Fear No Art?

 
I was reminded of this saying the other day when I saw a car bumper had this festooned to it. Not sure where the heck festooned came from in the recesses of my mind but let's go with it. 

Like most sayings, its universality raises questions. Anything positing as a Commandment must be true in every instance. Under the weight of this standard, the bumper sticker rips in half. Suppose for a moment that you are working with a menacing teenager who has threatened to kill his peers. Do you think it wise to let him continue listening to Death Metal or Gangsta Rap where the performer threatens to blow opponents' "F*cking head's off?" 

Poor Liberals...reality always intrudes on their idealism. Don't give me the line that it is the parents' job to police the child's listening choices...the parenting of such kids is often the problem, or lack of parenting. 

Allowing such children access to highly negatively charged musical messages is like putting bullets into a gun's chamber. I am not for censorship, but I would like to shame the music execs who promulgate this sociopathic crap up for a public shaming. Blood money, cashing in without conscience. Until it is one of their kids on the receiving end of the pathology. Name names, print pictures, make them defend artistic freedom that advocates a relentless cycle of violence, raping, and mayhem. It is possible to address difficult themes in art without glorifying them...a sense of moral reflection and redemption however is a necessary element. Without some bringing the cycle around for an ethical lesson, art can be corrosive to the soul and create or deepen horrific perspectives. We should fear some art for it is powerfully negative. 

The Libs are now all on the bandwagon to monitor students' lunches after years of them eating public school and Department of Ag subsidized food that is substandard nutritionally. Will we develop the same posture to seriously to address how art leads children astray OR will we continue to act bewildered in the continuous cycling downward of ethical and moral strictures among the young?  They only know what they have been taught and shown. And if we sit idly by and let them consume without us caring and confronting, who really is to blame?   

Luke 17:2

It would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around his neck than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin.    

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