Bad Idea -- Listening To The Radio

I had to drive an hour away from my house to help my wife at her parents' house. It was a far enough distance to where I could pick up different radio stations. When we left the following morning, I flipped around the dial and came across a station where a most lurid conversation was taking place.

A young lady was talking to the three hosts about how she was addicted to pornography. She talked about how she would find places on the Internet where she could call up any genre of porn that she wanted, sit back, and enjoy watching them. She would do this throughout the day, and whenever she felt her boyfriend was not giving her enough attention.

This station had some sort of gimmick on certain mornings where people could call in, confess something to the hosts, and then the person with the most depraved, gross, illicit, or horrible confession would win some sort of prize. Callers from all around the region would phone the station and share things that they would not tell their spouses or best friends to try to win money or get tickets to events.

Contrary to what I was expecting to hear, the hosts were not condemning of her, but instead were trading tips, techniques, and secrets in searching out smut. They stopped just shy of naming websites outright. One male host talked about how he was perusing a rather obscene and odd type of sexual fetish on the web on his laptop while his own kids were in the room. It was not until his wife passed by in the backyard and banged on the window that he stopped what he was doing.

After they finished with that caller, several more people called in, including:

• A woman who stole prescription medication from the ER where her husband worked as a doctor, to sell it on the street.
• A hotel staffer who was trying to get her supervisor fired, even though her supervisor was her own mother.
• A daughter who got her own mother exported to Mexico for illegally living in the US.
• A driver who knew most of the police department in her town in a Biblical way, so she could avoid traffic tickets and checkpoints.

I noticed that while these people called in, the hosts were not clicking their tongues at the callers or condemning them for their actions, but were instead asking about techniques, disseminating the effectiveness of their actions, and making recommendations along the way. They sounded more encouraging than they did dismayed at what people were doing. For the caller who sold drugs, one host asked how much, and said, "Huh. Not bad."

While once upon a time we had the good sense to see evil and call it as such, it has now become a novelty, something practiced and spoken about freely with others. Instead of feeling guilt or even shame for behaving in ways that would normally be frowned upon, people now uplift debauchery, malevolence, and violations of God's Law. Even overhearing casual conversations and looking at the magazines while in line at the grocery store illustrate this lack of decency and civility.

I was glad when I lost the signal to the station, but I have to wonder exactly what will come next in the guise of entertainment or day-to-day living.