By Frank Bublitz
For years I lived a double life. I was helping people recover from mental illness as part of my career. I was also performing in films, stage plays, and musicals.
I once played an actor who, in order to terrify little vandals from messing with him, pretended to be a serial killer. Also I played a Governor of Michigan who was a Satanist and a Pedophile. My own cousin refused to follow me on Facebook because I freaked her out.
Now I have learned that films, plays, and music contribute to the violence that we see play out on the streets of cities big and small. And I am advocating for it to stop.
When I began to desire to be an actor I did so in part because of “cop shows” and “war films” I saw as a kid. Back then these films and shows had a certain formula. Bad guys did bad things, good guys did good things, ,the good guys began to lose, but then came back to win in the end.
When my Dad noticed that a film I was greatly enjoying ended with the bad guys killing the good and escaping he made a prediction.
“When this starts happening in movies too,” he said with strong emotion, “ the world is going to go to hell!”
Dad was right. Violence for violence’s sake has taken over crime dramas, mysteries, and even comedies. Unhappy endings frequently happen. And young people especially hang onto these shows, and violent music of all kinds, and act upon them.
Last night on The Rookie a liberal lawyer advised a client how to deal with a murder charge. The lawyer was a DA for God’s sake. Yet he cleverly hid advice on how the man could escape the murder charge while “discussing a plea”.
The plea was second degree murder. The DA covertly suggested the criminal and his attorney reduce the plea from murder to manslaughter. The reason? “The guy had a heart condition and could have died at any time.”
Maybe the man could have walked out the door after the robbery if he didn’t have heart disease. My point is that the store owner could have lived for a decade if the criminal had not startled him by the robbery.
This story hits home with me because only 50% of my heart pumps blood through my body due to a calcium disorder. In real life that could have been me. The fact that this
criminal in the story used force to frighten the owner, triggering his heart attack, was treated as a JOKE was infuriating! So my days of watching Jenna, Alyssa, and Mellisa rock out their hot police uniforms are over/
Now we often see on film and hear in music the bad guys and the less bad guys. Evidence shows that conflict, anger, and aggression has a very negative effect on our society. Even more so when the negative outweighs the positive in the story.
So we need to change this with our pocketbooks. Or it will get worse. I suggest that you look hard at what comes to the theater or streaming to see how it portrays what values we should support.
Because some of these movies and shows might seem fun. But fun is not always healthy.
