Entertainment

In advanced industrial societies entertainment is virtually synonymous with leisure, since entertainment is the major form of leisure. People seek entertainment as a means of relieving boredom, as a diversion from the hardships and difficulties of everyday life and as a vehicle for courtship or friendly socializing. Most entertainment has two characteristics: (1) it is offered at a financial cost, and (2) it is consumed or used up by the people being entertained. In other words, entertainment is a leisure-oriented commodity produced by industry and used by consumers.

Electronic Forms of Entertainment

Entertainment is increasingly an electronic activity related to consuming one or another form of media product. Since World War II one form has increasingly dominated entertainment time—television, which includes broadcast and cable TV, satellite television, the videocassette recorder and video games. In the United States, for instance, television represents more leisure time than all other entertainment activities combined. Adult females view over five hours daily, while males watch four hours and children average approximately three and one-half hours. The phenomenal popularity of TV is undoubtedly partly the result of the medium’s seemingly low cost to consumers, who often bear the indirect expense through the cost of advertised products, government subsidies or monthly cable-TV charges.

Many other popular forms of entertainment are also influenced by electronics. Radio, for example, is combined with sophisticated audio circuitry for higher fidelity and greater realism. Musical concerts often rely on electronic sound reproduction and rely increasingly on high-tech visual “effect.” Movies also take advantage of special effects created by electronic fabrication of image and sound. New amusement parks are even started in conjunction with the entertainment industry, which creates exhibits and rides based on successful movie, television, computer or musical products.

It appears that the electronic revolution in entertainment products may be affecting the perceived value of other forms of leisure. Reading, exercise sports, participatory sports, companionship (e.g., conversation and socializing) and some hobbies are not as appealing to many people in a high-tech world. Some of these low-tech activities are being combined with electronic technologies (e.g., reading computer files or conversing via computer bulletin boards), but the overall shift in industrial societies is toward electronic entertainment.

Entertainment as a Public Event

One of the unfortunate impacts of electronic entertainment is the decline of valuable public events. Electronics tend to make entertainment an individual and private activity instead of a social and public event. Electronic reproduction enables industry to manufacture inexpensive copies of entertaining products, thereby permitting individual consumers to enjoy the entertainment whenever and wherever they wish. Videotape, for example, delivers movies and even some plays and musical concerts directly to the individual consumer at home. Why should a consumer bother with the effort or expense involved in attending a public performance?

The answer, of course, is that public events generally provide greater opportunity for social interaction and collective discernment. When small groups attend concerts or movies, for example, they typically discuss the quality and content of the entertainment. At home individual consumers shift almost effortlessly from one entertainment product to another, whereas at public events the entertainment is connected to the shared relationships of the attending groups. As a result the public event is selected more carefully, taken more seriously, enjoyed more deeply and discussed more fully.

Christians can avoid the loss of public entertainment in two ways. First, they can spend more leisure time attending public events and less time consuming personal entertainment products at home. Alternatively, Christians can practice hospitality (1 Peter 4:9) by inviting friends and relatives to their homes to enjoy entertainment together. This type of event-oriented hospitality has considerable potential in a media-oriented society, in which so many people live relatively shallow, insignificant lives. Post-entertainment discussion and fellowship are appealing to relationally hungry consumers. Even among families, this kind of media event can help break the cycle of personal, selfish entertainment use, as well as enhance familial discernment about the broader culture.

Producing Our Own Entertainment

Another disadvantage of the overindulgence in consumer-oriented electronic entertainment is people’s underdeveloped gifts and talents. Nearly all of the personal satisfaction from modern entertainment comes from the act of consumption, and very little of it comes in the joy of production. In other words, industrialized entertainment tends to disenfranchise the public, which is relegated to the status of audience, viewer or purchaser. Industry becomes the playground of professional entertainers, while the public is transformed into a fickle, often irrational market. People may spend much time watching professional sports on television, for example, but little or no time themselves participating in entertaining sports activities.

The church can encourage people to experience the joy and satisfaction derived from producing entertainment for their family and friends, including their church family. One possibility is for local congregations to sponsor more of their own homegrown entertainment. Some of this entertainment can be integrated into worship services in the form of dramatic presentations, music and readings. This technique certainly has its limits, given the appropriateness for worship, but it also has the advantage of transforming entertainment into something more than relief from boredom or diversion from the hardships of life.

Another use of gifts and talents in Christian circles is service-oriented entertainment. Comedy, drama and music can help people inside and outside the church who are suffering from the stress of their lives or the fears and pains attendant to physical illnesses. Some parachurch organizations and a few churches and denominations support small groups of traveling entertainers who perform for people in hospitals and special schools. Entertainment can also help individuals to see more clearly the spiritual dimensions of their lives. A handful of parachurch ministries work from this broader mandate, traveling in troupes from church to church or college to college.

Even within the family or neighborhood, however, there are possibilities for teaching children to exercise gifts and talents as entertainers. We should encourage children to make their own games and not just to rely on commercial products for entertainment. We should similarly invite our offspring to participate in the planning of social events, including family vacations, birthday parties, holiday celebrations and neighborhood gatherings. It might be helpful for some children if parents simply limit the availability of manufactured entertainment during particular hours or on given days. Especially for children, spontaneous play is often the most entertaining, creative activity.

Family Entertainment

Unless parents consciously promote family-oriented entertainment in their homes, the marketing of popular products will tend to isolate family members. The vast majority of entertainment products are sold to particular taste groups represented largely by demographics such as age. Teenagers, for example, tend to consume television shows, movies and music that are marketed to their own generation. An age difference of even five years can make an enormous difference as to which radio stations and movies teenagers prefer.

Parents would do well to offset this generational segmentation with cross-generational, family-oriented entertainment. It may require a bit of give-and-take on the part of each family member, but there are worthwhile entertainment products and events that all ages can enjoy. Local theaters and video-movie stores are among the best options. In order to attract local patrons, theater groups frequently perform musicals and accessible classics of the stage. Many video shops cater to families, providing special store areas designated for family-oriented films.

Family-oriented entertainment also gives parents an opportunity to transcend some of the highbrow versus lowbrow distinctions that separate many children and adults. Unless parents provide interesting fine-art entertainment for their offspring, children will gravitate almost exclusively toward popular art. And many parents will not appreciate any of their children’s popular art unless they take the time to view and listen with their offspring. Therefore, parents should be encouraged to share entertainment time and money with children, especially adolescents.

Entertainment and Identity

Finally, contemporary entertainment frequently becomes a status symbol for people of all ages to establish a meaningful identity. Like other consumer products, entertainment says much about the individuals who purchase and display it. Entertainment often has a status value which transcends the mere entertainment value.

Teenagers are most susceptible to this type of identity formation. They wear shirts, for example, that publicly advertise their favorite rock music groups. Also, they compare themselves on the basis of who has seen the most popular movies or been to the biggest musical concerts. Stereo music systems are not just a means of listening to music, but for many teens they are also a symbol of cultural power and personal cultural relevance. In fact, access to adult-oriented video movies, such as R-rated films, is an important sign of a teenager’s coming of age in many communities.

In contemporary consumer cultures, however, the identity value of entertainment extends across the generations. Individuals and even entire families define their social standing partly by access to entertainment products and, increasingly, by the purchase of entertainment technologies. Every new technological frontier, from personal miniradios to enormous television screens, advances the requirements for membership in the electronic status clubs. As soon as one identity is “purchased,” the status frontier has shifted to a new arena, casting a shadow over the old identity. Even young children play this status game, comparing themselves on the basis of personal TVs, video games, VCRs and audio systems.

From a Christian perspective, the whole concept of consumption-oriented identities is problematic, and entertainment-based status competitions may be among the most troubling of all. Christ looks not at our external consumption—what we are pretending to be by what we purchase and display—but at the heart of the individual believer (1 Samuel 16:7). When our hearts are focused on acquiring entertainment products and technologies, we are defining our value by the standards of the world, not by the heavenly standards of the kingdom of God. In some cases, this misplaced identity actually represents the love of entertainment rather than the love of God and neighbor. Moreover, the love of self is contingent upon the acquisition of entertainment; the image of God is replaced by the identity of entertainment-derived social status.

The Discernment of Entertainment

Entertainment is an important area of life for Christians to exercise discernment (Psalm 119:125). Such discernment should take three forms: (1) stewardship of one’s time, (2) wise selection of entertainment and (3) critical use of entertainment.

Godly use of entertainment first requires a stewardship of leisure time. It is too easy to fill nonwork time with personal entertainment, thereby living without deep and rewarding relations with God, family and friends. Entertainment should have an important but carefully limited place in the lives of Christians.

In addition, it is imperative that Christians select the most valuable or worthwhile entertainment to fill this limited time (Phil. 4:8). Because of the entertainment glut especially in industrialized societies, people often feel the need to consume entertainment with a kind of thoughtless frenzy, for fear they will miss out on enjoyable products. Video stores, record shops, cable TV, broadcast TV and movie theaters encourage this frenzy by regularly changing their products. Instead of being duped easily by the consumerist onslaught, Christians should seek helpful, critical information about entertainment products before investing time or money.

Finally, Christians are called to be on guard against the false prophets of every age, even as those prophets are represented in the seemingly benign forms of entertainment (2 Peter 2:1). Popular art is never culturally neutral but is instead an expression of values and beliefs usually forged by audience-minded entrepreneurs. Our task is not to enjoy this entertainment uncritically, but to help ourselves, our children and our communities see it for what it really is. Then we may truly celebrate the best and the most entertaining of the lot.

» See also: Computer Games

» See also: Games

» See also: Hobbies and Crafts

» See also: Leisure

» See also: Mass Media

» See also: Pleasure

» See also: Rest

» See also: Sabbath

References and Resources

A. M. Greeley, God in Popular Culture (Chicago: Thomas More Press, 1988); K. A. Myers, All God’s Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular Culture (Westchester, Ill.: Crossway Books, 1989); N. Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (New York: Viking, 1985); Q. J. Schultze, Winning Your Kids Back from the Media (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1994), also available in a five-part video series with Gospel Films; Q. J. Schultze et al., Dancing in the Dark: Youth, Popular Culture and the Electronic Media (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991).

—Quentin J. Schultze