Yesterday I went to Wal-Mart. Now this isn't an occasional thing for me, I probably go to Wal-Mart at least twice a week, but yesterday I was just killing time wandering around Wal-Mart. I was actually supposed to be going to Home Depot but Paul had asked me very sweetly for a Batman toy so I decided to run into Wal-Mart first and find one. As usually happens to me when I get to Wal-Mart I ended up looking through the video section and I noticed something very interesting. While I was walking down the aisle with all the little children's videos, the Classic Disney, multiple episodes of Barney, Dora the Explorer and all the lesser offerings (you know the straight to video cartoons and rip-offs of Disney with really BAD animation), well...I glanced over to the other side of the aisle. It was filled, and I do mean FILLED, with the most grotesque and lurid videos and video covers that you can imagine. Envision the goriest scene from Friday the 13th and then picture it on the front cover of about 100 DVD cases. Right there, at EYE level, across from the DVDs created for our youngest children.
Anyway, after this dawned on me I stopped and really looked around. The video department was full of people of all ages looking at these DVDs, they're BIG sellers (and yes, I do realize it's less than a week until Halloween). At the end of the aisle was an endcap with some "classic" horror movies and a woman with her child who appeared to be in the 6-8 age range trying to decide on a DVD. She was holding two cases and he was letting her know he preferred Freddy VS Jason.
I thought seriously about talking to the manager, pointing out how inappropriate their displays are but I have to admit I heard myself thinking "what's the point?" I didn't do or say anything and I'm really very ashamed of that fact.
Actually, that's not quite true. I did do one thing...I had picked up a movie for Paul. He loves the movie Zathura and our copy is quite scratched. Wal-Mart had it for $7.50 so I was carrying it around with me and as I looked down at the movie in my hand I remembered some things Rick had said. He was talking about the children in the movie, they are unpleasant and foul-mouthed in a PG kind of way. He was pointing out that nothing they say is positive or edifying and they are full of anger, albeit in an innocuous kind of way. He concluded with "they're just such unpleasant people, I really don't want to watch them". I walked over and put it back. Do I really need to have my little boy watching things like that? I believe very strongly in the concept of the slippery slope and I've applied it to a lot of things in my life but movies and TV shows are one area where I don't always think about it. Do the rude children of Zathura eventually become the crazed killers of Scream? Does the flippant treatment of sex and sexuality in Friends and Desperate Housewives deteriorate into Sex and the City and eventually hard core pornography?
I see a connection, I see a slippery slope and it's one I intend to start dealing with in my own home...then I'll take on the rest of the country, beginning with Wal-Mart!
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