Mormons and TV
Jun 20th, 2007 by Glenn
Costanza made a recent reference to the TV Show Three’s Company (“Come and knock on our door…”). My initial reaction when I read it was, “wow – I was not allowed to watch Three’s Company when I was a kid (“…we’ve been waiting for you”) – which only made me want to watch it more.
It made me think about the other shows I was not allowed to watch (or encouraged against watching — mainly by my father — because they were “rude”) and the ones that I was allowed to watch (which, upon close analysis, have a lot of the same copntent as the ones on the “do not see” list – not a lot of consistency here).
I remember when I was first married I was surprised by the TV taboos in my wife’s family versus what I had grown up with. So I’m interested to hear some other experiences as well – especially as my list will only reflect a certain generation of TV watching.
Could not watch:
M.A.S.H.
Charlie’s Angels
Different Strokes
Get Smart
Laverne and Shirley
Married with Children
One Day at a Time
The Bob Newhart Show
The Facts of Life
The Jeffersons
The Love Boat
Three’s Company
Welcome Back Kotter
Could watch:
A-Team
Addams Family
Battlestar gallactica
Buck Rogers
CHiPs
Cosby Show
Family Ties
General Hospital
Greatest American Hero
Grizzley Adams
Happy Days
LA Law
The ironic thing in my family is, growing up, we could watch M.A.S.H. but we were not allowed to watch the Cosby Show. The reason my parents gave for prohibting the show was that Bill Cosby often used sacrilegous material in his standup comedy routine.
Glenn,
Actually my parents were pretty easy when it came to TV, which is very surprising because they were so strict about everything else. I can’t remember anything being banned outright, but we only had one TV and whenever anything “bad” happened on a show somebody had to get up and change the channel (yes, I said get up and change the channel). I usually watched Three’s Company re-runs during the summer in the daytime when my dad was at work and my mom was busy with my little sisters. I remember that my older brother and I rented Commando (with Ahhnold) and Rambo (with Sly) one day. Both are rated R for violence and langauge. My dad came downstairs and asked what we were watching and we were scared that he would freak out–I think he was on the High Council at that time. All he said was “as long as it isn’s some European sex crap, I guess it’s ok.” He spent 30 years in the Air Force, so I guess he figured that violence was as American as apple pie. Sex, not so much.
I never said I was allowed to watch Three’s Company–just that I did watch it
Oh, I do remember one that was banned outright. It was the Dukes of Hazzard.
This may show how young I am, but the shows I couldn’t watch were the Simpsons, and Married with Children. I was a huge fan of Star Trek, the Cosby Show, and Full House (although I frequently found myself hiding behind the couch during embarassing scenes).
It’s funny, but ever since jr high, I haven’t been much of a TV fan, with the noticeable exception of West Wing and The Office.
I have always found it quite telling that Telesital and Terestrial both start out the same as television. Coincidence? I think not.
If I had my way, we would end the alphabet QRSUWXYZ. That’s how I learned it. And look how well I turned out.
Not exactly our discussion of TV, but close enough — Matt W. made a kickin’ video (pre-mission) over at New Cool Thing. Watching this I could only think of our dear beloved Elder K. This must have been his nightly missionary fantasy (except I suspect he turned the BoM on his companions once or twice as well).
Costanza,
Somehow I con’d my dad into watching Ferris Bueller’s once because I liked it so much. Sitting there watching it with my dad and his tangible dissaproval was seriously one of the least enjoyable experiences of my life — talk about TENSE. Appropriately enough, he turned it off at the “diamond” comment.
Jessawhy,
Age shmage. My dad was a big Trekkie, too. He wanted to be Spock. He even practiced the single eyebrow raise. The Office and West Wing are good choices (although The Office would have definitely been banned in my household growing up — especially the highly superior BBC version). But no Lost? That show rocks.
j_t,
That is very ironic. And Cosby was such a high-family-value show. Funny how that works. Do you think race had anything to do with it? I think it did on our The Jefferson’s ban (and Sanford and Son now that I remember) — not that my parents were racists, but it culturally was just a different type of humor.
And I would hardly call Bill Cosby’s “Noah” bits sacriligeous (norm ironically, did my father) — I LOVED the Bill Cosby standup records when I was a kid — I listened to them to death (literaly — I took them outside with my record player and an extension cord into my cardboard fort and scorching AZ sun warped them).
My dad loved the Dukes of Hazard. The only one that was banned in my house was M.A.S.H. (that I know of: my parents may have simply steered us clear or some we didn’t know about). Somewhat ironic because in later years it became one of my mother’s favorite shows. When I asked her why she’d watch reruns of it but had banned it when we were kids, her response was that she was glad someone had made the show, but that it dealt with topics that she didn’t feel we, as kids, had been ready for. That’s a good assessment and one that I think is worth keeping in mind when some people assert that the only content we should deal with as adults consists of things we would want our kids to see. (I’ve heard this “doctrine of childishness” preached from the pulpit on many occasions.)
When I was little my mother loved WKRP in Cincinnati. I remember one time she asked me to look in the paper and tell her what was one and the listing just said WKRP. I had no idea what that was, but I knew that W was silent at the start of some words, so I told her that the newspaper said that “crap” was on. Little did I know how often the same words would be uttered during my life about what was on TV, but for very different reasons.
Interesting comments about “M*A*S*H” being banned. If I recall correctly,in Salt Lake KSL-TV used to run M*A*S*H reruns at 1035pm after the news, and it was one of the few places in the country where a different station beat “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson” in the ratings. And not just beat, but had a substantial lead over the Tonight Show’s audience.
Phouchg, That is interesting — but I still to this day have never seen an episode of M*A*S*H — I don’t really know much about it except that many consider it one of the best shows ever on TV, with one of the most popular finales of all time. But I still don’t really know content-wise why it would be “banned” when something like Duke of Hazard or Happy Days wasn’t. When I see HD now, I understand all the sexual innuendos from the Fonz that went completely over my head as a kid — what were then name of those triplets he used to date? (It seems like Richie had a catch-phrase that would fit very well right here — but I can’t remember what it was.)
I wonder how much of the attitude towards the T.V. show M*A*S*H came from the movie? A while back my wife and I saw the movie at Blockbuster and the package said it was rated PG-13 (it is in fact R, which we realized while watching it). All I can say is that if the show were anything like the movie, I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. There is a world of difference in the feeling and attitude of the movie and the show, and I was really bothered by the film at times (I think that was the point of the movie though), while I usually found the show to be thought-provoking in a positive sense.
I remember some humorous inconsistencies growing up. My mom would watch Night Court fairly regularly. But when my dad was there, it was a terrible show. John Laroquette was quite crude, as I recall. The same was true of the Simpsons. When it was just Dad, or just Mom, there was a lot of stifled laughs and a disapproving look. When both parents were present, they told us to turn the garbage off.
The biggest complaint from either parent was what we kids tried to watch on Sunday. That was consistent regardless of whether one parent, or both were present. Quite often, Sundays were a PBS day, if any TV was watched at all.
This is one of those areas where people who grew up LDS seem so alien to me. I was allowed to watch anything I wanted.
Sounds just like my parents Rüpel
The one thing that was always allowed by my parents on Sunday was the PBS series Nature and any similar BBC shows: my father figured that we were learning about God’s creation. That’s sort of carried over in my household. We don’t have a TV, but if my kids ask if they can watch Blue Planet (the BBC series on ocean life) on Sundays (we have it on DVD and they use a computer to watch DVDs) we will usually let them. I actually find that more valuable than the scripture cartoons they have on DVD.
Well, I shall have to spell your name Sephen Erasus Knudsen from now on, I guess… But maybe I need to get rid of the letters from “computer” and “internet” as well, which leaves you as “Sh a** Kd.”
Ladies and Gentlemen, I think we have a new nickname for Stevie-boy. Thanks, Fenevad! Sh a** Kd is classic.
(Sigh) The bane of my existance is people who take things too literally. Go ahead and play your little mockery games — it’s consistent with what the scriptures say about everyone in that great and spacious building. As for me and my house, I will eat the pure fruit of the tree of life and never let go of the iron rod to point or mock or ridicule.
Rüpel
Ah yes — Night Court. Laroquette was a bit of a letcher. I think that was a little off the radar for my partents, but I saw it a few times, and my internal filter (a little cricket named Jiminey something) told me it should be in the “banned” list. The interaction between your parents and the need to mainatin appearances is very funny. Sunday was a diaapointing day for me, TV wise. No morning cartoons — who wants political talk? I think Kung-fu came on int he afternoon though.
Kuri,
Do you think this is really a Mormon thing? Certainly there are other religious traditions that proscribethings like this — maybe even other Catholics (you were Cathilic, right?) who were more strict about media than your family was. What do you think?
I realized I erred. Stephen, I should have included all the letters of “television”–not just T and V–which means you’ve been hAkd
Still not funny. Too bad I am always so immaculately clean. Even a little dust on the bottom of my shoes right now would be sufficient. Maybe I’ll go out for a walk.
Stevie-boy,
Immaculately clean? Darn. I always kind of pictured you being like Pig-Pen (Charlie Brown’s friend) who always had a dust cloud shrouding him. I figured you’d need something like that to shroud yourself from us mortals.
Fenevad,
I like hAkd as a nickname too. Maybe we should take a blog wide vote?
A blog-wide vote? And what is that — 4 people? Oooohh, I’m shaking now. This site has gone downhill since I relinquished control to the so-called “folklorists.”
Who is Charlie Brown?
Kung-fu on Sunday! Also on Sunday, Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom and, my all-time favorite, In Search Of with Leonard Nimoy.
Glenn,
I was nominally Protestant. But I don’t recall anyone having many restrictions on what shows they could watch.
“In Search Of” — right on. And “Cosmos” with Carl Sagen (”Billions and Billions of galaxies….”)
Did I strike a raw nerve, Stevie-boy? I’m sure it won’t be the last time it will happen.
FYI: Charlie Brown is the main character in a popular comic strip called “Peanuts” that runs on the comics page in most daily newspapers. I’m not sure why I’m telling you this. You probably don’t read the newspaper and will undoubtedly go off on a rant about the evils of comic strips.
Our “do-not-watch” list was: American Gladiators (I think because it was on Sunday); Arsenio Hall, Married With Children, and In Living Color (This one lasted about 2 minutes once my dad finally sat down to watch it with us one time). I guess I can see the reasoning behind most of those, though American Gladiators was great. Night Court, the Simpsons, and Threes Company, however, were family staples. It made for some awkward moments when I knew I wasn’t supposed to “get” the jokes but did and tried not to laugh too loudly.
I was rarely allowed to choose what I wanted to watch on television as a young child, because my LDS parent prefered to watch shows such as MASH and The Love Boat, as well as violent news serials (this was before the Berlin Wall fell), Americas Most Wanted, American Gladiators and the Simpsons (some of my favourite shows back then) as well as other programs I can’t recall but am pretty sure wouldn’t be condoned by the church.
Movie wise, I was exposed to the greatness of Hitchock as a wee tyke (however the plot was above me; I just wanted to see the blob eat people), was the only one allowed to see The Fugitive and when I was around 14 (after I had stopped attending church, and long since I even tried to believe) I was taken to see an AA (basically R rating) movie where the protagonist bared her breasts within the first few mintues; we stayed to watch the whole movie.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I’m a ‘heathen’ now
MASH is one of the few shows I remember being allowed to watch. My memory is that my parents used a “whitelist” strategy for TV shows. Anything not on the list was assumed to be off limits. Even watching the 10:35 PM M*A*S*H (I grew up in Utah too) required wearing my parents down, with the help of Eve and Lynnette, if I remember correctly. We just kept sneaking out of our bedrooms to watch it until they finally gave in and let us.
And like has been mentioned with other shows, I totally missed all the innuendo as a kid, and I look back now and am sometimes surprised at it all.
This post reminded me of why I grew up disliking evangelical preachers. For me Saturday morning meant cartoons (I’d get up so early I’d have to watch the test patterns while waiting for the 6:00 cartoons to come on, something kids now wouldn’t even be familiar with). I considered cartoons to be a little piece of heaven, so when Jim Baker’s PTL (Praise The Lord) came on at 11:00 or so in Anchorage and marked the end of cartoons for the morning, it meant that I had to descend from heaven to hell. Ever since then I have associated Evangelical preachers with the end of all fun…