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TV's role in shaping public opinion

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Garland-Green

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PostPosted: Thu Jun 16, 2016 3:03 am
A survey done by the CDC reported that only 1.8 percent of men self-identify as gay and 0.4 percent as bisexual, and 1.5 percent of women self-identify as lesbian and 0.9 percent as bisexual (Source).

Related; Americans Greatly Overestimate Percent Gay, Lesbian in U.S.

The Time article below is enlightening as to how a culture can change so drastically over just a couple of decades. Exposure. Seeing something again and again normalizes what we see.

Quote; According to a 2012 Hollywood Reporter poll, 27% of people who had changed their minds about gay marriage from anti- to pro- in the last decade said that they made their decision after watching gay characters on shows like Modern Family and Glee. (Source)

Television shows portraying gay characters;
List of LGBT characters in television and radio

Quote;
Television has increased its depiction of gay, lesbian and bisexual characters, with the edge going to cable and the Internet over broadcast networks, according to a study released Wednesday by the advocacy group GLAAD.

Networks are promoting the understanding of gay lives with some of the most inclusive programs yet, but should "strive to include significant transgender content," said GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis in a statement.

Excerpt taken from; Number of gay and lesbian TV characters growing, says GLAAD

Could it be that the dramatic shift in public opinion we have seen in the last few years is the result of years of clever marketing or propaganda if you will? Is transgender characters what we will see an increase of in TV shows next? Do you think TV shapes people's opinion more than they are aware? What are your thoughts?  
PostPosted: Thu Jun 16, 2016 5:29 pm
edited: to correct typo

The moment Adam and Eve sinned, sin became normal. But normal does not equate to "right and acceptable" in YHWH's eyes. So, it doesn't matter what becomes normal. God's Command define something as right or wrong, no matter how much creation deviates, no matter how much sin becomes the new "usual", and no matter how people try to persuade and mass communicate approval / sympathy towards our sinful, earthly, human nature.

But to answer the questions:


Garland-Green
Could it be that the dramatic shift in public opinion we have seen in the last few years is the result of years of clever marketing or propaganda if you will?


Question #1) Short answer, yes, it's a contributing factor. Whatever has access to a large number of minds and hearts has the potential to sway public opinion en masse (TV, radio, internet, etc). Add to that how increasingly unfamiliar people are with the Commands, and what the Commands protect us from, and thus minds and hearts who are not alerted of what is harmful, and you have the shift in public opinion.

They are being seduced into approving of certain lifestyles because TV never portrays the negative consequences of the act. It's fantasy land, not reality. But how does someone without the knowledge of God know that? If they did hold to the Commands of God, then no matter how often TV shows portray sin as heroic or glamorous or worth-sympathizing with, people would not accept the sin just because the recurring characters commit them. So, even though TV does have a large potential to shift public opinion, it wouldn't shift their opinion if their hearts were already wholeheartedly captured by someone else: the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

This is a battle for the mind and hearts of the people. It has been going on for a long time. The end goal is the same: make them cherish sin, down play the natural consequences. Persuade them that it is not that bad.

      • Proverbs 4:23 (NIV)

        23 Above all else, guard your heart,
        for everything you do flows from it.

      • Romans 12:2 (NIV)

        2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

      • James 1:27 (NIV)

        27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.


I use to hold characters like Jack Sparrow in high esteem. A pirate: a greedy, covetous, murderer and thief—a lawless man (and I was just as selfishly lawless too, no wonder I sympathized with him). I do not hold him in high esteem anymore because I accepted God's Commands, realized their true nature, and the true nature of these characters in light of the Commands. We need the Word of God to save us and drop the scales from our eyes.



Garland-Green
Is transgender characters what we will see an increase of in TV shows next?


Question #2) Well, according to the article, putting more transgender characters in the media is their plainly-stated agenda. So, yes, I think we will see an increase. I don't think I personally will see them on a habitual basis because I've given up being entertained by this country's prime time television. It was just sin after sin after sin after sin being resorted to, to save themselves from harm, or being portrayed as the fun thing to do. There was nothing to enjoy.


Garland-Green
Do you think TV shapes people's opinion more than they are aware? What are your thoughts?


Question #3) Yes. People naively think that brainwashing only happens to a few gullible people and only in religious cults. But we are literally washing our brains with information at all times no matter who we are. And our emotions are being swayed by all kinds of things, especially movies (which hold philosophies that are not necessarily equivalent to those of the Bible). It's only a matter of whose information we wash our brains with. And TV is no different.

So, of course, the information fed to us on TV shapes people's opinions. Authority figures appear on there. Seemingly intelligent and articulate people air out their reasoning on there. The simple follow their lead. It sounds right. Without YHWH's Commands, they fall for the persuasion.

Even the TV programs that are just there for the "funsies": they have normalized "lying" and "malicious speaking" as an acceptable form of socializing (e.g. pranks, violating the trust of someone close to you, making them feel bad, ruining your own reputation as a caring and trustworthy person, for the sake of a momentary laugh). TV is full of manifestations of treating people in ways you would never like to be treated back. And it being portrayed as something worth pursuing to express friendship and care. So backwards.

Laughter is a big one. Slapping people for a laugh, humiliating people for a laugh, being verbally abusive for a laugh, losing your cool / demonstrating no patience, all for a laugh, violence—not to protect others from danger, but for a laugh. Laughter makes people lower their guard. And if they used laughter to normalize lying, verbal abuse, and malice, then they will do it with those sexual sins too (making sexual immorality acceptable by being funny). And this is largely in part due to this world's mentality about laughter in general; our perception of laughter is messed up: laughter is an alert that something has gone wrong and laughter should shame the act being done (not demonstrate approval, like clapping does). Someone tells an obvious lie, people laugh. Someone curses, people laugh. Someone cross-dresses as the sex that they are obviously not, people laugh. Someone falls down (malfunctions), people laugh. Something is happening that shouldn't be happening. And the laughter is alerting you of what that is. And that it is wrong functioning.

They've even normalized polygamy (a show called, "Sister Wives" apparently. I don't watch it. I saw it advertised); so, why wouldn't they include transgenders on TV to make it acceptable in the eyes of the masses? Every possible sin / every possible deviation from God's original creation that you can think of has been depicted on TV as fun and entertaining; the protagonist, which the viewer sympathizes with (and automatically associates as the good guy) commits evil (deviance from YHWH's standard), but it gets applauded. Witchcraft, demon worship, gluttony, greed, pride/arrogance, theft, murder, profane speech, malice, lying, gossip, etc.

Watching TV programs is how I came to love the occult despite the danger of it, especially as a child growing up with this type of programming, in a house that did not teach the Bible and the Commands of God. So, yes, TV definitely has an influence. The access idolatry has, into our mind and into our heart, has never been easier. That, coupled with how Biblically-illiterate people have become, explains why we have people accepting the abominable—everything that YHWH calls abomination.

Homosexuality just joins the list of things that the world approves of, but that God did not, does not, and never will. Just one of many other things people will have to repent of when they finally accept Christ. And there will be more expressions of sins that become normalized—no matter what form of mass communication is being used by the idolatrous minds of the time to conquer many other hearts and minds to accept sin and the sinful ways that we are born in. As long as they don't know Christ—the real, Biblical Christ—they will fall for the persuasion.

      • Ephesians 4:17-32 (NIV)

        17 So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19 Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed.

        20 That, however, is not the way of life you learned 21 when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

        25 Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26 “In your anger do not sin”[a]: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 and do not give the devil a foothold. 28 Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.

        29 Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

        Footnotes:

        a. Ephesians 4:26 Psalm 4:4 (see Septuagint)
 

cristobela
Vice Captain


cristobela
Vice Captain

PostPosted: Fri Jun 17, 2016 7:27 am
I was so concentrated on answering the topic of "shaping public opinion" that I forgot to warn of something. So, putting aside the topic of "shaping public opinion" for a second: it's not exactly 100% free of danger to invest a lot of time watching TV once we know Christ / the Word of God. Whatever we willingly place in front of our eyes and ears on a habitual basis does subconsciously affect even our form of speaking, certain mannerisms, and the thoughts in our mind. TV, in a way, is socialization: you're inviting someone to come into your home, spend time with you/your mind, but you have no chance of affecting them, just them affecting you. Do it often enough, and you'll start speaking and acting like them.

      • 1 Corinthians 15:33 (NIV)

        33 Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”[a]

        Footnotes:

        a. 1 Corinthians 15:33 From the Greek poet Menander

      • Proverbs 22:24-25 (NIV)
        Saying 3

        24 Do not make friends with a hot-tempered person,
            do not associate with one easily angered,
        25 or you may learn their ways
            and get yourself ensnared.


We start mimicking what we constantly see and hear around us, who we spend a lot of time with. So, what we say and do is a dead giveaway of who we've been spending time with and modelling ourselves after subconsciously. Is it Jesus and other Christ-like believers? or the worldly and idolatrous? The proof is in what comes out of us, not in how we answer the question.
 
PostPosted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 5:58 pm
actually, it's part of a big picture, which could be called subversion

Subversion by Yuri Bezmenov

there are many links of this masterclass from yuri. it's really insightfull.

of course that talking about gays on the TV alone is not the main source of disruption of the values and etc...(but it's one of the components)
if you look at what the TV sells to people, on it's majory, it goes against all that they believe, considering that western civilizations have their based built upon christianism.

our belief in the God Almighty is stronger than we can even imagine. and those who are against try to disrupt it without us noticing it.

of course that we cannot obligate anyone to believe on what we believe, but we have the right to refuse to follow a code of "global acceptance" and put the mask of the "good guy" just because certain groups THINK that we are a threat.

and just a reminder. this is not limited by what people watch on TV, but it can be extended by what people do on politics, social groups(and media), and any social environment that is public(and of course, public services too)  

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