The adults were divided by gender: the males on the couches before the tv and their wives standing off to the side. The kids were gathered together upstairs. I spend a few minutes with the youth but quickly became uncomfortable. I don't know if I was any more comfortable when I went down to visit with their parents.
Beyonce performed various songs from her musical career, though the focus was not greatly on her music. Her performance began with her wearing a very tiny outfit, parts of which she ripped off as she walked across the stage. Her clothing, however, was only a small part of the provocative nature of the show. The sexual nature of her performance was in no way understated, in no way subtle. It was intentional and in-your-face. Quite literally, every pose, every step, every facial expression was sexually-charged.
When I went downstairs and joined the parents, I mentioned to an aunt of one of the youth's that I couldn't understand what the appeal of someone like Beyonce was. To me, she seems self-invovled to an extreme, sings uninteresting music (it can be described as "catchy," but certainly nothing beyond that), composes laughably terrible lyrics, and is incredibly overexposed in popular media. My comment was met, however, with seeming shock and almost offense. I was informed that Beyonce was beautiful, talented, and entertaining. How could I not understand this?
To me, entertainment has become so shallow and so obvious. Do we want to make things more exciting? Make the sounds louder and the songs catchier. Make the sights flashier with more people, larger screens, and more abundant flashing lights. Make the sexuality everything but mysterious. Leave nothing to the imagination. Just make everything such an intense feast for the eyes and ears, make it louder and brighter than anything heard or seen before, that the audience can't help but sit and take it all in, like gluttons at an entertainment feast.
And here, in this performance, we had Beyonce surrounded with people dancing like she danced, singing her songs with her lyrics, flanked on the left, right, below, and above with images of herself, images multiplied a thousand times over and blown up to 10 times her size. Every step she made was surging with sexual and self-obsessed swagger. And we all loved it. People in the crowds screamed and reached for her, even when she was 30 feet away, just to be a little closer.
The sexuality of the performance was my first concern and is perhaps the most obvious subject for comment. To see a room full of the Church's youth viewing something I found embarrassing (yes, I should have found a reason to turn the channel, at the very least...) was disheartening; to then see all of their fathers glued to the set with their wives not in the least surprised or upset was far more so. We have become so desensitized to something that would have been considered borderline pornography not very long ago. And we desire to be entertained by such things.
There is more to comment on here, though. Our attention has been so transformed over the years by technology. Who hasn't watched a video on YouTube labelled "part 1" and been delayed for minutes or hours or even days before watching "part 2" because the thumbnails down the right side of the screen of recommended videos grabs our attention. TV, computers, internet, cell phones, and various other things have transformed our brains so that we are constantly taking in every pixel for a fraction of a moment before moving onto the next. Halftime shows as I witnessed yesterday would have given me a headache 10 years ago; today, they are the very definition of entertaining.
I was thinking the other day about interviews with actors and actresses. In the 1950s and '60s, if you watch interviews with the Hollywood elite, they are slow and methodical, discussing the craft of acting with interesting questions and somewhat insightful answers. These answers can go on and on, but no audience member falls asleep or has to pull out a book to pass the time. Today, on late night shows, the "interviews" are shallow, quick, and full of pre-planned stories and jokes. We aren't interested in the person but in being entertained.
The Super Bowl halftime show is a symptom of our short attention span and need for visual and audible instant gratification on a massive scale. Is it any wonder, when we can stare at such spectacles without blinking, without considering what it is that we're watching, with no introspection, that we priests are told not to speak for more than 10 minutes in a homily for fear of "losing" the entire congregation?
But there is a third and perhaps even more serious issue at play. The halftime show was an overblown exposition of a woman not only being an entertainer but being an idol. The fan excitement over Beyonce bordered on worship, and nobody - including these Orthodox parishioners - seemed to care. Their response was, "How could someone not respond to Beyonce in this way?" To me, I found it all uninteresting except in that it was a terrible commentary on where we are as a people.
I wonder how we got here, but more so, I wonder how we can turn things back around. That halftime show should have come on and caused both the youth and their parents to scatter, to take the time to speak with one another in fellowship and complete disinterest at what was occurring on the screen... if not that, then outright disgust and fear. Unfortunately, when became the quietest moment of the Super Bowl was not a time for reflection, but a time for our passions to be satisfied. Thinking back to St. John Chrysostom's condemnation of those who went to the gladiator games, I wonder what he would have to say about what we consider entertainment today... something perhaps far less bloody but just as... if not more... harmful.
There is more to comment on here, though. Our attention has been so transformed over the years by technology. Who hasn't watched a video on YouTube labelled "part 1" and been delayed for minutes or hours or even days before watching "part 2" because the thumbnails down the right side of the screen of recommended videos grabs our attention. TV, computers, internet, cell phones, and various other things have transformed our brains so that we are constantly taking in every pixel for a fraction of a moment before moving onto the next. Halftime shows as I witnessed yesterday would have given me a headache 10 years ago; today, they are the very definition of entertaining.
I was thinking the other day about interviews with actors and actresses. In the 1950s and '60s, if you watch interviews with the Hollywood elite, they are slow and methodical, discussing the craft of acting with interesting questions and somewhat insightful answers. These answers can go on and on, but no audience member falls asleep or has to pull out a book to pass the time. Today, on late night shows, the "interviews" are shallow, quick, and full of pre-planned stories and jokes. We aren't interested in the person but in being entertained.
But there is a third and perhaps even more serious issue at play. The halftime show was an overblown exposition of a woman not only being an entertainer but being an idol. The fan excitement over Beyonce bordered on worship, and nobody - including these Orthodox parishioners - seemed to care. Their response was, "How could someone not respond to Beyonce in this way?" To me, I found it all uninteresting except in that it was a terrible commentary on where we are as a people.
I wonder how we got here, but more so, I wonder how we can turn things back around. That halftime show should have come on and caused both the youth and their parents to scatter, to take the time to speak with one another in fellowship and complete disinterest at what was occurring on the screen... if not that, then outright disgust and fear. Unfortunately, when became the quietest moment of the Super Bowl was not a time for reflection, but a time for our passions to be satisfied. Thinking back to St. John Chrysostom's condemnation of those who went to the gladiator games, I wonder what he would have to say about what we consider entertainment today... something perhaps far less bloody but just as... if not more... harmful.
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