The film “The Giver,” due out this summer, is part of a genre — “The Hunger Games” series, “Divergent” and “Elysium” are others of recent vintage — that depicts a world where some people in authority make decisions that everyone else obeys, or else.
Both extremes of the political spectrum find validation in these films. Conservatives see them as cautionary tales about what happens when “big government” tells you where you must conform, as with Obamacare, whether you like it or not. Liberals see these films as warnings about the excesses of the past, whether in the case of abusive church authority or in the example of traditional business and government patriarchy.
But rather than walk out of a theater thinking that your side has been vindicated, I urge you to ask yourself what warning(s) these films contain that today’s adults must heed. What do these films say about the way we act, and thus hint at how we must change?
Rather than focus on the defiance of Jennifer Lawrence’s character Katniss Everdeen, ask yourself how her society got to the place where it became so oppressive that it needed a heroine. Answer: It’s the result of the majority relying on a few people to do their thinking and acting for them.
The idea that a courageous teenager can battle and defeat a massive enemy against impossible odds is ridiculous. But equally ridiculous is the implication that a Jennifer/Katniss liberator will become a selfless hero and leader. History teaches that she could even more easily become the next dictator, elevated to that status by a public that trusts her too much. That scenario has played itself out numerous times. Examples: Fidel Castro and Adolf Hitler.
We all like to think we do what’s good and right. In the Book of Judges, the Hebrews did what they thought was right, but one of the things they deemed “right” was burning their children alive in sacrifice to idols. The lesson is clear: Our idea of “right” is always partly inaccurate and sometimes completely wrong. And our heroes are no more “right” than the rest of us.
We must all think clearly about how our actions undermine society. We must be prepared to discern what is good, even when it contradicts our beliefs, and then have the courage to recant the actions we took that were based on wrong-headed beliefs.
Flash! We’re lousy at doing that. We dismiss serious thinking because it takes too much time and forces us to confront the contradictions in our beliefs that must be sacrificed if truth is to be known. Simply put, we don’t want to go there.
And, as I’ve recently said, on those rare occasions when we discover truth, few people are willing to risk the “good life” by acting on the truth they know. That’s what leads society into the dilemmas like the one Katniss confronts in “The Hunger Games.”
There is no courageous, teen-aged superhero floating around out there to save us. We have only one Savior: Jesus, who is “the way, the truth and the life.” It would therefore seem appropriate to ask Him to reveal truth to us and give us the courage to live in it.
Each of these films invites us to do so, but as these films become more common, we become more immune to the warnings they contain. If we ignore those warnings and follow the whims or manipulation of others like lemmings we may unwittingly participate in turning today’s fantasy into tomorrow’s reality.
