Making wise media choices

A little more than a year ago I wrote down five goals on a white board attached to my fridge.  I chose a white board over a blackboard because I'm a huge racist.  One of the goals I wrote down was "make wise media choices."  Of all five goals, this and praying in the morning are the most difficult.  Every now and then, I like to watch an episode of South Park.  Nearly every day, I like to listen to the Adam Carolla show.  These two programs can get pretty crass, but there's something I like about each of them.

With South Park, it's just good, pure satire.  I don't think satire gets any better than South Park.  I think that episodes of South Park are typically spot-on with their criticisms and examples.  I think it takes a brain to really enjoy the satire of South Park.  The only other shows to have this level of satire are early episodes of The Simpsons (seasons 1 through about 6), and the first three seasons of Family Guy (and only the first three seasons because anything after that is just garbage).  One thing about these three shows is that they can also be enjoyed on the lower level; that is, potty humor, cursing, and pop culture references that go nowhere (I'm looking at YOU, Family Guy).  So while some watch these shows just for a cheap laugh with cursing or whatever, I'm looking at the deeper meaning regarding politics and things like that.  That's what I enjoy about South Park.

With Adam Carolla, I like how he's smart.  He and I have the same philosophy when it comes to entertainment while at the gym or while doing manual labor.  He says "let's listen to smart people talking."  I agree completely.  That's one of the reasons why I love Prager University on YouTube.  However, sometimes Adam has guests that are just...depraved.  Some of them are just perverts.  I don't want to listen to a pervert talk about how many prostitutes he's been with.  I want to hear from a man who talks about how much he loves his wife and how he takes her with him whenever he goes out of town.  The show I listened to today had such a pervert on and I just couldn't listen anymore.  It's like: I don't need to have those thoughts running through my head.

So instead of listening to that, I listened to the music that was playing at the gym (which is usually trash, but was actually good today), and then I queued up scriptures on my phone.   That's what I listened to for the rest of my workout.  I can't say that I got much out of it, but at least it wasn't perversion.  I'd rather listen to a very dry chemistry lecture than hear some pervert talk about his sexual exploits.

I think with making wise media choices, you need to make the decision first about which variety of media you will consume.  So if I decide to watch a movie or a television show, I may want to watch Full House or The X-Files instead of Beverly Hills 90210.  Holy crap I'm old.  I think that I will continue to listen to Adam Carolla and I'll occasionally watch South Park, but I'm going to be more selective in the future.  After all, that's what program guides are for, right?