Does anyone have a “clue” anymore??  Life has become one surreality television show after another (yes I made up that word) and I am ready to get out my view master!  What is wrong with us? When did we become the self centered, uncaring, violent, stupid beings that mutate in front of Plasma, LED 50 inch screens?  Good Grief Charlie Brown, when TV lost the Tubes, WE became the Boobs!

If you could look at society as a symphony, we were once directed with sections of woods, winds and strings that all came together producing solid and pleasant sound.  Now it is a dark, overly produced, incoherent video that only carries the redeeming grace that proves the radio star is dead and so is MTV. The way we see life is through a reality realm that expresses death, violence, and extreme everything including stupidity! Laugh if you will at Lawrence Welk, Happy Days, W.K.R.P., Mayberry or even the Addams Family!  But after those shows ended in the evening, there was family, friends, laughter, meals and self esteem.

Because he never had a Face Book page, I doubt if the name Charles Caleb Colton means anything to you.  Possibly however you have heard his quote:  “Imitation is the sincerest of flattery” and if you have, you will understand why he would be glad he died in 1832!

It really came together this week as the Florida trial for Casey Anthony was broadcast with comment on every news, talk and entertainment media outlet.  There were people literally running like Pamplona puppets, screaming and falling over each other in hope of being selected for one of the few pubic seats in the trial.  Are you kidding me? Then it dawned on me – no it is no joke, it is who we have become.

Physical trainers preach, “You are what you eat!”  And they are right, why is it so difficult to understand ‘We watch what we are?”  Oppenheimer himself could not have produced more destruction to mankind.  Family values don’t exist anymore, trinity of mother, father, child which was once the nuclear family has imploded and we have no one but ourselves to blame.  Seriously, our youth know where the Jersey Shore is but can they find Catalina?  (NOT the salad dressing).

Everything that is popular in our viewing window of life is dark in once way or another. In one hour, I can watch any of the following:

.     Kill a spouse, child or friend for greed, anger or revenge

.      Sexual stupidity or drunken fighting for amusement

.      Law breaking, stories of prison life or how to beat convictions with forensics

.      Live with multiples wives and upwards of 14 children, or 16 and pregnant.

.      Brutal animal death or torture

.     War, divorce, greed schemes,fraud

.      Medical science gone wrong or mistakes making valued lawsuits

.      Elderly abuse or children missing or abandoned

These samples only touch on the hundreds of daily televised selections, and most are found on “family” networks or woven into cartoon shows aimed at young people. Even more disturbing, is if you take the time as an intelligent person and watch the commercials shown in these time slots, the demographic they are aimed at and the subject matter is almost as depressing.   Who needs a Manchurian Candidate let alone Frank Sinatra; those tubeless vibrant color viewing boxes will do the trick just fine.

We need to wake up from the assimilation that this collective of acceptance and self satisfaction has provided.  Life isn’t going to ever be fair! Some WILL loose and Some WILL win, THAT is our journey, and you won’t always be able to dance to it!  Those struggles are what give character, pride and self esteem and maybe just maybe the incentive to be better than you were the day before.  Seriously, turn off the viewing day and hoist the American Flag again and make people think and do for themselves again.

We have become a nation that cares less about the future than the past it passes on.  Some stories our parents told, like walking 10 miles in a blinding snowstorm to school, may have been exaggerated, but the basis was solid.  You faced the hard work, you didn’t give up and you respected not just those around you, but yourself as well.  The concept is so simple it should be made into a television show.  Oh wait, it already was many times over and then cancelled.

Good night John Boy and Mrs. Calabash, and May God Bless.