channel surfing
Sorry for the lack of recent posts. The last couple days I have been fighting off a bit of a cold and haven't felt like doing much. I've actually started a few posts and then changed my mind and decided not to publish them after reading them over.
Last night I was a real couch-potato. Came home from work, fixed a hot cup of tea and then plopped myself in front of the TV. Unfortunately I could not find much to watch.
Joan of Arcadia is a new series that I had not seen before. It's centered around a high-school girl who encounters God in various disguises and each time he (or she) provides enigmatic instructions which Joan attempts to apply. The publicity I heard beforehand compared the show to Buffy but it reminded me more of the American Dreams series that has been playing for awhile on a different network. Both deal with a middle-class suburban family learning the daily lessons of life and both center on a teen-age girl. In American Dreams she is a dancer on American Bandstand. The early 60's backdrop (civil rights, the looming specter of Vietnam, and of course the music) may indicate that show is designed to appeal more to boomers instead of a younger crowd. In both there is a handicapped brother and a stay-at-home mom concerned with how to cope with that, and a father who faces problems of his own in the workplace.
One of the things I liked about Joan was that I could step into it without needing a lot of background. I don't tend to be very regular in my viewing habits; I prefer for every show to stand on its own without my having to be familiar with previous episodes. It's also got Joe Mantegna in it, whom I tend to like. I will probably watch it again.
After that I surfed through the channels for awhile and finally wound up watching a second-rate movie from 1972 called The New Centurions starring George C. Scott and Stacy Keach. It tried to show policemen as people, how their personalities affected their work and vice-versa. But it wound up making me feel very old. I kept thinking how different the police methods seemed from the more recent dramas I see - more relaxed, the crimes more trivial and the people less paranoid.
There was one scene where they stop a black man for a traffic violation and discover he has outstanding warrants. After a tense moment or two they arrest him. But when they ask him to get in the squad car he just opens the door himself and gets in. They don't frisk him or handcuff him; they don't push his head down as he gets in the door the way they always show it being done now. It was just a lot friendlier even though this was supposedly in LA during the time of the Watts riots and all.
It started me wondering if real life had changed that much in 30 years or just the way it is shown on TV.
Posted by Bill Hopkins on November 8, 2003 03:13 PMI would say both. I think the whole world was quite a bit more innocent 30 years ago, and more likely to be surprised, delighted, and shocked. I mean, who today would jump up and start pointing and shouting at a new plane flying by overhead (as happened in my 3rd grade class when the first jumbo jet flew over our school)?
People on television and in the movies also talked a lot more than they do today. And I think that was true of people the world over, in general. I think it has a lot ot do with having less technology to occupy our time. We actually had to sit down and engage another person, because there wasn't anything else to do. Sitting for hours and watching TV was not a thing you could do in many places because TV programs were only broadcast a few hours a day, and there weren't that many channels.
I'm not sure about the gentleness with blacks and such, though. There were a lot of beatings going on. But then, people were friendlier and gentler, too. Crimes just didn't happen as much, and murder was a truly shocking thing to have occur. Though there may have a lot of the kind of bullying that you mentioned in your earlier post, perhaps things rarely progressed to beating or the rough-handling that you see so often today. I think from the movies you have this present day image of the South as a cruel, racist place, but from what my father tells me (his mother is black, from South Carolina) even the relationship between whites and blacks tended to be more cordial (but not necessarily respectful) than they are in the movies today.
In general I think the world may be more aware today, but it is also a rougher, meaner place. We have gained a lot (just me being able to post my reply here is an example), but also lost a lot. As your post suggests, there is something very sad about this.
Posted by: Miguel Arboleda at November 8, 2003 09:30 PMYa know Bill, Sometimes you just gotta veg out on the couch and REST, not think, not blog, not dress, not shower, just veg. THen the shower feels sooo much better, and the blogging comes easier. Glad you're feelilng better.
Posted by: Mary Lou at November 9, 2003 02:04 PM