Woke Warning
We are still in the world, and we still need to deal with it in some fashion. I’ll take what tools I can, myself, but equipping children with the tools to navigate this culture is essential – they will inherit whatever we leave them, after all.
The MPAA has ratings and warnings, which used to mean something. G meant that the content was designed with a General Audience in mind, no matter the age. PG suggested Parental Guidance for children ages 13 and younger, although those older than 13yo shouldn’t have a problem. PG-13 is suggesting Parental Guidance for children ages 13-17, while generally calling the content inappropriate for children under 13 years of age. R is restricting all children from viewing this material, no matter their age, unless a parent accompanies them. X was modified into NC-17, stating that No Children 17 years of age and under are allowed, no matter what.
The ratings are derived from a consensus group of parents who have children in mind. We used to recognize one of the responsibilities of parents was to protect their children from some harms, while training them in how to deal with others. Some children are further along on the developmental spectrum than others, and the parents were to make that determination, not Netflix. As such, the parents needed to be informed well-enough to make that call.
The world has changed -- there isn’t a Woke Warning, and that time is long overdue.
For example, I started to read a book last week that really engaged me, in the first hundred pages or so. But once there was a gay innuendo, I was on alert. Then the main character identified as bisexual, and I put the book down; I stopped caring. Then I recognized that I was also upset. I was upset because it is harmful to identify a cancer as healthy, and that which is healthy as a cancer. It causes harm to a person’s soul; it hardens the heart against creation and the Creator.
Another book I stepped into recently was solid, up until a certain point, but then the author had to introduce a gay child who ran away from her home because her parents didn’t approve of her lifestyle. What the hell?! Children shouldn’t have a sexual lifestyle, in the first place. But the assumption that they do, was then eclipsed by the parents repenting of their ignorance. After that, the child returned home and everybody was happy. Again, what the hell?!
When I was a kid, my non-Christian friends and I identified the OSS in movies. OSS’s were the Obligatory Sex Scenes that didn’t move the story forward, but provided some awkward titillation, in the middle of movies designed for teens. We mocked them, because they were everywhere from Lost Boys to Karate Kid. Now there is the OGC, or the Obligatory Gay Character, and I’m maddened. More maddening is the OGS, the Obligatory Gay Storyline.
What could have been good writing, or at least good entertainment, is now hijacked by an ideology that shouldn’t be anywhere near children, let alone targeting them. And even though it identifies as a story, it is instead an ideology of poorly applied lipstick in the ill-fitted dress of pretending to be a story.
Even if the story is not designed for kids (I can’t say ‘Adult’), let’s just say it’s a book that we know deals with grit and grist, as grown-up fare – it should at least come with a warning beyond M or R.
I don’t mind violence because it develops the character, but I have an issue with gratuitous sex because it doesn’t. I don’t mind cussing when it is used as an explanation point (see above), but I do when it is used in place of every other adjective – that lazy writing is bad enough, but it's counterproductive in that it pulls me out of the story. I always have an issue with the name of God being used as a cuss word; I cringe. Warnings are needed on these things.
The MPAA added, at some point along the way, details as to why the rating was derived. They clarified as “extreme violence”, or “teens depicted using drugs”, or “scene involving smoking”. I appreciate all of those clarifying descriptors, and even though nicotine is not a remote concern of mine, I recognize that it may be for others.
When warnings are clear, people can make educated choices. I can’t help but think that is the point of media today in NOT having a Woke Warning. They want to normalize deviant sex as though it is more than a lifestyle choice; they want to celebrate it as a person’s “authentic self”.*
IMDB has a parental guidance section, and I appreciate that. Yet I don’t see any Woke Warnings there. I am confident that they are removed, if the descriptions are ever put up, much the way Twitter did for Hunter’s laptop.
Who will come out with a Woke Warning, to review books, movies and television? Focus on the Family has the infrastructure, but not this particular focus. I would like it to be a solid Christian group of people, but merely identifying scenes or characters doesn’t really necessitate that. It does feel as though there needs to be a Christian Wiki, designed specifically for non-Christian media. (I think I’ll reach out to Andrew Torba.)
Maybe, if nothing else, The Left will come up with a warning of their own, the way Sesame Street has a warning before their Old School episodes: “These … are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today's preschool child." Or like Disney now offers a warning to their classics, “It may contain outdated cultural depictions.”
Until the Christian Wiki arrives, I’ll take the Left’s own disclaimer as what I can call Safe.
ASIDE #1: Of course deviance from the created order is our authentic self. That is the definition of indwelling or, original sin. And we are to be transformed into the image of Christ.
ASIDE #2: By inundating culture with an ideology, those who would normally call something out as deviant, now defend it as normal. People can only keep their heads above water for so long before drowning. What’s that line: “If you repeat something often enough, it becomes truth.”? No, it doesn’t become truth – but it does become believed. The Overton window changes, and The Left are happy.
ASIDE #3a: The Woke expect a push-back. They wonder, just as much as a reasonable person does, where the line will be drawn. I think even they are surprised at how far they have gotten, to be honest. Regardless, they will keep picking up speed until the train we’re all passengers on slams into oblivion. But whenever and however that immovable object shows up, only then will they let off on the accelerator. In that moment the conservatives will claim victory, while The Left will know that they have arrived to where they have been going all along.
ASIDE #3b: It’s possible that the brick wall arrives internally, from an implosion of The Left’s own insanity, or it may arrive externally, as a pushback coming from the clear-headed. It may show up when that “+” is officially identified, or it could also arrive in an economic fashion – after enough people step away from the mainstream culture and embrace a parallel economy.
PREDICTION: How Reagan identified America as being the last bastion of freedom in the world should be acknowledged as now being lost. We are in the end-game. It will happen in my lifetime.