Brain Fertilizer

Excerpted from my reply to comments on the previous entry:

I admit this wasn't simply an immediate principled stand I decided to take. I hadn't gone to see movies in a theater or rented a movie in over a year.
Lately, I've been thinking more about the messages Hollywood communicates to us. Mel Gibson's The Passion and Hollywood's reaction to it beforehand...as well as its embrace of the movie after the box office receipts were clear, well it kind of casts Hollywood and its values in stark contrast with mine. I'm tired of the casual sex in Hollywood. I'm tired of how they confuse attraction with love and clearly have no clue what part commitment and marriage should have before sexual intimacy.
I don't like their idea of a story, as well. I don't like the way that they portray violence: usually displaying all the depth and understanding of 12-year-old boys talking about sex. Example: the bad guy lays down his gun and surrendurs,the good guy reluctantly has to refrain from shooting him, then the bad guy invariably betrays that mercy with a cheapshot and the good guy gets to kill in self-defense. It seems to me this reveals that Hollywood hates the idea of a heinous murderer going through the court system and getting the death sentence, but has no way to give any satisfaction with the idea of the really bad guy getting life in prison with the possibility of parole after 20 years....or is at least incapable explaining why they feel that way to the rubes they are trying to fleece out of $8.50 a ticket.
And movies are too short, anyway, for subtlety and depth. Television is even worse. One bonus for me in watching Chinese productions is they have 20-episode television programs: that's a length you can really explore character and craft some moral messages; and they do, very capably. When US television programs have a running plot, they deliberately attempt to avoid giving any decent resolution (see: X-Files), because the producers, writers, actors, and network will try to milk more seasons just to make more money. Artistic integrity is always below the almighty dollar in Hollywood, and I'm sick of it.
And even if there is something out there that avoids all these problems (maybe Deadwood or the Sopranos?), Hollywood is still mainly about bucks and celebrity and eye-candy. I'm sick of that, too. There's very little out there that stimulates the mind as well as a good book, and what little there is is usually crap for other reasons. Give me a good book any day, one I can revisit at will. Books can handle deep ideas and complex issues far more capably than Hollywood.
Well, I'm done with Hollywood. I'm sick of Michael Moore, and I'm sick of the idiots in Hollywood who support crap like that. I'm sick of their media induced delusions of importance. I'm sick of what they use their money and fame and influence for.
Screw them. I may not be able to do anything significant to bring them down a notch, but at least I'm no longer selling my life in prepackaged increments.
So I'm forgoing an hour or two of mindless entertainment each weekend. Or compared to some people, maybe I'm throwing away 3 hours of mindless entertainment every night. So what? I get to keep my time, spend it with my kids, or reading, or studying to improve myself, or playing guitar. My mind and my time are my own, not Hollywood's.