Conspire Day 1--Session 1

I meant to write and post this last night, but Lucy and I were having too much fun talking!

Here are the points that stood out to me from Session 1, "Discipled by Culture," by Phil Vischer (creator of Veggie Tales).
-More people in America have a TV than a fridge or indoor plumbing.
-"Electronic media in our lives is not optional--it's a necessity."
-2 out of 3 8-18 year olds have a TV in their bedroom.
-1 out of 3 0-6 year olds have a TV in their bedroom.
-1 out of 5 children under the age of 1 have a TV in their bedroom.
-Most kids have most of the media, most of the time.
-8-18 year olds have 7 hours and 50 minutes of daily media content in 5 hours of media time--kids are using multiple forms of media at a time.
-25% of 8-18 year olds come from homes where the TV is unrestricted and always on.
-Kids engage in media more than anything else except sleep.
-Kids today spend less time watching programs w/ clearly adult themes. There are more programs designed specifically for them.
-But, there's less motivation to create family programming because of this. There isn't a family to watch family programming0--they're all watching TV in separate rooms.

So how does this affect kids?
-As they get older, they're wanting to move on, they're wanting to grow up.
-"By segregating kids, when they decide they're too old for kids shows, they fall off a cliff."
-We are compressing childhood. They're outgrowing kids shows before they're ready for adult themes.
-They are losing a sense of adulthood. Adult programming is shaping a kid's perspective of what adulthood is. We have idealized a point in the lifestyle of humans-giving them a spring break mentality. They are between obeying parents and having responsibility.
-Compartmentalization of faith--Go from church all about God to shows where there is no God and there is no church. Kids see that God exists only on Sunday and the rest of the week He is gone.
-Advancing a new religion of fun. Everything is about fun. Fun, as a concept, is absent from the Bible. Kids think they have to be having fun every minute of the day.
-"Kids [TV] programming is marshmallow peeps--empty calories."

Things We Can Do
1. Do we need to fill our churches with media? It's all about content. The most affective teaching device in a class environment is you. You can love, have relationships.
-Help parents--they are clueless. We have to help the parents. the Kids' brains are overweight stuffed with peep media.