Question and Answers – The Andy Griffith Show and Current TV

Hi Cindy, I was listening to your presentation on purity, I have actually read a lot of people talking about it and I’ve got a quick question. In session 1 you mention TV shows that people shouldn’t watch, but how are they (the TV shows) any different from any other TV shows that promote a tolerance of sin… such as the Andy Griffith Show where Andy notably and throughout the entire series tolerates the dangerous and debilitating drinking habit of Otis, or how the production companies that produce one show that may seem good also produce a bad show? To me it would seem reasonable to say, “Well, with Andy Griffith the overall message is good, and one must use their sense of morality and commons sense to realize that Otis’s drinking problems are wrong”– but then could one not use that for other shows as well? I wanted to ask your opinion on this, thank you and have a good day.

Well, Arynn, I think your two key phrases here are “common sense” and “could not one use”. I think we DO have to apply our common sense to differentiate between a show that is morally harmful and one that is not. While perhaps one could argue that the difference is only one of degrees or quantity, I believe that it is common sense that tells us there is a vast difference between the portrayal of a funny town drunk on TAGS and the wholesale promotion of sin that is found on many primetime shows today. It is a cesspool of profanity, vulgarity, immodesty and lasciviousness that we find normalized on many shows today. This is simply not true of TAGS. Now, I do not make it my business to promote TAGS or any show on this blog. However, I do think that it’s important to examine the phrase “could not one use.” While not judging your specific motives, I know there are some who would “use” the kind of rationale you have given to justify in their minds the watching of filthy shows on current television. We must be careful that if we are using something as “optional” as a television show to justify putting our minds in the cesspool, that we just give up the more innocent show along with the cesspool, rather than using the more innocent show to justify the cesspool. Jesus said, “ If your right eye offends you, pluck it out, for it’s profitable for you that one of your members perish and not that your whole body be cast into hell,” (Mt. 5:29). Love you much, Arynn. Hope you and your little family are doing well!