Breakdown of a Civilization

THE BREAKDOWN OF A CIVILIZATION
By
DeBorn Luzer

Some years ago, and several times since, I watched a movie titled The Gods Must Be Crazy. For those of you who haven’t seen it yet, see it, but I’ll give you a brief synopsis of the story. An American pilot was flying across Africa and drinking a bottle of Coke. When he emptied the bottle he pushed back the canopy on the plane and threw it out. It fell to ground with a hollow, musical sound and landed in the midst of a Pygmy settlement. As the little Pygmies gathered around this strange thing and talked among themselves they finally decided that it was a gift from the gods and that they should be thankful and learn to utilize it because surely the gods knew what they needed.

Up until this moment in time the Pygmies lived a simple, sharing, communal type of life. They helped each other with work, shared the task of hunting, fishing, and finding food for everyone, helped each other raise children and took turns teaching them vital skills. The entire tribe pitched in when someone was injured and couldn’t perform their share of the duties until the injured one was up and around once again. There was no problem with jealousy, or envy, or greed because no one person owned anything individually. There was no crime problem, no murders, and no thefts. You can’t steal what you already own a share of. All in all, the little Pygmies lived in peace and harmony with each other and with Nature. Life was good for them. Until the Coke bottle came, that is.

One found that you could use the bottle to roll out dough smoother than ever, another found that you could make music by blowing over the top, and still another found that you could dip the top in dye and decorate loin cloths with pretty round circles. Yet another found that you could use it to carry water on a hike and one even found that you could use it to crush berries and nuts in a bowl. Pretty soon each one wanted to use it for their particular function and arguments began to break out. Before long, there were schemes and trickery to get it away from whoever had it and shortly there were even physical fights. The pygmy’s whole way of life, their peace and serenity, and their innocence had been destroyed by this gift. The council finally met and decided that it was not a gift from the gods but was, instead, a trick from the demons and was an evil thing. They finally gave it to a trusted member of the tribe and told him to take it and go throw it off the end of the world. His trip is part of the rest of the movie.

I’ve told you all this for a reason. Liken now, if you will, the dropping of the television into our midst with the Coke bottle. The first television I remember was dropped into our little community and landed in Mr. Raleigh Jones’ little country store. We all just assumed it was a gift from the gods because it was so magical and wonderful. You could see and hear people from all over the world, watch cartoons, catch up on the news, and see the Big Top Circus every Saturday. We began to worship this strange new thing and give it all of our attention. Soon televisions were dropping into homes all over the neighborhood and retail stores began stocking up on them. Soon thieves were breaking into homes and retail stores and stealing them.

We should have been as acute at understanding as the Pygmies were but we decided to keep this wonderful thing and exploit it to its fullest. Soon families stopped visiting other families, dinners were no longer eaten at the table and families stopped talking to other family members. T.V. trays became popular so that you could eat while in the living room watching a favorite program. Homework began to be done while lying on the floor by the soft glow of light coming from the television, if homework got done at all. Babysitters became unemployed because a parent could now just sit the kid down in front of the television and turn on several hours of animation. Fights began to break out between siblings over what channel each one wanted to watch. To overcome this more televisions were dropped into other rooms of the homes and each family member could isolate themselves to watch what they wanted, sometimes going for days without seeing any other family member. Children stopped playing outside in the fresh air and sunshine and began to be pale and sickly. They also became obstinate about going to bed at night because they wanted to see the end of a program and would have to be dragged from the bed the next day, ill-mannered and cranky. Today, we have become totally dependent on television to tell us what to think, how to dress, how to act, who to vote for, and to entertain us without our having to use our imaginations at all. After watching some of today’s sitcoms I don’t think the writers and producers even have to use their imaginations, either.

Do y’all see the parallel here with the television and the Coke bottle? Good! Let’s get the councils together, condemn this strange thing as an evil thing, throw it off the end of the world, and get back to our peace and communal living. But, let’s don’t act hasty. "Gunsmoke" still has a half an hour left to watch.