Family Time? Entertainment Media and Modern Technology

This may seem kind of strange, but I don't usually realize how different we are from others. These differences however really stick out whenever I go visit family and friends. The first thing that always strikes me is the television. Yes, I grew up watching it, however we have not had one in use in our home for several years. It seems that many do not know how to just simply turn off the television and visit. It is near impossible for me to hold a thought or have a decent conversation when a television is on. There it is ... blaring out all sorts of advertisements and programs promoting fornication, adultery, drunkenness, rebellion, perversion, pride, hypocrisy, witchcraft, worldliness, pornography, consumerism, and so on. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. It's all there in huge quantities and the occupants in these homes get a steady dose each day. The Lord is very grieved.

And now there are other things like hi-tech video games, cell phones with full internet access and texting, ipods, etc.

It seems there are so many living their lives in the same home but are completely detached from each other. Children are 'zoned-out' playing a video game, in their own world on the ipod or other mp3 player, off by themselves watching a movie or show, or surfing the internet and participating in social networking on facebook while parents are busy watching a show or movie of their own or maybe are on the internet themselves. All the while, each member of the home could be carrying on text conversations with friends.

We see it when we go preaching on the college campuses too. When students switch classes, there are more of them walking alone with either their headphones on or carrying on a text conversation instead of having a real conversation with the hundreds of potential friends all around them.

Parallel lives. Can't you see the great danger in this? We as a society are being sucked in by the machine!! We think we have so many choices and such freedoms now with all of this great technology, but the fact is, our choices are smaller now then ever. We are held in bondage to the machine. Our limits and walls are set by whatever machine we are attached to. Reality is fading away into virtual reality.

I recently read a study with the headline: DAILY MEDIA USE AMONG CHILDREN AND TEENS UP DRAMATICALLY FROM FIVE YEARS AGO - it included these alarming figures:

- Today, 8-18 year-olds devote an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes (7:38) to using entertainment media across a typical day (more than 53 hours a week). And because they spend so much of that time ‘media multitasking’ (using more than one medium at a time), they actually manage to pack a total of 10 hours and 45 minutes (10:45) worth of media content into those 7½ hours.
- Heavy users are the 21% of young people who consume more than 16 hours of media a day, and light users are the 17% of young people who consume less than 3 hours of media a day.
- 7th-12th graders report spending an average of 1:35 a day sending or receiving texts. (Time spent texting is not counted as media use in this study.)

WOW! First off, I cannot believe youth are spending an AVERAGE of 7 1/2 hours using this stuff each day!! and that does not even include texting, which I think it should. Secondly, the "HEAVY USERS" use MORE THAN 16 hours of entertainment media a day. What??? So that would mean that anything under 16 hours would be considered what ... average? medium? "LIGHT" use is less than 3 hours ... and I would have considered that HEAVY use!! I am so sad by all of this. It is a true picture of the state of our society and we see it all around us each day.

Putting entertainment aside for a minute, many are duped into thinking that computers and internet have made their lives so much easier. I appreciate an article I read by Franklin Saige called "The Drive To Consume". In one part he talks of how people defend their use of technology because it can be used "for good too. It just depends on what we do with it." To that he says, "Since people appear to be more enslaved in their work and home lives than ever before, we could instead ask ourselves whether the problems computers and electronic media seem to alleviate can be traced to the advent of computers themselves. Haven't computers and television speeded up economic life and increased social chaos? The fact is, these technologies wouldn't exist if not for their utility as pillars of the consuming society." At the end of the article he closes with this: "And I am going to tell anyone who will listen that the Here of real life, in real community, in real reality, is better than the virtual Here of the information superhighway any day of the week. That real and virtual are in fact speeding along in entirely opposite directions." (emphasis mine)

I see it happening. Young people no longer know how to communicate properly. They have blank faces. They always look 'zoned out' like no one is home in their brains. I think their brains got stuck in virtual reality and that has become their reality. Real reality is now fake and unimportant to them. Whenever they are actually pulled away from their entertainment virtual realities for a time, they think of almost noting except when they can return to their reality. If they are away from it for too long, they begin to get cranky and have attitudes. They experience violent withdrawals and need to get back to the machine as soon as possible. Adults too are effected the same way. It is idolatry. It is wickedness. It is ruining our children and adults as well. Satan is very happy.

I encourage you to evaluate your use of modern technology. Seriously sit down and think about how it is tearing families and homes apart. What are you allowing into your children's lives? You will be held accountable you know. How much time do you spend using these devices? What could you be doing instead of using them? Is it taking time away from your husband? Your wife? Your children? Others? THE LORD?

Isaiah 55:6 Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: 7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.