TV: America's Babysitter

I'm still putting together my next series of posts on what the Bible teaches about work and rest, but I just had to post this startling news bit featured in the November 2nd edition of the Plugged-In Online newsletter:

"Children's television viewing is at an eight-year-high, according to the Nielsen Company's latest statistical parsing of Americans' TV habits. Kids ages 2 to 5 spend 32 hours a week parked in front of the tube, while 6- to 11-year-olds watch slightly less (28 hours). [mediapost.com, 10/26/09 stats]"

There are 168 hours in a week. According to this stat, on AVERAGE (meaning some kids view more, and some people view less), kids ages 2 to 5 are spending 19% of their time watching TV. That's nearly 1/5th of their time, and that includes the time they spend sleeping. 6 to 11 year olds are spending only slightly less at about 17% of their time, or roughly 1/6th. Just think about that for a bit. The leading reason why the 6 to 11 year olds spend less time watching TV? They go to school. That's it.

Go ahead and ponder that for a bit. Now, how much time do YOU spend watching TV? How about your kids? I challenge you to keep track of how much TV you watch this next week, then take a look at how much time was spent watching TV (no, I don't think watching TV is by default just "wasting time", but when done to excess, that's EXACTLY what it becomes). I'll do the same and report back next Tuesday.

TST: Watch It Online

The Bible tells us to redeem the time (Ephesians 5:15-17), so I'm going to be posting tips every Tuesday on things you can do to save time. Unlike most resources, we all get the same amount of time, but we have to decide how we're going to spend it. If you have anything that you do to save time that you'd like to share, just let me know and I'll add them to the list.

Another great way to save time on your TV watching is watching shows online. There are several websites that allow you to watch TV (every network offers this service for most of their shows), but the biggest by far is Hulu (http://www.hulu.com/).

Hulu is a website owned and run by the networks NBC and Fox, and just recently added Disney (they own ESPN and ABC also), so they have 3 of the 4 major TV networks on Hulu (CBS is the lone hold-out at this point).

Hulu will list a program the day after it airs in most cases (the show House, for example, is posted 8 days after it airs). Hulu then only shows one commercial per commercial break instead of the regular slew. That saves you time, but watching online also can save you money. If you only have a show or two that you really want to watch from cable TV, check to see if Hulu offers it. We cancelled our cable subscription when we discovered we could watch our shows on Hulu for free (we purchased a program called PlayOn that lets you stream Hulu shows to an Xbox 360).

Hulu also offers a selection of movies and documentaries. Most of the movies are mainstream (and most of those are older movies), but they do have some indies and foreign films. A few weeks back I watched Ghostbusters again for free thanks to Hulu.

So, check out Hulu and see how it can save you both time AND money.

The PEG System

While teaching the High School class at church, we were introduced to a new way of "grading" music called the PEG System. The beauty of the PEG system is that it can be applied to more than just music. You can use it to grade TV shows, movies, and pretty much anything else you spend your time doing.

So, how does it work? Well, you have 10 points, and you get to split these 10 points among the three categories, which are P(rofitable), E(mpty), and G(arbage). So, a hymn like "Amazing Grace" would be something like 10-0-0. A song like "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" would be 2-6-2 (it's useful for teaching kids music, but really, the song doesn't MEAN anything). A song like "More Human Than Human" by Rob Zombie would be something along the lines of 0-4-6 (bad language, but the song really doesn't MEAN much at all if you listen to the actual words).


Now, here's where it gets tricky. The way you use the scale will depend on your values. For example, if you are a high schooler, you probably aren't going to say there's any profitable parts to "Row, Row, Row Your Boat", but as a father with two kids in Piano, I see some profitability there.


If you let your Christian values slip, then you'll miss the point of the PEG System. If you start to think things like drugs, alcohol, and bad language as somewhat profitable, then you'll slew the rankings and water them down.


It's not much, but it's a pretty simple way to grade Pop Culture elements as you encouter them. Are they Profitable, Empty, or Garbage?

Tools: ClearPlay

Today I'd like to introduce you to a DVD player that takes the bad out of most movies.

ClearPlay (http://www.clearplay.com/) is a DVD player/service that removes the "bad stuff" from your DVD's by seemlessly editting it out.

How it works is pretty simple. You download the filters for whatever movies you plan on watching (or have in your DVD library) onto a jump drive. You then plug the jump drive into the ClearPlay DVD player and it will pull the info when you watch your movies.

You get to set the level of filtering done based on a variety of categories, such as gore, violence, sex, and language. For scenes containing things you don't want to see, the ClearPlay DVD player seemlessly removes the scene so that you don't even notice it was missing. For language, the player mutes the DVD whever bad language is used. The people at ClearPlay do their best to maintain the plot of the movie (if they didn't, then there'd be little point in WATCHING the movie) while cleaning it up.

If you're wondering if they cover movies you might already own, you can go to their website (http://www.clearplay.com/) and search their list of over 2,000 movies that they cover.

The only problem with this system is how it might affect your testimony if you run into someone you know while at Blockbuster with your arms full of R-rated movies. That could have a negative impact if they don't know that you are running the ClearPlay system. Just something to consider.

Resources: Plugged-In Online

Today is the first entry in what will be an ongoing series of various resources you can use in order to live a more pure life in today's world. Until I can come up with a catchier title, I'm just going to call this series "Resources". We're going to begin with Plugged-In Online.




Plugged-In Online (http://www.pluggedinonline.com/) is a website put together by Focus on the Family. What they do is review movies, TV shows, music, and video games from a Christian perspective. Instead of giving a rating the movie based on the usual standards, they review them based on content and what are the appropriate and inappropriate elements you'll be subjected to if you watch/listen/play.

The website first categorizes what they are reviewing (Movies, Video/DVD, Music, Television, and Games). The movies section covers films that are currently in theaters, while Video/DVD covers things that are currently out on video or DVD (snazzy, eh?). The other three are pretty self-explanitory. I use it mostly for the Movies section, so that's what I'm going to concentrate on here.

When you click on an article to read, they start off with a brief synopsis of the plot. This is to give you a general idea of any blanks you might need filled in before partaking. Don't worry, they do NOT spoil the plot. They give a Spoiler Warning before they list anything that will spoil the movies/shows plot lines.

After that, they list out the Positive Elements. They are pretty thorough, and sometimes some of the positive elements they list are kind of a stretch. Take, for example, this Positive Element from the movie G-Force:

When in the midst of a smash/crash chase scene that concludes with a massive fireworks explosion, one of the careening guinea pigs looks at some observing children (and us) and says, "Don't try this at home, kids."

While that is indeed a positive element, it's kind of stretch, but it does go to show you how thorough they really are in their reviews. This section also gives you a good idea of what to reinforce with your child if you take them along with you.

After that, they start to review the bad stuff. They break the bad stuff into several different categories (Sexual Content, Violent Content, Crude or Profane Language, Drug and Alcohol Content, and Other Negative Elements). They continue their thoroughness in each of these different categories as they break down specifically what occurs in the movie. For example, they will tell you how many times various words are used in the film, even down to "jeez", "suck", and "what in the heck?" (again using the G-Force review as an example). In place of the filthier language, they give us the good ol' grade school trick of "s---" and "f---" (remember using the phrase "the f word" back in the day?) instead of the actual words. Again, they will give you a Spoiler Warning before they spoil anything you may not want to know before seeing the movie.

Finally, they give you a conclusion on the movie. This is the writer's general summary of taking the positive elements and the negative elements and telling you their overall opinion on the movie. By the time you've reached this point, you already should have a pretty good idea about the movie, but they use this space to explain if the negative moments are isolated and barely noticeable, or if they permeate the entire movie.

Clarinda and I personally use Plugged-In Online for help in making our movie-watching decisions. We've all been there where a movie trailer has us excited to see a movie, then we go watch it and wonder why they had to add all the filth to it. Plugged-In Online will give you a warning beforehand on what filth you'll have to subject yourself to in order to see the movie. The key is to use this tool, and then use your own discernment on whether you want to subject you or your children to the good AND the bad in a movie.