Programmed Morals

Television. Dramas. Comedies. Actors and actresses. Writers and producers. Production assistants and stage hands. The people that get coffee. These things, and many others, all add up to what we see and what we watch and what we are consistently entertained by. What we are moved by.

While TV can offer a release from our daily lives and allow us a sort of mental vacation from reality, there appears to be much more that it can offer.

I started writing this after the conclusion of an episode of Heroes. The episode ended with a gorgeously scripted and narrated inquisition about generational living, parental guidance, and the choices we make. While I had an initial desire to explore this idea further, I realized that Mohinder (from Heroes) said everything I wanted to say. And he did it in a manner that I would have done it. He proposed questions as opposed to finding answers. He summed up everything I wanted to say in 40 seconds of well thought out dialogue. This surprises me. Not because a writer of a very popular show did something better than me, but because a writer of a very popular show thinks like me.

So when I explore the topic of 'what has TV actually taught me,' I usually settle on the idea of fictional characters on a set as a whole, the grand scheme of TV, and say something like 'never take life too seriously,' or 'don't ever believe what you see on TV,' stuff like that. But in reality, the fictional characters are based in something so true, that paired with talented, or insightful writers, life changing, or life affirming ideas can seep out stronger than nerve gas. Sometimes these ideas are caught in convoluted dialogue. Sometimes they are meant to be inferred from action. Sometimes they are spelled out in narration.

But some of my most important life theologies have roots in the TV shows and movies that I have come across in my life. I once wrote that they should have told us as kids that some of the Disney movies that we grew up loving would be such fine teachers of character down the road, like the Lion King teaching about accepting change, learning from your past, and gaining the courage to move forward. Well as time moved on, and I grew from Simba and Scar to Jack Bauer, I have started a collection of the closest thing I have to a set of morals.

Balance.
Listening.
Questions Over Answers.
Trust.
Compassion.
Friendship.

Things that are not hard to find. Not hard to hear. Things that come up in daily conversation, in nightly reading, in religion and in politics (haha). Things that are everywhere we turn. But sometimes, it takes a talented writer and a talented actor or actress to convey the meaning behind the truth. Even if it's something that I attach to and someone else ignores, it's still there. And if you're open enough, and pay close enough attention, the fictional programming that consumes our free time can offer the compliment we need to the way we were raised.

Ha, I ended up writing about the choices we make based on how we're raised after all. Maybe Chip Douglas didn't have it so bad... and I love everyone who gets that reference.