Christian Economics

I have two tracts on television which I found in an old Quaker meetinghouse. The appear to date from the late 1950's, and were originally printed by the Pilgrim Tract Society of Randleman, NC. I am posting htem here because i think it might be enlightening to look back at these warnings from the time when television was still new to American culture, and see if they have been confirmed by experience.

What Is Television Doing To Our Youth?
Oswald J. Smith, Litt. D.

It seems to me that television is the greatest menace of modern times, and how Christians are going to be able to make use of it I do not know. Anyone who has sen it must be convinced of its danger.
Television can be used for good. It has tremendous possibilities, but I am afraid it is being used for evil almost exclusively, and that it will do more harm than Hollywood to demoralize the youth of our country. It has been proven that the eye-gate makes a much greater appeal than the ear-gate, and while there will be good programs on television, there will be so many of the other kind that it is going to be most difficult to put on one and blot out the other.
I shall never forget how shocked I was when I visited homes where television had been installed. They told me about the lovely church services that could be seen, the concerts and other good programs that could be turned on. But no sooner were the parents out of the room than the children, boys and girls in their teens and those younger still, hurried to the television set, and when some of us returned we found them stretched out on the floor, fascinated by what they were seeing. and what was it they were looking at? A bloody wrestling match where two men were tearing each other to pieces, trying to gouge out each other's eyes! And as the children watched and listened to the groans and cries of the wrestlers they could hardly control themselves.
At still another time it was a night club show, women for the most part unclad, drinking and smoking, going through sensual dances, every action plainly visible, the entire scene revolting and demoralizing. Yes, they could have turned on another program, they could have looked at something else, but they turned on that in which they were most interested, the scene that fascinated them.
For generations we have refused to take our children to night clubs, theatres, wrestling matches and boxing bouts. Now these very scenes are brought right into the home and displayed before the children's eyes. It costs nothing to see them, except a loss of moral standards. In their early life they now can become acquainted with sin in its vilest form. No longer will parents be able to protect them from the awful things that go on in the world.
If you want to know how serious it is, read the article on Page 103 of the Reader's Digest for April, 1956. The other day a Salvation Army officer warned parents to turn off their television sets between the hours of four and seven. These hours, which are devoted to shows for children, are filled with the most brutal crimes imaginable, and it is these scenes that inspire our teenagers to go out in gangs to commit acts of violence.
A polluted diet of crime, violence, brutality and sadism, sponsored by cigarette companies, breweries and distillers, is now the daily menu for millions of boys and girls. The Theatre, with all its filth, that we as Christians wouldn't dream of patronizing, is now brought into our living rooms. Television may well be the final step in the complete collapse of the moral and spiritual life of our nation. Children will do what they see others doing.
I do not think television can be controlled. If it is in the home, it will be used. Children have been known to use knives on their parents when the parents insisted on turning it off. Your son will see what he wants to see in spite of what you do. I have never had a set in my home, and if my children were still with me, I would never dream of having one. I think that is the only safe policy.
These are the last days and we are going to the bottom. Soon we will be on the lowest rung of the ladder, and judgment will fall. Alcoholism has almost doubled since television began to feature liquor ads. Robbery with violence is increasing by leaps and bounds. Thirty killings a day have been shown on television in one city, and in another, forty-eight, and twenty scenes of violence in a single hour, according to the Reader's Digest. What kind of a harvest can we expect?
I do not know the answer but I am afraid, very much afraid. I always have looked upon hte movie world as the most demoralizing agency in existence. It alone has been responsible for the teen-age gangs of today and for the terrible things that children have been doing in this generation. But now something much more dangerous is upon us. The atomic bomb is bad, the hydrogen bomb is frightful; but television is going to be worse than either, and far more destructive. It will completely wreck the rising generation; and, before long, it will turn the Unitred States and Canada into a Sodom and Gomorrah, infinitely worse than the Sodom and Gomorrah of Bible times.
When that day comes, judgment will be inevitable. There will be no cure. God will have to send terrible judgment on the race, and it will be because of television and its diabolical influence on young minds. Science will have succeeded in wrecking civilization.
But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it NOT ONCE be named among you, AS BECOMETH SAINTS; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. for this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God on the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them. For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. Ephesians 5:3-11.

Labels: Ephesians 5, television