior." Until such a time that a savior is needed, the public won't turn to a moral leader.
There is hope, however, because the chaotic state of modern leadership provides that possibility - even though those willing to accept the boundaries of morality have never been, and probably never will be, a majority.
Very well said!
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"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
The last truly funny man on Tee Vee was Jack Benny - ya, I am that old. I have been collecting his older radio shows for play on my PDS. The humor is genuine and with no profanity. How quaint.
Jack Benny- absolute master of timing and his famous ‘pregnant pause’, (usually related to a money matter).
That's a keeper.
But even Jack was not fully aware that we cannot give any weapon, no matter how small to the leftist culture killers, they will use it.
Jack portrayed himself as being a tightwad and less than proficient with the violin, both highly inaccurate.
The lefties used this type of stereotype to character assassinate males subsequently in the likes of "All in the Family", "Married with Children", and "The Simpsons" reaching a zenith in "American Dad" and "The Family Guy" (not), proving that excrement can be transmitted on the public airwaves.
True, he was so ‘bad’ because he was really good - vilon player that is to say.
The victim in any of JB jokes was Jack himself. One of my favorites was the bit on the patatoe ‘soap’.
Jack was generous and just as funny in real life. ANy of the few nterviews left floating around are worth the time to download and watch/listen to.
What can I say, I am an old time radio fan.....
Neither is mine. But I definitely want to see a leader who is a good moral model for those whose personal behavior is still at the formative stage.
The last truly funny man on Tee Vee was Jack Benny - ya, I am that old.
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I am that old too and Jack was great but I think Tim Conway used to do some pretty funny stuff on the Carol Burnett show.
While much of this is attributable to our culture, a lot of it is attributable to laziness or lack of talent. Potty jokes are what you tell when you don't have a real joke to tell. The Austin Powers movies illustrate this.
There was a gold mine to be found in satirizing the James Bond movies, and the first Austin Powers movie did a great job of that. Those movies deteriorated quickly after that and became nothing but a series of weak, unfunny potty jokes. What a waste of talent.
Teach them about Jesus Christ first. Moralizing at them without this will lead nowhere. ;)
Granted married with children has its fill of raunch humour, but I seem to remember that in that show the audience could at least identify with “Al” as an old-school shavinist All American Male!
It’s the way I took it, he may have done “dumb” things, but his philosophy was at least party correct (and more importantly Anti-Feminist/PC Culture..).
That’s ABSOLUTELY correct, and exactly what I was thinking.
Agreed, but my point was that overall Al Bundy was not a role model.
Your point, as taken, is also valid. "Married" trashed everybody including PC groups theoretically untouchable. The real victim in "Married" was the perception of American culture.
And funny it was!
I vote for Tim Conway, Red Skelton, Jack Benny and Bill Cosby. Yes I’m that old, too ;)
For the women, it’s Lucy for me.
You’ll find some killingly funny out-takes on youtube, though I’d better warn about the language.
While certainly not for children, "The Family Guy" has a few funny moments. However, the ongoing story line of an infant repeatedly seeking to kill his mother is the most spectacularly unfunny thing unimaginable.
Other posters are mentioning Lucy, Carole Burnett, Tim Conway. I'll throw in Ozzie and Harriet, George and Gracie, Beaver, Father Knows Best, Danny Thomas, MTM, Dick Van Dyke, all hilarious and fit to babysit my kids, if you know what I mean.
Clean fun is the part of American culture that I miss.
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