I found this chapter very interesting. I never realized how movies can make an impact on a child’s life and how they were once (and maybe still are) competition with the schools for children’s mind. There was an experiment where one group was made to drink coffee, another group was sleep deprived, and another group was taken to the movies before going to bed. I was shocked to see that the group of children that went to the movies before bed was disturbed as much as the other two groups. I actually never really realized the effectiveness of movies.Studies depicted how it affected the health, behavior, and attitudes of children.
It was also interesting to see how the censorship code came about. The code would ensure that movies were a good influence on society, and used it to be “morally uplifting” instead of “morally degrading”. I think this was a good idea. I never realized how much movies and t.v shows influenced our thoughts and actions. It was interesting to see that instead of competing with movies for children’s mind, movies was going to help schools in educating on what is right. ” Like other proposals for self-censorship, the production code was designed to shape movies so they taught audiences moral, political, and social lessons”
The code listed the things that were not allowed on children’s programs. To name a few mentioned in the book that I found interesting:
– Disrespect for either parental or other proper authority must not be encouraged.
– Unfair exploitation of others for personal gain must not be made praiseworthy
-Dishonesty and deceit are not to be made appealing or attractive to the child.
A question that popped into my mind while reading this section was :
Was there less misbehaving from children because of censorship? Obviously, if you look at the stuff on our televisions and in the movies, we can say that things are less censored as years go by.
Do you think if things were more censorship now, there will be a decrease in crimes, murder, and such?