So I've started to watch a new TV series, which is a little on the
creepy and weird side. What drew my attention after watching the first
episode (and the reason why I'm writing this post) is that the
co-creator and co-writer of this series is Ryan Murphy. Murphy is the
think-tank behind Glee.
Before he came up with the singing cash-cow, Mr. Murphy was the creator of Nip/Tuck, a wildly successful show with adult audiences. The thing is, Nip/Tuck
was about two plastic surgeons, one of whom was a sex-addicted playboy,
while the other was married to a wife with an adultery problem and had a
son who was confused about his sexuality. Not as edgy as his new show, American Horror Story (the one that I've begun watching), but still pretty out there.
After Nip/Tuck came Glee, the biggest teen phenomenon since Twilight. It is a teen show that does push boundaries, but it's still a show directed towards teens and tweens, at its base.
Now that Glee has Murphy rolling in some serious dough, he's decided to tackle another show: American Horror Story.
This show follows a family as they move into a new home that has had
many (and I mean MANY) deaths on the property, most of them the family
is unaware of. This house is haunted by their spirits and the family is
generally unaware of the fact that these weird-o creeps that keep
visiting them are ghosts and not real people; plus there's something
creepy (possibly a Frankenstein-ish monster) that's living and killing
people in their basement. The family has its share of problems too: the
wife had a miscarriage within the last year (and is pregnant again...
possibly by the house?), the husband had an affair (and got the girl
pregnant), and the teenage daughter is a cutter who is in love with one
of the ghosts (without knowing that he's a ghost). I know, I know...
weird.
After watching several episodes of this new show and researching Nip/Tuck (as I have never seen even a minute of the show before), it got me to wondering why we let our youth watch Glee? I mean, don't get me wrong... I am a sold out Gleek and the running plot-line of AHS has me at least a little hooked. But, why are we letting children watch (and be influenced by) Glee,
when it came out of the same mind that gave you the creepy show about a
risk-ey haunted house and the creepy show about plastic surgery and
sex?
Some things to take into consideration when thinking about
this are things like the fact that our culture is already obsessed with
sex. You can't search ANYTHING in Google or other search engines without
getting at least one result that's porn. I once heard (although I can't
verify this) that one out of every five results from an internet search
engine is porn. Allowing youth to watch a show that was created by
someone who clearly has no issues with some pretty "kinky" stuff is a
little bit of a risk, don't you agree? Even Glee itself is a
little out there. Every episode has at least one sexual innuendo and
there are at least 7 characters that are either gay, bi-sexual, or have
"experimented". And the next episode is entitled "I Kissed A Girl",
featuring Katy Perry's song by the same name. The preview of this
upcoming episode hints that a few of the girls will share that they have
kissed (or something more intense than that) another girl at some point
thus far in their lives.
Another thing, is that there is a new
obsession forming with the supernatural and the afterlife. As a believer
in God, I normally wouldn't mind this because it can spark an interest
in Christianity. But, this new obsession isn't about where you're going
when you die, nor is it about angels and God. It's about sticking around
here postmortem (which is not possible, Biblically speaking), and about
monsters and demons. This obsession is very dark and isn't going to
turn very many (if any) people to the right side of the coin. If a
series like AHS can come out of the same grey matter that brought you Glee,
don't you think there will some cross-over (in two ways). One way, is
that because the choir show has been so popular with youth, there will
likely be some that will start watching AHS just because Murphy's name is attached to it. Another way, is that Murphy may possibly bring some supernatural aspects to Glee;
it won't likely be in a big way, probably just little things like the
episode last season about God (that basically said that He didn't
exist), or things like that.
Again, don't misunderstand me here. I love Glee.
It's very entertaining and the music is great. But should we be letting
young people be influenced by a man that is clearly disturbed (at least
a little)? If this is what comes from of his creative outlets, there's
definitely got to be at least some of it floating around his noggin
because he believes it in some part.
I'm not trying to offer a
solution or say that Ryan Murphy's shows should be banned from young
adults. All that I'm trying to do here is state what's been floating
around my head since watching a few episodes of AHS, and raise a few questions about how media may be corrupting our youth. I only use this as an example.
'Til next time,
-B
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