In the last 20 years or so every time something vaguely magic or witchcraft related becomes a part of popular fiction and/or culture it seems there a ready made fundamentalist group ready to vigorously condemn it as indicative of the increasing decay in American Christian values.
And yet, in seaching my memory as youngster, I don’t really recall any fundamentalist furor (possibly I missed it) when “Bewitched” was on the air from 1964 to 1972.
Why was it OK then, but it’s not OK now?
My WAG is that kids weren’t becoming Wiccans back then, so shows like Bewitched weren’t seen to have the effect of turning America’s youth away from the path of righteousness.
Jack Chick was awake and alert to the danger; he knew that Bewitched was Satan’s favorite tv program, even in reruns. His tract quoutes Satan “…that show paved the way for all our occult and vampire programing viewed by Millions today.”
Did fundies watch television back then? I remember, circa 1969, someone on the street handing me a Bible tract called “Why Jesus Doesn’t Watch Television.”
I think it was only after the televangelists exploded on the airwaves that most—but not all—fundies changed their minds about it.
Its coz Sam was WAY more sexy than Harry Potter is…
Can’t get rid of your guilty pleasures.
My church was definately anti-Betwitched in the 70s. It was inviting Satan into your home to watch that show.
I recall X Files being considered the worst.
Recent wise.
What about the Addams Family?
:eek:
There were lots of things people didn’t used to get upset about that they do today. There are things that are done today that weren’t done back then. Over the years, it has been an escalating tit for tat (which may be a pun of sorts). You complain about me doing this then I’ll complain about you doing that. You are doing some new extreme thing, so I’ll go to the extreme another way. You say I’m not being politically correct, so I’ll start quoting the Bible. The extreme right and extreme left are getting to be a rock and a hard place and the rest of us are caught in the middle. 
It may not have been a fundamental Christian movement against Bewitched but as a child who grew up in a foursquare church with moderate fundamentalism, I was not allowed to watch the reruns ( I was born in 1972) specifically because of the witchcraft. My parents (before they divorced & my mother came out of the closet) were Focus on the Family wannabes.
It seems there was another witchcraft based show I wasn’t allowed to watch but it must not have made that much of an impression. I do remember reading “movie reviews” in Christian newsletters of Disney cartoons that made the “The Little Mermaid” sound like the “Biggest Mer-Whore in Disney”.
Like Homebrew and Smokinjbc said, there were certainly a lot of individual churches that frowned upon shows like Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie and parents that didn’t allow their children to watch them. When I was living in a group home for boys in the early nineties, we had a counselor who wasn’t allowed to watch Bewitched when she was a child and I seem to remember her telling us that if she ever had children, she wouldn’t let them watch it, either. This was before the first Harry Potter book was published, of course, but I don’t imagine she thinks too highly of them, either.
A couple of years ago, I worked with a young woman whose parents never let her watch The Wizard of Oz when she was a kid, presumably because of the witches, one of them a “good” witch.
The difference between fundies then and fundies now is that present day fundies are more vocal and media savvy. It’s no longer enough to prevent their own children and their churches’ children from reading Harry Potter and watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Oh, no. They’re on a crusade to… Oh, nevermind. I have nothing to say about this that hasn’t been said a million times before. There’s no point in beating a dead horse.
Ah, the sweet relief of apathy!
Well, its not like Disney has that many other Mer-Whores . . .
I suspect it’s because between 1964 and 1972, there was no “communications revolution” going on.
Back then, if you wanted to get your message out on the mass media, you had to pay. Either that, or own the TV or radio station. Sure, there were nutball evangelists who owned radio stations, but a radio station can only broadcast so far.
Back then, there were all of three national networks, and getting any kind of major message onto them cost an arm and a leg. As a rule, the serious nutballs just don’t have that kind of money. Consequently, the only way to get the nutty message out was via tracts and mailings, newsletters, that sort of thing.
Nowadays, communication is different. We have a million TV channels, and the Internet, for potato’s sake.
ANY kind of weird-assed message can go national. We live in a world where a fat kid playing Jedi Knight can go from totally unknown to internationally famous, totally by accident…
Well, its not like Disney has that many other Mer-Whores . . .>>
Dread
LOL… good point…
I forgot too, I did get in trouble once for pretending to be a witch (probably around Halloween). I also got grounded when I brought home “Mysteries of the Unexplained” by Readers Digest (that was an awesome book LOL) from the library when I was 12.
I’m sure the Harry Potter books would have been off limits if they came out earlier. We did celebrate Halloween but were not allowed to be any supernatural, monster or witch type character and our church had a Halloween (officially called a Autumn Festival) party that also banned any devil, witch, monster or ghost costumes.
I was allowed to read Chronicles of Narnia (thankfully) that has more than its share of magic & witches, but since it was written by C.S Lewis- it was ok.
Further comments inspired by MidnightRadio. Before the mid to late 70s, Fundamentalists actively eschewed politics. That changed with the founding of the Moral Majority in 1979 by Jerry Falwell. The religious right became activist, mostly by being anti-everything secular. For a great in-depth look at the fundamentalist movement, pick up The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong.
Further comments inspired by MidnightRadio. Before the mid to late 70s, Fundamentalists actively eschewed politics. That changed with the founding of the Moral Majority in 1979 by Jerry Falwell. The religious right became activist, mostly by being anti-everything secular. For a great in-depth look at the fundamentalist movement, pick up The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong.
Thanks Homebrew. I have a note to read her book The History of God and I will add The Battle for God to the list.