Articles
The Horror Effect
The Horror Effect
I hate scary movies! If you like scary movies, I still love you, I just don’t understand you. Why would anybody find it enjoyable to be scared? I’ll share a secret with you. For over 20 years, I never once laid in bed terrified I’d open my eyes to see a creepy little girl staring at me; that happened for the first time when I saw The Ring. I was at mom’s for vacation and we rented it because it was supposed to be “more suspenseful than scary.” Mom probably heard that from a horror movie lover, but for us amateurs we were so freaked out we could hardly finish it! Then for a week I laid in bed utterly terrified I’d wake up to a creepy little girl who wanted to kill me; sometimes when I think about that movie I still get chills. I have a vivid imagination and I live by myself, so don’t judge.
Here’s my point: movies put thoughts in our minds that would never be there otherwise. Before The Ring, I was perfectly fine, living in blissful ignorance with not one creepy, murderous little girl haunting my imagination. That thought came from a movie, and it’s a perfect illustration of how the media affects us. It works that way with images, with attitudes, with worldviews, with language, and with what we think of as normal. If people never watched pornography, they’d never have images of naked people in their heads. If they never watched profanity-laced comedy specials or TV shows, they’d never think to talk to people that way or think about life so negatively. If they never watched shows where it’s totally normal for people to sleep together before marriage or for there to be homosexual couples kissing, they’d never think that was normal and natural. If they never watched shows where all the main characters do is complain, they wouldn’t resort so quickly to complaining when things go wrong. From childhood on, we learn how to think, talk, and act from what we hear and observe.
I’m not saying it’s not sinful to watch any show with sin in it; the Bible contains accounts with sin in it. But the Bible doesn’t glorify, celebrate, or normalize sin. Because of the horror effect, movies, tv, music, podcasts, and video games affect how we think, talk, and act in ways we may not even realize! That’s why God says to fill our minds and hearts with what’s good, so we’ll think, talk, and act righteously. “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” (Philippians 4:8). “I will set no worthless thing before my eyes…” (Psalm 101:3). “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)
