Q:
What should our attitude be towards rock ‘n roll, TV and newspapers and so on?
A:
And the answer is, why should we have any attitude towards rock ‘n roll? What’s there about rock ‘n roll to have an attitude to? What’s rock ‘n roll anyhow? If somebody likes music, so we’ll talk about music. But why do you have to rock with it?! So if you’re asking what is our attitude towards making yourself meshuga, so we say it’s quite negative.
What’s our attitude towards TV? We have a very positive attitude! You take a hammer and you smash it. That’s the only attitude toward TV! And it’s time for Jews to wake up. Jews are as stupid as could be! They think they can still make a mishmash – that they can be Orthodox Jews and have TV. They don’t realize that those two things are directly in contradiction. Having a TV means that you’re a talmid of the venereal disease cult. If you sit at the feet of these sages, these wicked people – then you will lose your cheilek in Olam Habah. Look, nobody’s going to tell you the truth, so I will. Even if it’s innocent TV, it’s such shtus, it’s such silly things. And the truth is that you’d be hard pressed today to find any innocent TV programming today. And so you’re filling your head with garbage; so how can you expect to put anything good into such a head?
And therefore, there shouldn’t be any question in our minds about such things. I spoke recently about this.There was a church that made a big party in the backyard, and they made a bonfire, a big bonfire. And everybody, every member of the church, they brought their television sets and threw them into the fire. It was about seven years ago. Seven years, and I’m still waiting for some synagogue to do that! You know what that means? It means that Jews are just talking through their hats about being Jews. But they don’t really mean business. The Orthodox don’t mean business! About the others I’m not talking at all.They can’t even claim to mean business. But I’m telling you that the Orthodox don’t mean business. That’s the plain truth. The Orthodox, they just want to fool themselves as they go merrily down the primrose path of assimilation that descends into the באר שחת. That’s where they’re all going. With few exceptions, most of the Orthodox are treading the path down towards destruction. Most of the synagogues, they don’t mean business. They’re getting worse and worse. Only very few are making a change and heading in the opposite direction. But you’re not going to go in the opposite direction, towards Hashem, if you’re lugging a television set and the newspapers.
Now, newspapers are a different story. Newspapers you have to know are garbage she’bih garbage. But maybe if you read the headlines and don’t read the editorials, or if you happen to read them but you know that they’re all wicked men – they’re perverted men – especially the NY Times which is pushing homosexualism for all it’s worth. Once upon a time people thought that reading The New York Times meant that you’re cultured person, that you’re intelligent, and therefore they used to carry it. Even people who couldn’t read used to carry it. I know one rebbe, a milameid in the yeshiva mesivta. He makes a point of carrying The New York Times, so that people should respect him. If he would pick up a handful of dog droppings and walk into the mesivta he’d be more respectable.
TAPE # 203 (February 1978)
