What Goes In

Tom Walsh

One of the topics in life that I focus on rather consistently is that of what we let into our minds on a regular basis. While we often don’t have much of a choice as to what we see and hear in the world, we more often do have a choice; unfortunately, few people are taught while growing up to discriminate in their choices as to what they let into their minds.

There’s a fallacy out there that says that we can choose whether or not we’re influenced by what we see and do. There are people out there who watch hours of television and movies each day who claim that their thinking is in no way affected by their hours of viewing other people’s ideas of what life is like and about. But this is untrue–it’s been proven time and time again that consistently watching television or film, or playing violent video games, leads to major differences in perception about what the world is about, what other people are like, and what types of actions are appropriate in social settings.

I know that this is true for me, mostly because of my own peace of mind. When I was watching movies as most people do–indiscriminately–my mental state wasn’t nearly as peaceful as it is now. I used to go to any movie that looked halfway exciting, and I saw an awful lot of people being killed or abused or tortured or whatever else happens in movies. I saw Dawn of the Dead three times, and I thought it was hilarious. But as I grew older, I started to notice that what I was putting into my mind stayed there–my perception of the world became flawed, and I saw the world as a violent place where everyone did what they could for themselves, and where sex was supposed to be quick and easy and where friendship consisted of trading one-liners and getting laughs by looking for other people’s flaws and exploiting them. I was a flawed person, and the major flaws came about because of my warped perspective.

No, I didn’t get violent and go out and hurt people. I didn’t even want to hurt people. But I do remember seeing The Silence of the Lambs and being severely affected by the film. The pain that the victims in the film had to have felt was with me for days, as was the shock that someone like Hannibal Lecter could have been made into a hero by the film makers (they’ll argue that point, but the people in the theaters saw him in a positive light–he was in control). At that point in my life, I had been considering changing my film-watching habits; that film made me change for good.

Of course, most people are familiar with Erma Bombeck’s letter to the television networks: “During a single evening I saw twelve people shot, two tortured, one dumped into a swimming pool, two cars explode, a rape, and a man who crawled two blocks with a knife in his stomach. Do you know something? I didn’t feel anger or shock or horror or excitement or repugnance. The truth is that I didn’t feel. Through repeated assaults of one violent act after another, you have taken from me something I valued–something that contributed to my compassion and caring–the instinct to feel.”

My point here is not that the people who make the movies and television programs are bad. I know that they are, for the most part, uninformed, ignorant, lacking in creativity, uncompassionate, and self-serving. Many people in business and education and social services have the same qualities–they just don’t get the same exposure that people in the entertainment industries get.

My point is that I have to decide what goes into me. I have to make conscious decisions about what I’m willing to watch and what I’m not willing to watch. Because ultimately, the responsibility for the effects that television or movies have on me is up to me. I’ve made my decisions–no more weekly programs that rely on violence for the resolution of conflicts, especially the police shows–if real-life police officers drew their guns half as much as these television cops do, they’d be kicked off the force as a public hazard.

And almost just as bad, the comic-book-like bad guys that they face make it seem like there are many more horribly violent people out there in the world than there really are. How many ultra-violent criminal “masterminds” has the public been exposed to this season alone?

I also avoid the shows that cheapen sex, or that make sex seem like a necessary part of any intimacy or deep friendship. I don’t need to have the show-maker’s perspective on sex and sexuality drilled into my head–I need to make up my own mind about my own sexual attitudes.

Believe it or not, there are still an awful lot of movies and television programs that I can watch. Boston Public, while suffering from somewhat flawed story lines, still presents a compelling examination of good people trying to deal with difficult situations, all on a very human level. Fox’s Sunday-night comedy line-up is hilarious, even if it’s not for all tastes, and especially strong on satire, a form of comedy pretty much lost on the other three networks. And there are other television shows and many movies that make me think rather than react, that make me feel compassion rather than anger, that inspire me rather than depress me, that make me admire a character’s courage and compassion rather than hate a character’s violence and lack of feeling.

You have choices to make every day. One of those choices is to determine what goes into your mind to help to form the person who you are. If you let in courage, compassion, love, hope, empathy, peace, devotion, consideration and other such qualities, just guess what’s going to be coming out of you? On the other hand, if you constantly fill your mind with hate, anger, violence, murder, rape, revenge, torture, abuse, prejudice and other such qualities, guess what’s going to be coming out of you? You probably won’t start acting like the characters you see, but your perspective definitely will be affected by what you’ve let into you.