Today, i've found myself thinking a lot about how entertainment impacts our lives, the consequences of that impact, and what can be learned about people by studying entertainment. Now, this is a rather complicated and difficult subject and there are a variety of perspectives that people have. This post has the potential to be a novel on the subject, but i will attempt to be brief while explaining my observations and conclusions.
I suppose the first thing that needs to be addressed is the question: What is "entertainment"? This is a very hard question. For the purpose of keeping us all on the same page (HEYO!), i refer you to the wiktionary definition: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/entertainment. I have copied and pasted the relevant definition below for the lazy/bandwidth limited among you:
An activity designed to give pleasure or relaxation to an audience, no matter whether the audience participates passively as in watching opera or a movie, or actively as in games.
So now that you understand how i'm choosing to define entertainment, we can move on to more interesting observations. I want to start by posing the question: What qualifies as entertainment? Well shoot, just about everything I do qualifies as entertainment. I mean, i'm a sports fan (check!), i love watching movies (check!), i enjoy listening to music (check!), i like hanging out with friends (check!), playing cards (check!), chatting with my wife (check!), browsing facebook (check!), sex (check!), going to church (hmmm, am i allowed to check this one?), etc. Ok, so maybe listing all of the things that i do that are entertainment isn't the best way to do this. How about the things that are not entertainment? This leaves work (most of the time), commuting, and flossing. I hate flossing, it gives me no pleasure or relaxation whatsoever. That's why i cannot remember the last time i flossed. I'm pretty sure people who work in dentist offices must have side bets going about how many people they can get to lie about flossing. I never lie to them. I proudly announce that I do not recall the last time I flossed. I then promptly get put in my place about proper dental hygiene. Sure... like that's supposed to help. That just prevents me from coming back.
Wow, i just wrote 8 sentences about flossing/dentists. My apologies. But, i feel like i have safely established that flossing is not entertainment. Well, that is unless you're talking about the bets being made by dentists. Sigh... (Girl look at that body!)
Anyway, back to the entertainment deal. I've always been under the impression that entertainment should comprise a small part of my life, as there are better/more productive/holy/wholesome ways to spend my time. And yet, here I am and it seems my life is dominated by what appears to be entertainment. Plus, I really love my job and derive great pleasure from it. Also, I love doing things with/for my church. So really, for me it's commuting and flossing. One of those we've established doesn't occur, so it's just commuting. So, for 7.5 hours per week, i'm not experiencing some form of entertainment. For good measure, I'm going to add 7 hours to that total, because i'm sure i'm forgetting something. So, 14.5 hours/168 hours in the week brings me to 8.6% of my week not spent on entertainment. This leaves 91.4% of my time is spent on what i consider entertainment. WOW!
Now, i feel like i need to qualify this a little bit. I'm obscenely optimistic. Those of you who know me, and that's probly all of you, know I'm an optimist. It's not even like i have a choice in the matter. It has been ingrained in me since i was very little, and i no longer have to try and see the positive in things. Shoot, i had a hard time adding commuting to my list of "non-entertainment activities" because i listen to the radio on my way to work. And quite enjoy it for that matter. So, some of my information might be a bit skewed. But, i think that upon inspection, many of you spend huge amounts of your lives on entertainment.
All right... where am i going with this? The impact of entertainment on our lives. I love reading books, watching movies, browsing facebook, watching sports and listening to music because it takes me away from where i currently am and allows me to experience other perspectives. I love playing cards, hanging out with people, participating in church, chatting with my wife, and working because it broadens my own personal experiences and sphere of influence (both incoming and outgoing). These two lists have very different impacts. One is taking me away from myself and the other is refining myself. Now, certainly the music we listen to and the movies we watch impact our thoughts, opinions and beliefs. Perhaps this is more like research. Anyway, what i'm getting at is there are different types of entertainment.
I'm not going to define what a good "ratio" of entertainment types are. I really don't know, and I'm inclined to think that it is very dependent on stage of life and individual personality. What i would say is that it's important to evaluate the way you spend your time. As a Christian, there are things that scripture says i need to be doing and areas of my life that i need to be working on. This is not preventing me from enjoying entertainment, but instead making sure that i'm choosing entertainment that is healthy. For me, improving my quality of life, depth of faith, and relationships with those around me provides me much pleasure and therefore counts as entertainment in my book.
I'm curious to hear your thoughts on entertainment, so please share in the comment section. I have also decided to continue to add disclaimers to my list, but to do so at the end of current posts.
Disclaimer:
8. I am a sports fan. I can talk moderately intelligently about most mainstream sports (including golf and NASCAR but not including WNBA, fishing, and canadian football). My team allegiances are defined by where I am living at the time in which i become a fan. For example, I have always been a football fan and was born in northwestern PA. This makes me a Steelers fan. I didn't start liking baseball until i lived in Colorado. This makes me a Rockies fan. There are many great things to be learned from sports (team work, self improvement, practice, determination, etc.) and there are many bad things that come with sports in America (idolatry, drunkenness, greed, violence, etc.). I do my best to take advantage of the first set, and avoid the second.
9. I really enjoy plays on words. Puns, pop references, jokes. It will not be unusual to see one or two work their way into a post. Some are better than others, but that has rarely prevented me from sharing them. Enjoy or ignore, whichever is your preference.
I just realized i spent almost no time discussing what can be learned by observing others' choices in entertainment. Perhaps this will be addressed in a future post.
ReplyDeleteAre we calling Nascar and Golf sports now? Also, I think we need a better definition of entertainment if you are including sleep.
ReplyDeleteI can think of no activity that passes time quicker or is more relaxing than sleep. As for golf and NASCAR being sports, i have no good response, mostly because i'm not sure what else to call them. Sport is the closest word i can come up with.
DeleteSo, I think there are some other things that probably qualify as non-entertainment...which would boost that 14.5 hours a week up a little higher. (using the bathroom, cleaning - vacuuming, dishes, dusting, etc., laundry, showering) Plus, I think that naps might be in the entertainment category because those are specific choices you make to feel better...but nightly sleep is a requirement, so kind of doesn't fit in as well.
ReplyDeleteI'd be really curious to hear your perspectives on what one learns from observing others' choices of entertainment. I think that, to an extent, what people choose for entertainment can give someone a glimpse into their persona. However, just because someone watches a horror movie does not mean they enjoy the aspect of people getting murdered...or just because someone watches a tv show with bad language does not mean they condone the use of it. Right??
Warning: this may not be too profound.
DeleteObserving, and drawing conclusions from others' choices in entertainment is quite challenge and inexact at best. I've found the most reliable way to use the information is in predicting what that person may or may not like next. But when looking at someone's choices in entertainment it seems like the best gauge isn't the content of the entertainment as much as the "tone." You'll hear this debate between parents and kids all the time when it comes to modern music. The kids like the songs because they are catchy and fun, where as the parents don't want them listening due to the sex/drugs/partying/violence in the lyrics. I feel that the same goes for all types of entertainment. I particularly enjoy action adventure movies, but that doesn't mean i'm going to be going around shooting up random places/jumping out of planes. Look at the content often found within an action movie, and you'll get an insight into who i am. They usually have a mystery/problem of some sort, there is generally a group working toward a common goal, there is a clear leader in said group (and probably someone who resents them), there is lots of comedic relief, and there is a little adrenaline laced adventure thrown in. All of those point to aspects of me that I place value on. I like to have a little excitement, work with people, and have a lot of good laughs. Now, this is a clear cut example. Other examples are not so clear. Such as horror movies. Perhaps a person likes them because of the fear that it causes them to feel. Maybe they like them because it means they get to get close to a person they are watching with (standard high school horror movie date night). So, while observing someone's tastes in entertainment can give you insight, there is much that is left to a mystery.
Perhaps a better scenario is to observe one's choices in entertainment over a period of time and draw conclusions from there. For example, in the last several years my personal taste in music has drifted somewhat dramatically. Looking back, there is a clear correlation between various events in my life that directly affected what music i would listen to. This application is, of course, more useful when trying to figure out if something is wrong with someone you're close to. BUT!!!!! I've also found that even something as small as getting cut off on the way to work has made me listen to metal music for a solid 3 hours, so use caution when drawing conclusions here. As always, your conclusions will be greatly improved if you have tons of data to work with.
I was also wondering if your analysis classified sleep as entertainment. I assume so, since it gives relaxation.
ReplyDeleteAlso: these text boxes with the random characters required to post on here are extremely aggravating.