“When a society turns death into entertainment, it should
not be surprised when members of that society find entertainment in death.” krbd
I had a huge box elder tree on the property line of my
home. The tree provided a lot of shade
and was even pretty in the summer time.
But the tree had become dangerous.
It was infested with insects and completely hollow inside. It compromised the irrigation ditch between
my home and the neighbor’s. There would
soon be a risk of the tree rotting through completely and falling into one of
the yards, or – worse yet – onto one of the houses. The camel’s straw of the issue was that the
tree had grown so tall that its branches had compromised the power lines that
ran from the street to the houses.
One day, a man came to my door. He was from the power company and had come to
ask my permission to cut the tree down.
For years APS had been lopping off the offending branches and had
finally decided that it was more cost effective to remove the tree. My neighbor and I both agreed and the deed
was done. But that’s not the end of the
story. My understanding was that the
power company would treat the stump so as to kill the root and prevent the tree
growing back. Whatever they did was
inadequate.
The roots of that tree are far from dead. Little volunteer box elder trees are sprouting up everywhere and they are almost impossible to root out. Of course, they are bushing up all around the stump, but fairly substantial shrubs are already adorning the full length of the ditch, getting in the way of the free flow of life-giving water. They seem to defy all of the chemicals designed to get rid of such pests. Both my neighbor and I have tried. I spray them on the ditch banks; I mow them in my lawn; I cut them out of my rose garden.
These malignant growths cannot be pulled out because they are attached to a root system that has been growing for close to 100 years. It is an ongoing battle, but my neighbor and I are not giving up. We cannot. Left to proliferate, they would overtake every desirable plant in my yard.
As I pondered the events in a Colorado movie theater and as I watch the media and public responses to it, I thought of that box elder tree. The first knee jerk response was to increase security at movie theaters. Some theaters in big cities have already stationed police at the doors and others are talking about metal detectors. Some in the liberal press are pushing harder for gun control until they have completely abolished the second amendment. To me, that's like cutting off the limbs. It looks like a valiant and even popular effort, but is worse than ineffective because it give an illusion of attacking the problem in lieu of really attacking the problem.
When will we as a society stop lopping of the fruits of such evil while ignoring the roots of such evil? My box elder tree had to be removed because it was rotten to the core. The box elder bugs ate away from the inside out until there was nothing healthy left. They had probably been working on it for most of the past 100 years. The damage wasn't noted until it began to get in the way of something important - in this case, electric power. But even though the tree is gone, the roots are still deep in the soil and it takes constant vigilance to keep them from taking over my yard.
What are the insects that are destroying our society from the inside out? I'd like to suggest three. These were suggested to me in the late 1980's by a professional colleague by the name of Bill Oliver. He said that since 1963, the United States has gone through three major cultural revolutions: the sexual revolution; the drug revolution; and the entertainment revolution. He summed it up in the bumper sticker from the 60's - Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n Roll.
Sex - When Hugh Hefner first published Playboy in 1953, I don't think even he in his wildest imagination ever pictured that sexual philosophy alive and well at the middle-school level. I personally know school nurses who worry each month about some of their 5th and 6th grade girls. Sexually Transmitted Diseases are rampant and some of the oldies, like syphilis and gonorrhea, are making a comeback, as superbugs become antibiotic-resistant. By the 1970's we had discovered herpes and by the 1980's, AIDS. According to the CDC, in 2009 41% of live births were to unmarried women and -because of changing patterns and societal mores - more of these women are keeping their babies and raising them as single mothers. The abortion rate for 2008 was 16.0 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 - 44 years, and the abortion ratio was 234 abortions : 1,000 live births.
Drugs - When I graduated from high school in 1962 - the last year of the cultural 1950's - I could not have told you where anyone could get marijuana, much less heroin. I'd have been hard put to know how anyone could obtain cigarettes or alcohol if he were underage (although some of the "rowdies" in my class likely could have!) Today the most innocent kid in middle school could tell you who to talk to if you want to "score." From the coming out of the drug culture at Woodstock in 1969 until the present day, we have a different America from the one in which I grew up.
Entertainment - Now we come to today's headlines. I do not believe that it was by chance that the venue for violence was the newest Batman movie. The perpetrator told police that he was the Joker and that he had been plotting and stockpiling weapons for months, planning his midnight attack. The fact that many people present in the theater didn't register immediate awareness of danger because they thought it was part of the movie is very chilling to me.
Don't get me wrong. I am not attacking this specific movie, but I am using it to point out a cautionary tale about entertainment in general. I grew up in the 1950's. In my lifetime, I personally have watched the entertainment industry become more violent and more erotic; the music is loud and angry; people are immoral and hateful and aggressive - often without negative consequences to the perpetrators. Those in the industry seem to get more creative every year as to how far they can push the envelope. Worse yet, the public eats it up and asks for more.
We ask, "What can we do as a nation to weed out these insects of destruction?" Perhaps what we should ask is, "What can I do as an individual." Every nation is made up of individuals just like you and me. I truly don't have the answers, but I do have a few ideas that have guided me for years. If you feel as I do, perhaps you do these things as well:- Don't participate. Don't buy the music. Don't attend the movies. Don't wear the clothing or accessories that glorify drugs, immorality, or violence and don't allow your children to do so.
- Teach your children your family's values. A family without values is not an immoral family; it is an amoral family. If children have no guidelines, they cannot be guided. If you don't mark the path and walk it yourself, you will never know when they have strayed from it.
- Support causes, laws, and candidates who share your values. Let your voice be heard and your vote count.
- Search, ponder, and pray, and never give up.
I found this final photo online at Flickr. It's title is "Broken Wooden Heart." I thought it was appropriate. Today, in Colorado, many families' hearts were broken. Colorado's collective heart was broken. This nation's heart was broken. Isn't it time we all did something about it?
Picture of a box elder tree from www.swcoloradowildflowers.com
Picture of a box elder stump from www.popehat.com (This stump is nothing compared to the size and condition of the box elder stump in my yard!
Picture of box elder bugs from www.arborist.treecare.com
Picture of box elder bug from www.box-elder-bug.com
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