Learning From Educational Films...Really?

In case you can't see these videos here, I have set up separate blogs for each of them. Check the November blog list to the right. There is some problem with uploading these videos. They can both be found on YouTube if you can't see them here at all. They are called, "Don't be a Teenage Boozer" and "Educational Film, Hipsters and Your Young..."  Sorry for the mixup.

Did you ever watch a filmstrip like this when you were a teenager? We were supposed to learn how to be good citizens; how to behave; how to resist life’s temptations; how to be a good wife and mother and good father and husband. How much did you learn from these mini movies?

With the recent death of Barbara Billingsley, the actress who played June Cleaver, the Beaver’s mother on ”Leave it to Beaver;” and Tom Bosley, who played Howard Cunningham, the Dad on “Happy Days;” we lost two icons of 50s and 60s ideal families. June Cleaver was always dressed in a crisp dress, with perfectly coiffed hair and she always had a pearl necklace around her neck. Howard Cunningham was always there for the young kids with good advice.

The films we saw were very sexist and even racist. The age of political correctness had not yet begun. They covered subjects like anti-drug films; behavior films; sex education; good hygiene. The most racist film I came across in my research was an anti-drug film which began with slaves in Africa and morphing into black Americans sitting up against a city building in a drug-induced state.

As for sex education, they separated the boys from the girls when explaining the birds and the bees. The boys usually met in a locker room in these films. A coach talked to them. He used graphs to explain male and female functions. Of course the boys were all very attentive; did not snicker; and even asked questions. Is that how your sex education class went? The girls always met with a nurse. The most prominent subject was menstruation and how wonderful it was to finally become a “woman.’  In one film I saw, the mother and daughter were discussing menstruation and the father walked in on and actually joined in on the discussion. That happen to you?

There were many anti-drug and anti-drinking films. The drug one I watched was called “The Terrible Truth.” and tells the story of how a young person can slide down into the worst depths of drug addiction. They mentioned the two government-run hospitals for drug addicts, in Lexington and Ft. Worth Texas. How would all the drug addicts fit into these two places today? Of course the mother of all drug films was called “Reefer Madness.” Every see that one?

Listen to some of these other titles I came across: “Changing ‘Deviant’ Behavior;” which had nothing to do with homosexuality but rather just being a juvenile delinquent; “Choosing for Happiness;” “Gang Boy-Anglo & Latino Gangs;” “Cindy Goes to a Party;’ “Say ‘Hi’ to Hygiene;” “The Demon Weed;” “What Makes a Good Party.” If you ever watched filmstrips in school, you can imagine how these films went.

All of the films I’ve mentioned here and more can be found on YouTube. Go exploring some day just for laughs. The most shocking film I came across, however, was one sponsored by Aetna Life Insurance Company and J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI. It’s called “Hipsters and Your Young Adult.” I believe this film was a precursor to the anti-Communist McCarthy Hearings to come and the practice of collecting dossiers on prominent people of the day. See what you think.

Thanks for listening.