"The Stranger"..short essay, sent by a friend.

THE STRANGER
>
> Author Unknown
>
> A few months before I was born my dad met a stranger who
> was new to our small town. From the beginning, Dad was
> fascinated with this enchanting newcomer, and soon invited
> him to live with our family. The stranger was quickly accepted
> and was around to welcome me into the world a few months
> later.
>
> As I grew up, I never questioned his place in our family. Mom
> taught me to love the Word of God, and Dad taught me to obey
> it. But the stranger was our storyteller. he could weave the
> most
> fascinating tales. Adventures, mysteries, and comedies were
> daily conversations. he could hold our whole family spellbound
> for hours each evening.
>
> He was like a friend to the whole family. He took Dad, my
> brother, and me to our first major league baseball game. He
> was always encouraging us to see the movies, and he even
> made arrangements to introduce us to several movie stars.
>
> The stranger was incessant talker. Dad didn't seem to mind,
> but sometimes Mom would quietly get up--while the rest of us
> were enthralled with one of his stories of faraway places--go
> to her room, read her Bible, and pray. I wonder now if she ever
>
> prayed that the stranger would leave.
>
> You see, my Dad ruled our household with certain moral
> convictions. But this stranger never felt an obligation to
> honor them. Profanity, for example, was not allowed in
> our house -- not from us, from our friends, or from adults.
>
> Our longtime visitor, however, used occasional four-letter
> words that burned my ears and made Dad squirm. To my
> knowledge, the stranger was never confronted.
>
> My Dad was a teetotaler who didn't permit alcohol in his
> home--not even for cooking. But the stranger felt as if we
> needed exposure and enlightened us to other ways of life.
> He offered us beer and other alcoholic beverages often.
> He made cigarettes look tasty, cigars manly, and pipes
> distinguished.
>
> He talked freely about sex. His comments were sometimes
> blatant, sometimes suggestive, and generally embarrassing.
> I know now that my early concepts of the man/woman relation-
> ship were influenced by the stranger.
>
> As I look back, I believe it was the grace of God that the
> stranger did not influence us more. Time after time, he
> opposed the values of our parents, yet he was seldom
> rebuked, and he was never asked to leave.
>
> More than 55 years have passed since the stranger
> moved in with us, but if I were to walk into my mom's
> home today, I would still see him sitting there waiting
> for someone to listen to his stories and watch him draw
> his pictures.
>
> His name? We always just called him . . . TV.

I mean, the end result is good. TV is evil. But the way they get there is just so - ignorant and authoritarian and babyish.

We need to stop blaming the faceless media for our own faults.