What with my first school volunteering sessions and tummy bugs (the Joker had it and then gave it to me – yuck) last week, posting has been a bit slack and now I’m off on a minister’s wives’ conference for most of this week. I’m looking forward to spending the next few days thinking about God and catching up with some old friends. So all the stuff I’ve been thinking about posting will have to wait a few days. I had thought I might blog from the last conference I was on, but once I was there I remembered that there’s far too much encouraging and interesting talking to do.
In the meantime, just wanted to note that a Home Office report issued last week agrees with me about Lads’ Mags (see my sidebox on the subject). Mind you, it’s funny how the Times is happy to link to the smutty mag Nuts on their webpage. Maybe they get advertising money for click throughs.
Don't shop here unless you want an eyeful
The supermarkets seem to have already clocked that these mags are unsuitable for kids and are now shielding them and placing them on the top shelves. Not, alas, the music and media chain HMV, it seems.
The Vicar and I were in their Birmingham Bullring shop recently and were confronted by a display of Zoo etc as we queued to pay up. I complained to the assistant who served us, but was rather batted off as he agreed with me but didn’t offer to refer the matter to the manager.
HMV is a shop much used by teenagers, and in Birmingham they force their customers to confront this porn – it’s not an option since the mags are right by the tills. I’ve not written to them yet, but I guess I should take the step. They don’t make it easy – there’s no customer service complaints email address on their website (rather like HMRC, but that’s another story). I like shopping at HMV, but I’ll not be able to until the porn is removed from the checkout.
The Vicar's Wife 
I’d be very pleased if the lads smut got ditched, but there’ll still be a massive problem with the ladies mags.
I’m sure that there’s a broad spectrum that ranges from OK/Hello/Take a break to Red and Cosmopolitan but they seem to be just as damaging to a right understanding of life, possibly more so as teenage girls would probably not be as shy about reading them as boys might be about reading Loaded.
I take your point about the girls’ mags, peterB. Our old vicar used to say that Good Housekeeping was as bad as porn because of the worldview it promoted.
Because the lads’ mags assault us visually from the rack they attract more attention. And you don’t have to read them to be confronted by their worldview.
Hmmm, pondering on this and struggling.
True enough.
I’m glad you enjoyed the conference. Our vicars wive had to pull out at the last minute through illness 😦
I’m currently trying to figure out a policy on Disney Princesses for our daugher (3 years old later this month). She loves dressing up as a fairy, but I don’t know about the morality of Snow White etc. The songs are great and I don’t want her to be a social outcast at school over it, there will surely be pleanty of other issues after all!
Welcome to the Vicarage, Almost Stewardship. Praying that God would help you in your struggles.
Hi peterB. Gosh, I’ve not thought that deeply about the Disney Princesses (although we don’t like the way that the Little Mermaid disses parental authority), although we’re not huge fans here. I think the main point that a 3yo would get would be the triumph of good over evil. It’s good to watch things together and then talk. That way our kids learn to analyse the morality of what confronts them, not hide themselves away from the world.
I’m pretty sure that we are on safe ground, particularly with snow white, which has the best songs any way (and that’s what really matters to me). I don’t know who did the analysis in that image link I posted, but it made me think twice… it’s so easy to blindly accept things as being okay because they’re traiditional kids stuff.
My struggle is how do we be part of the world and yet not in it – or is it that we should be in it and not part of it.
Unless there is an attractive alternative (wholesome etc) I am not sure what can be done and with Christian Book Shops going bust does that indicate that the market is not there – and if it is not there does that mean that the Church (in the generic and non-denominational sense) has failed.
Being ‘in’ but not ‘of’ is something which Christians have always struggled with, and I guess it’s a matter of deciding on some ground on which you will stand firm, and then using your best judgement with the rest.
I have found it a lot harder to judge as a dad though.
I understand why a couple of our friends are homeschooling, but we’ve opted for the state primary down the road (no church school in walking distance). It matters enormously to our 5 year old son that he can watch things like The Incredibles, but it really pushed the boundaries of what we’re instinctively comfortable with.
I think there’s a feeling that you need to keep your kids uncontaminated by the world for as long as you can, and we easily forget that they’re already wretched sinful idolaters.
In terms of our kids, I’m tending to think it’s enough to want them to be different because they love Jesus, without adding to the ‘outcast’ unnecessarily.
It’s a struggle to get the balance, isn’t it? We’ve not had a tv licence since we were married nearly 15 years ago and the kids have grown up on a dvd diet. We’ve just decided that it’s time to take the plunge – the Queen has been feeling very out of the loop for not watching the X-Factor last winter. So a licence and set-top box beckon for this autumn. There’s also the 2012 Olympics to factor in, mind you…
I’m not sure Christian bookshops are going under because Christians are not buying. I suspect they are buying online, rather than on the High St. I often use Amazon & the Book Depository for my Christian books. And of course, there’s The Good Book Company, 10 of Those and Eden.
You’re right that people increasingly buy online rather than in a bookshop – hence Borders UK going out of business, and Wesley Owen / STL UK going into administration. Note, both their US counterparts are going fine. There wasn’t the commitment from the bosses, to the UK market. But also, if those Christians who know what the good books are, buy them online, then what’s left in the Christian bookshops are those which are popular, so the less discerning person walks in and that’s all they find. In other words, if the ‘strong’ just do what’s more convenient for themselves, they undermine the weak. Rather than contributing to demand for good stock in a local bookshop, and then going there to buy / order, and chat / minister to others as they browse/buy.
Hi étrangère
We love to buy books in Christian bookshops, but don’t often get the opportunity where we live – the nearest ones are a good drive/tram journey away. Guaranteed we’ll come back with a haul from CLC every time we’re in Birmingham tho’!
I’m actually thinking about starting some sort of bookstall in church too, as I don’t think many church members get to Christian bookshops very often either.
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