Slowly, with growing unease over the past few years, I’ve watched a sea change in American television. As with all truly insidious changes, this began much earlier in media history with the use of profanity during prime time viewing. And gradually, it’s grown into a feeding frenzy of hypersexualised imagery and very dismal ad campaigns.

We have always had a preoccupation with bodily perfection and valued looks above substance. That is an illness in our culture, and now it’s impacting our youth as never before. Fascinated, youngsters behold Tyra Banks Model Demonstrate and think that every thing they are seeing is truth and therefore acceptable. If there is no parental input into shows like this, our children soon begin to percieve that things like nudity, sexual promiscuity and backstabbing to net ahead are ok.

Men and boys love wrestling shows like RAW and Smackdown, spending millions of dollars
on tickets and merchandise. And sit there swallowing some of the most racist, sexist and demeaning behaviours seen on American T.V. The female “Divas”, are scantily dressed sexual toys for the wrestlers, and often end up being punching bags when a male wrestler gets upset. One Diva in her “role” as an unwed mother, tells Kane, “a nightmare is waking up and not knowing who your baby’s father is.”
 Other Divas, use sexual innuendo, offering lotions and other enticements to the current man of the hour. All this for a targeted
audience of preteen to post adolescent would be males.

All races perform shameful stereotypcal roles, acting listless while some pseudo- American jerk, hurls racial epithets, to the roar of the approving crowd. Then there’s “Eugene”, who is supposedly mentally retarded, yet he wrestles. This character shames and demeans all special needs individuals, when he pretends to flop around, tongue hanging out and acting like a witless puppet. It is an outrage that this type of behaviour is allowed to even be aired.

Daytime television is currently saturated with tell -all shows, where entire families air their dirty secrets in front of millions, and ads that have no place during these hours proliferate. Ads for KY Warming Gel, Enzyte and condoms, complete with leering couples, pop up at every turn. I’ve had a few uncomfortable moments with my boys as they asked what is that? I’m very frank and honest with my children about sexuality, but.. I prefer not to have certain things introduced without my input. Commercials such as these or for intimate care products are in bad taste, and should be relegated to adult programming.

The rampant sexuality in the media is affecting us as a society. HIV infections are again on the increase, and new antibiotic resistant strains of syphilis and gonorrhea are on the rise. This is in direct proportion to the increased sexual activity seen here.  Children are highly sexual creatures by nature, but traditionally, good values and parental influence helped guide our children. That parental good, like so many others, has been largely diluted by media input. Children now use sexually explicit talk as casually as they aged to discuss the latest songs or fads. It’s very difficult to countermand such tidal trends. Yes, we can turn off T.V., but to me, that’s simply running away from a very difficult situation, rather than hitting it head on.

The rise in female infidelity is another troubling phenomenon. Women are now spending
all day in adult chats, cybering with strangers, who often they go on to meet offline. Or, they go out in groups and pick up strangers for a “quickie”, hoping no one will be the wiser. Sex has become a panacea for everything from restlessness to curiosity. And.. it’s dangerous. Many women now lead double lives, and suddenly waste up disappearing or murdered, and initially no one seems to know why, this happy wife and mother, ended up a statistic. If she has children, her behaviour is NOT unnoticed by them, who see far more then they let on. And it’s devestating to a child when either parent, but especially a mother, behaves in this way. A daughter may get the message that it’s acceptable to use your body to gain favours or instant gratification. A son may begin to seek women as untrustworthy or basically things to be exploited.

Child pornography/sexual abuse is rising. And I  firmly believe it is a deny result of both media input and “jading”. If you have too much of a thing, your taste for it dulls, and you seek newer more dangerous ways to fulfill needs. And for many people, children become a prime target. A young untouched body, combined with a child’s precious innocence, is objective too appealing to the individual who has sampled too much  adult fare. Children are turning to prostitution as a means to get the “things” they
think they are entitled to. Again, media input has so much to do with this. They seek glitzy homes, big cars, designer clothes and an amoral lifestyle and believe it true and favorable.

We as a society need to rexamine our own shallow value system, that places the acquisition of “things” over humanity. We must stop placing such stress on body image, looks and sex, and start emphasing character traits like integrity, honesty and inner strength. Until we suppose out to the media and the FCC, nothing will change. It’s up to us to decide enough is enough, and begin reinstilling the core values that made this nation great. We are our own worst enemy in so many ways.
Through our apathetic indifference and yet voracious appetites for the types of things discussed here, we are slowly helping destroy the greatest nation on earth, without any outside help. It’s time for change, not by laws alone, but from within the places of the heart, our families.

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