“
The big problem is the medium itself. You are passive. You sit and watch a box.
”
While I agree in general that kids should be playing, reading, running around screaming, etc., rather than only sitting inside and watching, I don’t think that watching is in itself not doing. It would be as easy to say reading is not doing and therefore not valuable for learning; and, in fact, that’s exactly what people did say about novels when they first came out. Is watching a play not doing? Or a movie? There is a thought process that goes on inside, and we can connnect with other people and with God through popular culture by seeing human experience played out before us…as we watch. Jesus told stories, after all, and advised Mary to sit passively at his feet (http://www.biblegateway.com/bible?passage=Luke+10:38-42). Going out and acting should accompany and follow watching, but both are necessary.
“One is not idle because one is absorbed. There is both visible and invisible labor. To contemplate is to toil. To think is to do.”
— Victor Hugo
amanda
Sep 28 2002
10:52 pm
“
The big problem is the medium itself. You are passive. You sit and watch a box.
”
While I agree in general that kids should be playing, reading, running around screaming, etc., rather than only sitting inside and watching, I don’t think that watching is in itself not doing. It would be as easy to say reading is not doing and therefore not valuable for learning; and, in fact, that’s exactly what people did say about novels when they first came out. Is watching a play not doing? Or a movie? There is a thought process that goes on inside, and we can connnect with other people and with God through popular culture by seeing human experience played out before us…as we watch. Jesus told stories, after all, and advised Mary to sit passively at his feet (http://www.biblegateway.com/bible?passage=Luke+10:38-42). Going out and acting should accompany and follow watching, but both are necessary.
“One is not idle because one is absorbed. There is both visible and invisible labor. To contemplate is to toil. To think is to do.”
— Victor Hugo