by Rusty Pugh and Jody Brown
(AgapePress) – In an example of what can happen when determined citizens take a moral stand, concerned city officials and churches in one Alabama town have won a battle against pornography.
Movie Gallery, the nation's third-largest video retailer, owns almost 1,000 stores in 31 states, and offers hard-core pornography from back rooms in 200 of those stores. The rental chain also rents “soft-core” porn from the main floor area. But as reported last week in this space, when Movie Gallery announced plans to open a new store in Fayette, Alabama, the mayor, city council, and churches took immediate action.
Fayette Mayor Ray Nelson says city officials and church leaders had vowed to continuously picket the new store if it rented porn. Nelson contacted Movie Gallery and says the company, while not cooperative initially, has decided they will not stock any pornography in the Fayette store.
“It's just a matter of principle and convictions and [a willingness] to stand up,” Nelson says, “and that's what our people have done here in our community. We said 'No,' and it was through the grass-roots efforts of our people and our churches that we've won this victory.”
Nelson believes the victory could inspire other towns to take a stand and fight pornography.
“From Day 1, we've put forth an effort here to keep our city a morally decent city and not have any evil influence in our city with pornography,” he says.
City officials were assisted by the American Family Association, which is spearheading a national boycott of Movie Gallery. AFA Director of Special Projects Randy Sharp calls the Fayette case a “wonderful example” of civic and church leaders pulling together for a common cause to make their community a better place to live. He believes Fayette was successful in its bid against Movie Gallery because the town understands the impact of pornography on crime.
(This update courtesy of Agape Press.)
These Are Not Your Parents' TV Shows Anymore
by Bill Fancher
(AgapePress) – A respected media monitor says Hollywood broke its contract with families 30 years ago and has been “pushing the envelope” on decency ever since.
Parents’ Television Council President Brent Bozell says the TV content available today is completely different from what it started with back in the 1950s. He says the television industry used to limit itself on what it portrayed because of its potential impact on children — but that changed in the 1970s.
“Hollywood broke its contract with the family and began deliberately and unequivocally to challenge the rules of decent behavior in the name of artistic freedom,” Bozell says.
The pro-family advocate says since that time, Hollywood has filled its programming with all kinds of sexual content, foul language, violence, and religious bigotry.
“Pure sexual content were [sic] inserted, depictions of violence were made ever more graphic, obscenities, ever more obscenities, began to creep into the copy. The envelope pushing had begun,” he says. “Each new assault on tradition and family values was met with an outcry from America’s families.”
Unfortunately, with very few exceptions, Bozell says most of the outrage was not sustained and in many cases was not sincere. The American Family Association was one of the first organizations to see where television was headed and led the fight to try changing it.
Bozell charges that Hollywood continues to push its sexual and violent content to the limits censors will allow. He believes it will get worse before it gets better.
