More than enough?

What a pleasure it is to view a programme like “the Darling Buds of May”: a programme where things go terribly wrong but where in the end everyone sorts themselves out and lives more or else happily ever after. Now don’t get me wrong: I am perfectly well aware that people are not like those in programmes such as “Darling Buds” (well only a bit like that) and that people swear and use bad language to express themselves; nevertheless I am also aware that there seems to be some sort of compulsion on those responsible for planning and directing our programmes that they should use as much bad language as possible in their plays etc. and because there is now such a tremendous choice of channels they can put anything they like on, however offensive and however exaggerated as was. for example. the recent controversial progrgmme about paedophiles: after all (or so goes the argument) you can always turn it off. The trouble is, of course, who is going to turn the rubbish off when children are on their own, in their own rooms, viewing unsupervised either the telly or the internet. 

            Having said all that I am well aware that with all the technology that is around we are going to have to learn how to deal with all the problems, which go with it. I am myself getting on just a bit but find a great interest is finding my way around the Internet and really enjoy the experience. The older I get however the more I begin to wonder if people any longer care enough about the material that is available to us, or even worse is available to our kids via our screens, whether on the internet or on the ‘normal’ channels. The way violence is presented on the screen, for example, or sex is explicitly shown, the way villains are seen to run rings around our police, or the way kids are depicted as being disrespectful and getting away with it, all these things must surely have an adverse effect on the more vulnerable members of society both grown up or otherwise. But then of course if they were not allowed to do this kind of thing the stories would be less ‘entertaining’ or, what is possibly worse in their producer’s eyes, would no longer be ‘realistic’ enough to allow them to produce the sleaze which will attract the lowest common denominator amongst the viewing public.

The reality of it all of course is that there is enough trouble in the world these days without any need to dramatise it further. Indeed we only need to turn to the news channels and we get any amount of drama, for there we find war, rumour of war, famine, and deprivation in abundance, say nothing of rioting in the streets of our own town. Yes and there an abundance of sex too for good measure. Yes indeed there is more than enough drama in everyday life without adding to it unnecessarily.

setabil