Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Hollywood doesn't get fundamental Christianity
I was reading an article about the show True Blood.
I was struck by this passage:
"It was the Fellowship of the Sun that really held my interest, as it has throughout the season. My central problem with the plotline is this: Steve and his followers’ blanket hatred of vampires doesn’t seem as unmotivated and needless to me as the show wants it to seem. It’s not like when fundamentalist Christians launch blanket attacks against gays, and it’s clear that they’ve not evolved along with the rest of society. While the rest of the True Blood world does seem vaguely more accepting of vampires, most of the vampires we’ve seen are or were bloodthirsty killers who have capacity to utterly destroy most humans they come across and are – literally – demonic forces. The vampires we’ve gotten to know are conflicted about the wrong they’ve done, but the show seems to think this is, somehow, enough, as though murdering people is not a sin that should be punished. I realize this is kind of an old argument, but it gets to the heart of what I didn’t like about the show in the first season: True Blood is a show with a cool universe that caters to people predisposed to like vampires. If you’re not one of those people, though, it’s hard to see what everyone sees in them outside of them being generically cool. (Though it’s entirely possible that Alan Ball, just like everyone else in Hollywood, just doesn’t get fundamentalist Christianity.)"
Hear, hear! (Or as my old school Pentecostal brethren would say: "Preach!".)
Christians are easy to make fun of, and deservedly so. But all media (Hollywood based TV media, NY based print media, and DC based political media) get Christians wrong on so many levels.
The biggest whiff, and this is probably because I understand it best, is on the portrayal of the pseudo-supernatural. Christian exorcisms and "revivals" are portrayed as ironic or comical. They are, on many levels, but I think there is significant emotion to extract from the fact that the actors in the real-life "spiritual" dramas are acting from a sincere(ly misguided) and (tragically) benevolent set of emotions, rather than the typically presented xenophobia and helpless mysticism.
Side note: In the old days, I would get frustrated with the use of the word "spiritual" to describe (spineless) Eastern mysticism or New Age philosophy masquerading as religion. In the new days, I've replaced that dogmatic insistence with arguments with my girlfriend that Twilight are poor representations of real vampires.
What was once, will be again. ¶ 11:37 AM
I was struck by this passage:
"It was the Fellowship of the Sun that really held my interest, as it has throughout the season. My central problem with the plotline is this: Steve and his followers’ blanket hatred of vampires doesn’t seem as unmotivated and needless to me as the show wants it to seem. It’s not like when fundamentalist Christians launch blanket attacks against gays, and it’s clear that they’ve not evolved along with the rest of society. While the rest of the True Blood world does seem vaguely more accepting of vampires, most of the vampires we’ve seen are or were bloodthirsty killers who have capacity to utterly destroy most humans they come across and are – literally – demonic forces. The vampires we’ve gotten to know are conflicted about the wrong they’ve done, but the show seems to think this is, somehow, enough, as though murdering people is not a sin that should be punished. I realize this is kind of an old argument, but it gets to the heart of what I didn’t like about the show in the first season: True Blood is a show with a cool universe that caters to people predisposed to like vampires. If you’re not one of those people, though, it’s hard to see what everyone sees in them outside of them being generically cool. (Though it’s entirely possible that Alan Ball, just like everyone else in Hollywood, just doesn’t get fundamentalist Christianity.)"
Hear, hear! (Or as my old school Pentecostal brethren would say: "Preach!".)
Christians are easy to make fun of, and deservedly so. But all media (Hollywood based TV media, NY based print media, and DC based political media) get Christians wrong on so many levels.
The biggest whiff, and this is probably because I understand it best, is on the portrayal of the pseudo-supernatural. Christian exorcisms and "revivals" are portrayed as ironic or comical. They are, on many levels, but I think there is significant emotion to extract from the fact that the actors in the real-life "spiritual" dramas are acting from a sincere(ly misguided) and (tragically) benevolent set of emotions, rather than the typically presented xenophobia and helpless mysticism.
Side note: In the old days, I would get frustrated with the use of the word "spiritual" to describe (spineless) Eastern mysticism or New Age philosophy masquerading as religion. In the new days, I've replaced that dogmatic insistence with arguments with my girlfriend that Twilight are poor representations of real vampires.
What was once, will be again. ¶ 11:37 AM
