by John Kasich
WALKING THAT WHOLESOME ROAD
There’s a thinking out there, in Hollywood and other centers of the entertainment industry, that the G-rated fare of yesterday won’t fly in today’s R-rated world, but a recent study puts this argument flat on its face. The Dove Foundation, a group that encourages the production of family-friendly movies, studied the gross earnings of the two hundred most widely distributed studio films each year from 1989 to 2003. Not surprisingly, slightly more than half of those films (or, 51.4 percent) received an R rating from the Motion Picture Association of America. PG-13 movies came next, at 28.4 percent, followed by PG movies, at 16.1 percent. Trailing the field, by a wide margin, were G-rated titles, representing only 4.1 percent of all major studio releases during that period.
But here’s the shocker: G-rated movies raked in an average profit of $79 million, while R-rated movies managed an average profit of only $6.9 million, putting to lie the myth that family-friendly fare doesn’t make money—and sending out an all-important reminder to entertainment executives that Americans seem to be hungering for movies and music and television shows they can enjoy wholeheartedly with their children.
Realize, I don’t come at this argument from any kind of sidelong view. I watched MTV when it was first getting off the ground back in the early 1980s, and I still watch it today—only lately I start in with my cringing a little sooner than I ever did before. To be sure, there was gratuitous sex and violence in a lot of those early music videos, but it’s become much more hard-core in recent years, and much more disturbing, to where I can no longer look away from it. I still listen to new music, but more and more these days I find there are some thresholds I have a hard time crossing. I bought the new Roots CD, for example, because I try to stay on top of things, and because I was determined to give hip-hop a fair shake. It’s hard to ignore it, because even if I turn the dial it pops up on the next station. It’s everywhere, and all around, so I slipped in this new CD and was quickly appalled at what I was hearing. The lyrics just put me over the edge. Every other word, or just about, was intended to shock and titillate, for no good reason but to shock and titillate, and I couldn’t listen to it.
I’m not a moralizer, and I like to think I have an open mind, but I’ve got to tell you I couldn’t open it wide enough to accept such as this, and as I listened to the CD I kept coming back to the language. I won’t repeat any of it here, but it was so unrelentingly foul and offensive, almost gratuitously so, that I caught myself feeling angry at myself for even listening. More than that, I was angry that I was being subjected to it. Realize, it wasn’t so foul and offensive that I became morally outraged or anything like that, but I couldn’t see the point. The language didn’t add anything to the music, or to the message, which I guess is the very definition of gratuitous. And then I caught myself thinking, What if my wife got in the car and the album happened to still be in my CD changer? How could I ever explain what I was doing buying this stuff? Or, even worse, what if my daughters chanced to hear it? How could I ever explain to them why Daddy was listening to such filth? There was no justifying it, really, and yet I suppose on balance it was little different from any other rap or hip-hop artist out there making music today. It’s what we’ve become, in our society of extremes, and what we’ve tacitly agreed to accept, as we vote with our dollars and ratings, and there I was on the consumer end of the equation, embarrassed to be a part of it.
So what did I do? I pulled into this place near my house where I usually stop for coffee and threw the CD in the trash. I didn’t even think it through, just pulled up alongside this garbage can, popped the CD from the console, and threw it away. Understand, I never throw anything in the trash like that, but I was so put off by what I’d heard that it seemed the only thing to do. The right thing to do. In my own way, I was taking my own little stand, against the societal drift we’ve allowed ourselves to get caught up in, against the meaningless and increasingly offensive drivel that passes for intellectual or creative thought. We throw up our hands like we’re powerless against it, but in truth there is tremendous power even in a small act such as this, which struck me at just that moment as all-important. Why? Because I couldn’t believe that these talented artists would obscure their gifts with such vulgarity by their own choosing. Because I couldn’t believe that I had spent my hard-earned money to listen to it. And because I’d convinced myself that if I let that kind of garbage into my life and the life of my family I’d have lost—and yet even as I slipped back into my car I worried this was yet another case of too little, too late. We’ve all lost, really, in big ways and small, because this kind of garbage is everywhere and all around, and I maintain that if we don’t stand against it, if we don’t take our own little stands, we’ll look up one day and it will be who we are.
Paris Hilton doubles-down for another fifteen minutes of fame by agreeing to videotape a sex act with her boyfriend and laughs it off when the footage becomes the most popular download on the Internet—and laughs harder still when she becomes one of the most popular personalities on the celebrity scene, parlaying her “home movies” into a hit reality show, a best-selling book, a successful clothing line, a guest-hosting gig on Saturday Night Live, and a suggestive commercial for a fast food hamburger chain . . .
Ours has become a culture of celebrity, wouldn’t you agree? We’ve got actors and musicians passing themselves off as environmental experts and political analysts, stumping for this or that cause or candidate, and we’ve allowed their opinions to influence our own—all because of the power of their celebrity. We’ve got rap artists like 50 Cent, making the rounds to promote his debut CD, proudly telling admiring interviewers on mainstream news and talk shows that he’d been shot so many times in his young life it’s a wonder he doesn’t leak. We’ve got music videos that denigrate women and glorify violence, and reality shows that encourage contestants to eat the stir-fried phalluses of yaks, and video games that cast players in the role of a disaffected student off to shoot up his high school. All in the name of entertainment.
And, like it or not, we’ve got Paris Hilton, who in the blink of a false eyelash has become the pop icon of her generation—for no valid reason I can easily determine. Okay, so she comes from a rich family, and we seem to want to catch her behaving badly, but that should be where it begins and ends for this young woman. How is it that we’ve managed to build her up into such a name-above-the-title-type star that she shines brighter than the signature H outside her family’s hotels? There’s no talent here, at least none that I can see. For all I know, Paris Hilton is whip-smart and has strategically crafted a public persona—a brand, in today’s parlance—that will serve her enormously well in the years ahead; at the very least, she’s smart enough to have surrounded herself with whip-smart advisors. But beyond the marketing blitz, there’s no personality, no great charisma, no undeniable charm. She’s a pretty girl, is all, and judging by her scandalous behavior she’s pretty much willing to do anything, and this last has been enough to push her onto the cover of every popular magazine in the country. I don’t mean to rip Paris Hilton, because I’ve never met her and I’ve tried diligently to avoid her “work,” and I don’t mean to dwell on her rise to such prominence because I don’t want to give it any more attention than it deserves. But I think her appeal is emblematic. There’s no there there, and yet she is absolutely everywhere, and I can’t be quite sure if the public has embraced her as much as her handlers would have us believe, or if the media haven’t foisted her upon us and left us with no choice in the matter.
WHY CELEBRITY MATTERS
I understand our fascination with wealth. I get the appeal of shows like Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous—or, these days, MTV’s Cribs. They play to our prurient interest, and speak to that part of us that’s always thinking the grass is somehow greener on the other side of the fence. I’ll sometimes watch these shows myself, because I like seeing how rich people spend their money, how many fancy cars they have in their driveways, how elabora
te they’ve made their home gymnasiums or screening rooms. This kind of stuff is interesting to people, in a Peeping Tom sort of way, but it’s when we put these celebrities on a kind of altar and begin to worship at it that we get ourselves into trouble, because it’s one thing to check out how they live and quite another to have it influence how we live.
And the most troubling piece is that, in the main, our celebrities are clearly not up to the position, because a great many of them seem to get themselves into trouble at every turn. We’ve given them the burden of shouldering our expectations, and modeling our behavior, but what comes back to us on the rebound is one scandal after another, each one more notorious than the last:
Halle Berry, the Oscar-winning actress, is convicted for leaving the scene of an automobile accident, and sentenced to 200 hours of community service and three years’ probation . . .
Paul Reubens, better known as children’s entertainer Pee-wee Herman, is caught exposing himself in an adult theater in Florida . . .
Hugh Grant, one of Hollywood’s most popular leading men, is arrested for soliciting a prostitute in Los Angeles . . .
R. Kelly, the Grammy-winning R&B singer-songwriter whose hit “I Believe I Can Fly” became an inspiring anthem for inner city youth looking to harness their dreams, is indicted on child pornography counts in Cook County, Illinois, as his new album goes multiplatinum . . .
Winona Ryder, another acclaimed movie star, is arrested for shoplifting $5,500 in clothing from the Beverly Hills Saks Fifth Avenue . . .
Once again, it begs the question: What the heck are these people thinking? And, the too easy follow-up: Are they even thinking at all? I feel the same way about these misguided celebrities as I do about our athletes, and it’s amazing to me that they can have so much going for them—looks, talent, wealth, fame—and still be determined to throw it all away on the back of a bad decision. And, as often as not, it’s not just one bad decision, but one after another. I read about their various falls from grace and start to think, Why don’t these celebrities use their powers for good? Why don’t they turn their popularity to advantage and build on the public interest to shine important or compelling light on one thing or another? Why don’t they use their positions of influence and authority to actually stand for something?—something positive, that is.
Of course, the stars are not solely to blame for their various inabilities to lead purposeful, value-laden lives away from stage and screen; it’s also on the industries in which they toil. And it’s on us. Flip around the television dial and you’ll get what I mean, as you come across show after show laced with sexual innuendo and senseless violence. Even at seven and eight o’clock at night, there’s stuff on network television I certainly wouldn’t want my daughters watching. Goodness, I couldn’t even begin to explain away some of what passes for acceptable behavior on some of these shows! The comedian George Carlin used to do a routine about the seven dirty words you couldn’t say on television, and I won’t stoop to repeat them here, but I will state that I’ve since heard most of them on prime-time network shows. And the ones I haven’t heard have been hinted at.
THE SLIPPERY SLOPE
When did it happen that you were allowed to show partial nudity on network television? When did it happen that the story lines of shows scheduled in what used to be known as the eight o’clock “family hour” included such subjects as sexual promiscuity, unprotected sex, bisexuality, and group sex? When did it happen that sexual innuendo became the default option programmed into the hard drives of Hollywood’s so-called comedy writers? And when, pray tell, did it become acceptable to treat hot-button issues like abortion, single motherhood, and same-sex marriage so cavalierly that they can be delivered with a laugh track? Our young people are especially vulnerable to the kind of idol worship that leaves them mimicking the behavior of their favorite characters and stars, and we’re fooling ourselves into thinking they can take in all these mixed messages and begin to make sense of them. Forget the off-camera exploits of some of these celebrities—it’s the on-camera scenes that create such a disturbing impression. It’s the willingness of Hollywood producers to set aside conscience and promote all manner of irresponsible messages to our impressionable young people that gets us into trouble—and keeps us there, for the near term. Why is it that writers are so quick to romanticize, say, the plight of an unwed teenage mother? Ask them about it and they’ll say it sends an empowering message, to demonstrate to young female viewers that it’s possible for an intelligent, strong-willed, independent woman to go it alone as a single mother. They’ll say it’s a creative choice, well within their purview as writers and entertainers. That would be their view, and they’d be entitled to it, but I look on and think it’s a missed opportunity to address the root social ills of teenage and unwed pregnancies.
Say what you will about Hollywood producers, but the best-intentioned of them realize that we live in a global village, and that as producers of popular entertainments that coarsen our society they have a deleterious impact on our children and consequently our future, thereby lowering our societal bar. They don’t produce this stuff in a vacuum; there’s a consequential cause and effect at work here. I don’t care where you fit in Hollywood’s pecking order, just to continue with this one example, whether you’re an actor, or a writer, or a grip . . . everyone bears responsibility for the finished product and for the insidious effect it might have on our society. Even parents are responsible, because they’re the gatekeepers of last resort, capable of shutting this stuff off and keeping it from their children—in most instances.
Like it or not, we mimic our fictional heroes and heroines, just as we mimic our real-life heroes and heroines, and if a brassy, determined female character happens to stand as a role model to millions of American women, the people who created that character have a certain obligation to present her in a positive, hopeful manner. Does that mean that each and every one of our recurring television characters must always be made to act morally and responsibly? Does it mean our best-selling novelists must only create protagonists who demonstrate positive ideals? Does it mean rap artists must only write songs about peace and love and helping others? Absolutely not, because that would be boring, but if we’re going to have a popular character embrace a “lifestyle choice” in a meaningful and lasting way, then we had better think it through because our kids are watching, and reading over our shoulders, and making their own choices based on these so-called creative decisions.
A recent RAND Corporation study brings the point powerfully home, revealing that teens who watch a lot of television with sexual content are more likely to initiate intercourse in the following year than teens who don’t. In effect, the study showed, young Americans who watch the most television with sexual content “act older” than their peers who watch less. They have intercourse at an earlier age. The silver lining is that television shows addressing the risks of sexual promiscuity, or discussing some of the consequences of that promiscuity, tend to have a positive impact on our children, who are more likely to practice safe sex as a result of having seen one of their favorite characters practice safe sex on television, but I see that only as a silver lining to a mess of dark clouds.
ABC-TV airs a titillating promo for its hit show Desperate Housewives, as a lead-in to its Monday Night Football broadcast. The spot features actress Nicolette Sheridan, one of the attractive stars of the show, dressed only in a tight-fighting bath towel, crossing an otherwise empty NFL locker room toward Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Terrell Owens, and as the camera pulls close she suggestively drops her towel. The network is flooded with calls of protest from angry parents and watchdog groups who argue that the spot was irresponsible, and inappropriate, and the network issues a public apology the next morning . . .
Enough’s enough, don’t you think? I mean, network television executives ought to know better than to put this kind of provocative imagery on its prime-time airwaves, at the front end of a broadcast when millions of adolescent
boys are sitting down to watch the game with their fathers, and yet somehow it passes muster with enough suits and knee-jerk executives that it winds up in our homes—and this is what I find so unacceptable. Once again, I’m not such an old prude to suggest that the sight of an attractive actress in a bath towel is the end of the world, or that the suggestion that she is about to walk naked across a men’s locker room to seduce a nearly naked football player is patently offensive—but in this context it was definitely out of place, and ill-conceived, and it leaves me thinking we ought to be doing a better job policing ourselves on this type of thing. I’m not arguing for a return to censorship but I am calling for a redoubling of self-censorship on the part of network executives. Let’s start paying attention to these types of improprieties and figure some of this stuff out for ourselves, because I find it hard to believe that each and every network suit who signed off on this Desperate Housewives promotional spot didn’t see this one coming. It wasn’t a decision made in a vacuum; it was a decision made by a committee, and any committee worth its six-figure bonus should have known that such a lewd, suggestive spot was bound to backfire—especially when parents have a quite reasonable expectation that when their children tune in to an NFL football game they won’t be assaulted with such as this. The constant barrage of negative images ought to at least be limited to the bad behavior demonstrated by the athletes on the field.