But on the other hand when forced to make moral judgments I set jokes aside and tend to err on the side of prudishness. I don't know if it is my separation of fantasy vs reality or some horrible moral dichotomy that will condemn me to perdition in the end.
In fact we were discussing this all at supper last night. What if you were being raptured and you got about 50 feet off the ground and you exclaimed "oh shit!" Would you fall back to earth? My daughter was of the opinion that God's grace would be sufficient but I am not so sure...
But I digress...
We now have television.
My wife bought one of those LCD TV's that have been on sale. It is smaller that the huge Plasma TV that we got as a hand-me-down from her Father, but it has a much better digital tuner.
We now get four channels of OPB, FOX, The Hispanic Channel, and a station from Eugene that fads in and out.
So it was with great excitement I sat down to watch "The Big Bang Theory." I had read a number of reviews on The Eye of Polyphemus and frequent updates on Kaley Cucuo and so I was thinking I had missed quit a lot in not being able to watch the show.
It was then I realized how completely out of touch I am.
The show seems to be a long compilation of not that funny sex jokes hung on a thin plot. Ok, are there any TV writers who were not beat up in high school? Or were not nerds, or were completely happy with their sexuality? (gay or not gay)
I have a theory about TV and movie writing. There is either a script writing program or there is a huge dart board. Script writers get drunk and tell sex jokes and then throw darts at the board. I imagine they are drinking Peppermint Schnapps with a snooty name, mixed with Red Bull and they are throwing darts. On the board are various plot devices. Nerd, pretty girl, car chase, misunderstanding, roommate is a nerd, roommate is gay, roommate can't communicate, racial stereo type, gay stereotype disguised as enlightenment, and so on.
Every time they hit something on the board they tear off the tag and paste it into the storyboard. If they hit words like Gay, Singing, Lets Put on a Show, then it is a storyline for Glee, if it is Sex Joke, Nerd, difficult roommate, Hot Chick, then the storyline is for Big Bang Theory, and so on.
Anyway, I know all of you that watch TV on a regular basis don't mind all the sexual innuendo and it all may be funny.
My daughter walked in the room during the show and was shocked and turned around and left.
So I've been thinking about this for a week.
We have all heard the stories of teens having sex all the time and sending naked photos over the internet and we all know how accessible internet porn can be.
I wonder if the utter pervasiveness of rude TV has more affect than anything else? The daughter is somewhat offened by the open sexuality on shows and I see her covering her eyes or leaving the room frequently. We have not been real hard line on that kind of thing. Somewhat rude jokes are made in our family. There have been real live examples of things that are joked about in TV shows and we have discussed them.
I suspect that our family and Amish people are perhaps the only people in the country who do not have TV and so have not noticed the general lack of morality shown over the airwaves. The television is actually worse than movies. I enjoyed "The Hangover" greatly but I did not show it to Lulu. I was offended by "Grease," but it was also not one long sex joke.
The problem with TV is that it purports to depict everyday life. What is normal on TV may be normal in everyday life. I suspect anyway.
It seems that you make a decision to look at sex on the internet, but you are exposed to a pervasive attitude of sexuality when you watch evening TV shows.
I have no idea if I am right or wrong or if anyone cares about my little rant.
It is pouring down rain and the river is flooding.
I don't want to go out of the house.
I suppose the biggest joke of all is myself. We don't have network TV because I am too cheap to subscribe to something I think I should be able to get for free. Then when after a few hundred dollars wasted on various antenna amplifiers and antennas and the joke of having an aluminum extension ladder leaned up against the side of a
Or perhaps the joke is that someone like myself who enjoys off color humor and pictures of girls who are no-better-than-they-ought-to-be has such a double standard in real life. It is like I told my 20 something sometimes a great helper, "I will make the jokes and rude commentary but I have no illusions of being some sort of "player," if she gets within two feet I will run... Laugh at me if you will-I don't care, I yam what I yam..."
Posts
To show you how out of it I am, I thought that "the Big Bang Theory" was a science documentary and it took me a few lines to get the innuendo. We have TVs but I only watch it when walking through the room.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I consider being called a prude a compliment.
I find myself finishing fewer books all the time because the author seems to be stuck in some adolescent sexual stage. I get pretty good at skipping the silly sex scenes but sometimes it isn't worth the effort.
No you are not alone.
Grace and peace.
Big Bang Theory. Not one of my regulars but I get to see it at my brother's place. And Kaley whatsername is certainly not hard to look at. I think tv and the media in general is making me (and maybe the rest of society) a bit immune and insensitive to what once would have been considered shocking behaviour. And I doubt that is a good thing.
ReplyDeletea commitment to religious beliefs could be considered as a correlation to this acceptance of "shocking" behavior also.
ReplyDeleteBig Bang Theory. Adolescent humor. I watched it once. I find nothing wrong with sex as a subject for jokes any more than anything else. The "humor" on the BBT however, is not very good.
ReplyDeleteAfter thinking about this post for a few hours I guess I lean more towards me having a bit of a double standard. I don't want my kid exposed to non stop innuendo as then it becomes how you think. We watch Sienfeld together, and have watched Glee. The ladies of the house decided Glee the second season was stupid and offensive and the cleverness of a group of people suddenly bursting into song was not worth the patheticness of the show. I was unable to actually watch anything past the first episode of the second season without becoming so annoyed at the preaching and the predictable plot and Gyneth that I left the room.(Actually I was kicked out for my incessant commentary)
ReplyDeleteSo I don't know if it is the difference between sitting down and watching a show together and then discussing controversial stuff vs unregulated background noise or if it was just that I sat down and actually watched TV for three hours that makes the difference.
We are back to OPB and the oldies channel. Actually we are on a Hogan's Hero's marathon which is at times a special form of pain and suffering all of its own.
I've heard a lot about Big Bang and think I would like it if I actually watched a couple episodes.
Anyway... the reception wasn't that good anyhow.
I haven't watched television since January of 2010. I honestly don't miss it and I may never get the equipment to turn it back on.
ReplyDeleteNow I love a good dirty joke. I come from a family in which all the adult members have their own stand up routines.
Have a good start to the new year.
Yeah...network TV is pretty bad these days. I'm against paying for TV but we are blocked from Eugene stations by a couple hills and too far away from Portland so we have a dish. The only decent channels IMO are the HUB (lots of Doogie Howser M.D. and 1960's Batman among other good stuff), and VH1 Classic where you can watch such quality shows as Classic Albums (for example, one featured Fleetwood Mac discussing how Rumours was made...sex, drugs...etc..big surprise!).
ReplyDeleteBig Bang is OK but the Sheldon character is seriously annoying. And Kaley is OK but I always liked her "sister" on 8 Simple Rules better.
Maybe I just don't have the sources that I used to but it seems like the really funny dirty jokes are pretty few and far between these days.
Orin, so this Penguin takes his car to the Walrus to get it checked out. He decides to go uptown and have an ice cream while waiting.
ReplyDeleteAfter the ice cream cone he check in with the Walrus about his car.
The Walrus says the car is pretty much o.k. although it does look like he has blown a seal.
The Penguin replies,
"No, its just ice cream."