WHEN VULGARIANS SEIZE A CULTURE

When Vulgarians Seize a Culture

When unwashed, obscenity-spewing comedian George Carlin was arrested at Summerfest in Milwaukee back in 1972, it was because of the moral outrage of a police officer named Elmer Lenz. His wife and his little boy were in the audience, and he had the temerity to resent the filthy language hitting them in the face. Being a decent man, he got up to do something about it and reported it to a senior officer who arrested the comedian. Now, all these years later, he's gotten over it. The whole episode doesn't matter anymore. How very sad that it doesn't.

A columnist from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Jim Stingl, wrote about Lenz's more mellow views, 35 years after he called for Carlin's arrest for public obscenity.

"Lenz long ago cooled off. Just a couple weeks ago, he noticed a George Carlin special was on HBO, so he watched it. "I sat there and laughed a few times," he admitted.  "He was funny."

Sometimes a nation's epitaph can be written in just two sentences. Nearly everyone is used to those seven dirty words now, aren't they? Just as people exposed to bad smells don't notice them after a time, these words just don't shock anymore. That's why a recent movie, big with the teen crowd,  chalked up so many uses of the F-word that a reviewer lost count after 200.

Over the years, George Carlin's episode at Summerfest has taken on the burnished quality of a folk tale, where a fearless warrior stands in the face of fear and hang-ups and advances an important cause. He even says he wouldn't have changed anything about his toilet-talk routine even if he had known children were present in the audience. Here's his famous quote. Perhaps it will even make it into Carlin's obituary some day.

"I think children need to hear those words the most because as yet they don't have the hang-ups.  It's the adults who are locked into certain thought patterns."

Indeed adults are locked into thought and speech patterns, Mr. Carlin, and thanks to men like you who have fought for the cause of obscene and filthy language, those patterns are now firmly rooted in the gutter.

In countless documentaries, the cultural revolution of the 1960's is presented as a time of great liberation, wonderful advances and above all, social progress. The promiscuity, the drug use, the rampant disrespect for authority, all of it is made to look like such a wonderful thing. The children who have had to live in the world created by that generation, including this writer, think otherwise. We now have network television that is so saturated by cheap sexuality and foul language that no family with any moral compass whatsoever can leave it on in prime time. (CBS has just been fined for a teen orgy scene in the series, "Without a Trace".) Popular music now billboards the rapper heirs of Carlin's libertine philosophy as they fill the air with words like "ho" and "bitch", terms that hardly raise an eyebrow among the young. But it's only people with hang-ups who object to these things, remember? They're just words, right?

It's never just a word. Words have meaning because they convey ideas, and ideas have consequences. The moral squalor rampant in American popular culture today continually worsens because people in this country have slowly, over time, lost their capacity for moral outrage. All too often, that outrage and indignation is turned on those who actually have the guts to object to the filth. Narrow minded bigots. Blue-nosed fundamentalists. We have a right to watch this stuff. You don't like it? Don't watch it! Who cares about what your children have to hear and look at? Who cares about innocence anymore? What an outdated concept. This is America! Sadly, it really is America, and what the neighbor kids watch does have a direct impact on our own children.

Worse still, many emerging pastors today are embracing the idea that foul language is a great way to engage the culture. A recent church baptism training video (intended to look like an MTV farce) features a pastor in a pool, preparing for a baptism, when someone does a cannon ball right behind him. The church thought it would be funny to bleep out what the pastor says, as though he is cussing. When the church starts becoming like the culture to supposedly win people, nowadays that includes the use of foul language. On the Christian news blog that I publish, I cannot even link to some church sites due to their use of vulgar language and their promotion of Hollywood filth. I frequently have to delete comments from Christian readers who use words like "su***", and cr**. Christians are joining the great stampede toward Gomorrah, and they justify it every step of the way. Those who oppose this kind of speech by believers are told to get over it.

I refuse to get over it. We are commanded in Scripture to be holy in our conversation, as that which becomes a child of God. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. If our conversation is peppered with vulgar and coarse speech, we have a serious heart problem that needs to be addressed. When we are made new in Christ, old things are passed away and all things are new. That includes our language. America's cultural darkness is worsening. Let the light of Christ shine ever brighter in the blackness as we imitate our Savior in all areas of conduct.

Only let your conversation be as it becomes the gospel of Christ...

--Philippians 1:27

By Ingrid Schlueter Email: vcyproducer@aol.com Click here for bio and archived articles

Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/31/07 02:31:04 AM Age 47, NV Being a new "Believer", I see my generation and the children we/ they raised are victims/culprits of this onslaught of vulgarity/ stupidity. I endevor to stop it any where I can. Unfortunetly, our culture has now regressed to the point that anyone who speaks out against this cultural trash is instantly labled "intolerant'. I don't care, I'm concerned what GOD thinks, and really why should we care at all what people think in the first place when it's about the "TRUTH"! Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/12/07 10:53:23 AM Age 54, IA Ingrid, i do so enjoy your articles and this one is no different. stuff like the video is an affront to true Christians, though we are few in number as Christ prophesied we would be in Matthew 7:13-14. there is little reverence for our Lord nowadays, and the Emerging Church is leading the way away from solid biblical teaching. the Enemy has this new movement on one end, and on the other end, the old, entrenched in cement traditions, that people refuse to give up, even when they know they are wrong. i applaud your boldness and support your ministry. i pastor a small rural baptist church in Swea City, IA and sometimes i feel like a fish in a sea of sharks. we have many pretenders but not many of the true faith of Christ. May He continue to be your guide and strength--we will need it as times get tougher and as many churches become mirror-images of the world. God Bless You, your fellow soldier in Christ, Van Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/12/07 09:15:48 AM Age 56, CANADA I really appreciated being reminded (again) of how the words we speak is an inward look at our heart. In life, I have been tested and have on occassion failed the test! Sometimes my mouth is quicker than my mind it seems. Oh Lord, forgive me! As a born again believer, we need to be ever consious of what we say and what we do because there are those who 'watch' us. What kind of an example are we to our co-workers, neighbours and oh yes most importantly, our family. I am sure we have all had those 'not so precious moments' when almost without thinking we blurt out something that we wish we could have taken back. As Christians we need to keep pressing on and when we 'mess up' we need to 'fess up' not only to those who may have heard us but also to our loving, heavenly Father who will noot only forgive us our trespasses but will cleanse us as well. As a Christian, I am still a 'work in progress'. Thank you for the gentle reminder. You have raised my sensitivity antenna. Lord with your help, may I never become 'de-sensitized'. Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/11/07 10:12:07 PM Age 37, MN Wasn't "brood of vipers" considered kind of vulgar back in the day? I don't disagree with your main thrust but I think it can be taken too far. Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/11/07 04:04:46 PM Age 47, CO Well said Ingrid. A profound lack of understanding of the gospel combined with unchecked lusts of the flesh (one of our 3 enemies... world, flesh, devil) make for compromised living. Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/11/07 12:39:55 PM Age 20, CA Great article! I find it interesting that this new wave of emergent/emerging leaders, who stress the importance of orthopraxy over orthodoxy, cannot seem to practice correctly in this area. Titus 2:8 teaches that we should use uncondemnable sound speech so that our adversaries have no charges to bring towards us. Dave http://seeingclearly.wordpress.com Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/11/07 06:10:41 AM Age 48, OH I could not agree with you more. There are very few shows anymore that are fit for families to watch. And seculer radio is pretty bad also. With bad language and the types of commercials. Thats why I listen to KLOVE ( a non commercial christian station).As a 48 year old women I can hardly even go to a PG13 movie the language and content is appaling.Christians need to stand up and stop supporting movies and TV shows and music that is counter to the teachings of the bible. Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/10/07 10:57:42 PM Age 63, TX Some might be outraged because their child is exposed to vulgarity, but before outrage becomes the reaction of the believer there must be a broken heart. Feeling the pain that is an offense before God is primary as well as is the pain that is endemic in the sinner. We also grew up in a religious culture that damned the fire and brimstone preachers without ever understanding they could see that sinners slept in a house-on-fire. Righteous indignation must flow from the vision of Divine Righteousness and that includes identifying with the pain of sin and the nearness of Judgment. Then our outrages and our warnings are prophetic and redemptive messages! old glen Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/10/07 10:12:23 PM Age 13, WV Dear Ingrid, I find your vicious assault on popular culture somewhat disturbing. I myself do not commend vulgarity of any sort, but if it bothers you so, why not move out of the country and see if you can find a country that is not so laden with popular culture, instead of posting unnecessary messages on your boards. The best course of change is action. Correct me if I am wrong, but I do not feel that you have swayed anybody's opinions on culture, but you may have made a few die hard christians want to overthrow Hollywood. This subject obviously bothers you, but maybe if you payed a little bit less attention to it you would not have to be so disturbed. With respect to your cause, Nathan King P.S. If you consider moving, you should shoot down here to Botswana. Be sure to bring you Swahili FOR DUmmies guide. Re: When Vulgarians Seize a Culture Posted On: 07/10/07 09:31:42 PM Age 41, PA Once again, you hit the nail on the head, Ingrid. My Mom-in-love once spoke to me about people lettings words spew out of their mouths that they wouldn't dare pick up if they were objects on the sidewalk. I'm a bit puzzled as to why some people's idea of expressing themselves actually involves stooping to such unimaginative grammar! I'm glad we've pretty much given up secular TV!