The Modern American Male has a couple of problems facing him. Puritans, escaping persecution, started what became our American society. They had intense, fanatical, religious beliefs that were passed on to the next generations. We are the only nation to claim an area called “The Bible Belt” and be proud of this fact. We are taught that sex is bad and dirty. We are taught that the body is something to be covered. Because of this baseline, television has limits on what it can entertain us with. The entire aspect of sex is glossed over or only hinted at in our television shows. We are instead given adventure as an entertainment. As a result, we are more comfortable watching two people trying to kill each other than two people having sex. This does not change whether we are in front of our parents or children. Our sex drive, however, is still there. We would really like to watch (or take part in) sex. Advertisers will tease us with innuendo, scantily clad people, and sexual overtones. The lesson becomes - Sex is bad, but we will use it to sell you stuff. The corollary is - Killing is bad, but we will entertain you with it. This is the paradox, and it is problematic. The vent that must occur is often at the cost of some ‘sacred’ social norms. We as a nation have the highest percentage of rape, a violent crime with sexual factors. We, as a nation, are a breading ground for serial killers and were the first to invent the job of ‘FBI Profiler’ the counter that fact. We invented the ‘drive-by shooting’ and are raising children who think this is a good way to problem-solve.
Our children are having children these days because sex is bad and a drive all at the same time. They don’t talk to us about what they are feeling because we are both uncomfortable even talking about sex. We are all born instinctually capable of figuring out sex and its basic mechanics. Babies occur. Anorexia and bulimia come from a low self-worth someone develops because of their comparison of self and the plastic, TV people or the bad/good sex paradox. We get into deep debt to accumulate objects to make ourselves feel better because the advertisers said we’d be sexier once we owned them. We gamble on get-rich-quick schemes, in the casinos of Las Vegas, or on the weekly Lotto drawing to get the money to buy the lives we see others living on TV. We devour the plastic reality of the World Wrestling Federation where we can see others doing what we cannot because of the violence is wrong/entertainment paradox.
We know the TV is nothing but fantasy. We can see through it from the age of ten. Ask any teenage boy/man you find on the urban streets. He knows the TV shows him that the police always catch the bad guy in 30 to 60 minutes. He knows that you can “Just say No” and that HIV can kill. He also notices that the local drug dealer usually walks out of the courtroom smiling and gets into his Mercedes. He sees the crack mother and her five children from different fathers getting the welfare check for doing nothing. He also sees his girlfriend. She is wearing a halter top and painted on jeans because it seems to be OK to tease according to advertising. Another predatory boy/man is attempting modern human mating ritual while talking to her. This threatens his territory and the sex drive gives rise to his perceived need to defend by attack. He may or may not know that both drives are fraught with danger. He can’t fight either for long and is told by society that neither is the proper way. Paradox.
“You have to have a license to own a dog, or catch a fish, but any butthead can be a parent.” - Keanu Reeves in Parenthood.
As a nation, we are failing to pass on to those we have created, the wisdom of our experiences and also given to us by those who only wished for us to have a better life than they did. We have become trapped ourselves by the paradox of the TV. My blood roils in my veins while watching a realistic gunfight/martial art/sword play on the boob-tube. The more carnage, the more realistic the gunshot wounds, the more accurate the tactics, the more aroused it makes me. I feel more comfortable viewing this with my two children than ‘Debbie does Dallas’ or flipping through the latest issue of Maxim. My family has been briefed on several occasions concerning the steps, tactics, and location of the household weapons required to clear our home if an intruder attempts entry. The standing order is: “the intruder(s) don’t make it out the door alive!” I think we may have covered what to do if the house catches fire, once, maybe. I speak of the paradox from inside the paradox. This is my qualification. These words are my attempt to salvage the wisdom I was given and add what I have learned. I must prevent the loss of continuity between my generation of men and the next.
It must be stated that this is only MY perception and MY random brain droppings. There is no altruism. There may be bits that have a universal value. There may be some insights into the inner workings of humanity.
There may not be… It is for you to decide what to take and what to leave behind. “Believe nothing you hear and only half of what you see with your own eyes” is a good motto.
