TV reflects our culture’s fundamentalist roots leavened by an almost surreal disentanglement from our long-held standards of behavior. It’s not just a void of ethics that we’re witnessing, though; it’s the celebration of that void. Many of our most popular narratives sidestep unwieldy talk of values, a seemingly outmoded term, in favor of a recurring struggle to dominate, or else to avoid domination. Brutality, mercilessness, lack of concern for principles—these are painted as prerequisites.
