Keep the media ball in your court

Viewpoint by Sandy Hill/reporter

Censorship is considered a !@#$%& word, but self-censorship shouldn’t be.

Hollywood seems to lack self-censorship more and more these days. While foul language, violence and sexuality have always been a part of entertainment, they have never been as graphic as they are today.

Movies and television can be educational as well as entertaining and a great escape from daily stress, but we should never indulge in media habits that violate our own conscience.

While I have been known to walk out of a movie theater before, I love it when I find a movie I can take my whole family to that reflects wholesome values. They do exist. We just have to look a little harder to find them.

My family recently saw the movie Courageous. As we were leaving, my 19-year-old son said, “That was 10 times better than I thought it was going to be.”

As directors keep raising the bar in our already R-rated world, viewers become more comfortable with what they see. I can’t help but wonder what the viewing audience of the early 1900s would think of our movies today or even what our movies will look like a hundred years from now.

With kids spending more and more time involved with media, parents need help navigating the media highways and byways.

The Motion Picture Association of America’s movie ratings can be hard to trust as Hollywood continues to push the envelope on what is allowed, putting profits ahead of common decency. This leaves moms and dads struggling to find movies that reflect the values they want to instill in their kids.

Websites like PluggedIn.com, CommonSenseMedia.org and ScreenIt.com are great tools for checking movie content beforehand.

Self-censorship allows moviegoers to show their approval or disapproval every time they purchase a ticket sending a message to the powers that be in Hollywood. Since movies carry so much weight with the general public, imagine all the good they could do if used more positively.