TV undermines fathers

9 September 2008 - Submitted by Tony

In the mid 1960s television featured a lot of what were called "family sitcoms", short for family situation comedies. They were all produced in the USA and were regarded as family entertainment. As the name family situation comedy suggests, the plot revolved around a fictitious family and the various situations they got into. So it seemed to us that American culture, at that time, upheld the family. However, this turned out to be a complete falsehood and it was brought home to me this way. A friend I knew at the time asked me "what television program do you think has the most insidious effect on children’s morals?" I named a few of the more immoral shows I could think of, mostly British comedies with a fair amount of “smut” in them. She replied “No, the most morally insidious program on television is "Flipper". Flipper was one of the popular USA made "family sitcoms". She went on to say why she thought it was so insidious. The basis of her argument was that in that particular "sitcom", the father was always made to look a fool and the children always portrayed as the clever ones. I thought about it and realised that all the “family sitcoms” of that era had the same theme. So what appeared to be pro family was actually undermining the family.

The hidden insidiousness of this theme was the denigrating of the Father as the head of the household. Later, I read a book by a British psychologist indicating that the rejection of the Father was an important feature of American culture going way back to its founding in the mid 1700's The Bible outlines the proper role of the Father as the head of the household. He is among many things to be its spiritual and moral guardian. The Mother has a special role in this also in that she has the most time with the children in their formative years. Popular American culture has always undermined the role of parents in general and the father in particular. It has always emphasised peers over parents. There are many social surveys out today in western countries indicating that young people turn to their peers for guidance and not their parents. This is regarded by many sociologists to be the leading reason for the enormous growth of youth gangs in recent times.

Over the last 120 years or so, American culture has been transmitted to the whole world by technology and American industry. First came the gramophone which started the American popular music industry. Then came the cinema which established Hollywood. Then came television which enhanced Hollywood’s effects on people even further. And now finally the internet which has even bigger global implications than all the above. Big American corporations such as Google and Microsoft are now setting themselves up to dominate it just as Hollywood did with cinema and television. Popular internet programs such as Beebo and Facebook are specifically aimed at enhancing peer communication among teens as opposed to parent communication. We see daily, the effects of this enhancement of American culture around the world in the form of disintegrating families, increased crime and decreased social cohesion. All of this is a direct attack against God’s law:

Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. (Ex 20:12)

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