Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain… and most fools do.
Dale Carnegie

I recently saw the new Indiana Jones movie (I know I'm about 6 months behind - I was out of the country, okay?). I have to say I was wildly disappointed with the film. It wasn't that my expectations were too high - it was that my expectations were simply based on this planet. I loved the religious mysticism of the first 3 films, but aliens? I just couldn't buy it.

Which brings me to another group of people whose expectations seem... out of this world. That would be the Communist Party.

I know what you're thinking - They still exist? Yes. Not only do they still exist, but they are still pushing their failed program's propaganda. Note this Russian article's statement: "the dissolution of the Soviet Union remains one of the greatest tragedies of modern contemporary history." Propaganda anyone?

A few months ago the St. Petersburg Communist Party Chief Sergei Malinkovich stated his outrage at the new Indiana Jones film, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The film is set in 1957 during the period when the United States and the Soviet Union became hostile towards one another, and the antagonists in the film are Communist agents trying to steal a mystical crystal skull that could give them ultimate power to rule the world.

Malinkovich is angry about the film because he believes that young people in Russia will think that the story is a true representation of history. He said that they don’t know the real history of what was happening in the Soviet Union in 1957, so they will believe whatever Hollywood shows them. Other Communist Party members agreed and said that America was trying to trick people and make children afraid of Communists.

They also said the actors Harrison Ford and Kate Blanchet were helping the CIA spread propaganda against the Communist Party, and that these actors should never be allowed to enter Russia.

I have to admit that when I heard these comments from the Communist Party, I laughed out loud. Are they really worried about Indiana Jones’s perspective on the Communist Party in 1957? Are they so insecure about how people think about them that they have to make a public statement concerning a popcorn action movie for teenagers? Do they really think Indiana Jones is in the CIA? Maybe Chubarashka (Russia's version of Mickey Mouse) works for the KGB, or is it the FSB now?

This is why most Americans don’t respect the Communist Party. The Communist Party is too serious, and they think everything is a threat to national security. They think that movies for children are going to threaten their power and authority, and they claim that we are disrespecting the accomplishments of the Soviet people. In America, we do not laugh at the Soviet people or at their accomplishments. In fact, we highly respect, and sometimes even fear, the strength and intelligence of the Soviet people.

However, at the same time, we think that the Communist Party, the corrupt and paranoid system of government that stole billions of dollars from the Soviet people and which lied to and murdered its citizens for decades, is ridiculous. We view it as tyrannical, hyper-critical, inefficient, inherently dishonest and corrupt, and in modern times, obsolete.

The thing that I find the most amusing about this situation is that the Communist Party is complaining about propaganda. Never in Russia’s history has a political party twisted the truth or used propaganda to control the people more than the Communist Party. They lied about everything. For them to complain about the use of propaganda in a film would be like Hitler complaining about ethnic prejudice towards Germans.

Perhaps they haven’t seen the original three Indian Jones movies, in which Indiana fought against the Nazis to prevent them from finding magical items which would enable them to take over the world. These films are not historical documentaries.

In the second Indiana Jones movie, a Hindu cult is shown eating live snakes and bugs, serving monkey brains for desert, and then a cult priest tears a man’s heart out of his chest with his bare hands. In the film, the cult was said to worship the Hindu goddess, Kali, known as the goddess of death and destruction. In reality, Kali is the goddess of time and change, but there were no protests or complaints by Hindu leaders at the outrageous events in the film.

They understood that it was just a movie.

No one believes that the Nazi’s tried to steal the ancient Ark of the Covenant in order to use it to conquer the world, or that Hitler wanted to find the Holy Grail so that he could live forever. Indiana Jones is a movie. It’s half action, half historical fantasy. If your children don’t know the real history of the Soviet Union, it is not Indiana Jones’ fault. It is your own fault.

Hollywood is not responsible for educating our children. It never has been. Hollywood’s only responsibility is to entertain us, and to make enough money so that it can continue to entertain us in the future. The Communists are confused about this situation, because in the Soviet Union films were always used as propaganda, and the government controlled everything that was shown. In America the situation is completely different. The government cannot control or influence what we show in our films. Everything is the choice of the director, producers, writers and actors.

As humorous as the Communist Party’s comments were, however, they reveal a trend of criticism and a common misconception which many older people have about the media, especially in America. Parents in America and around the world are blaming Hollywood and television and music and video games for their children’s bad behavior. But what kind of parents are they if they allow their children to watch and listen to such harmful things? And how can these things influence your children unless you have not raised them well?

As a child I watched hundreds of scary movies and hundreds of violent action movies, but I have never been in a physical fight in my entire life. I have never done any of the terrible things that I have seen on television or in movies.

Why? Because films are fake, and my family and our morals and standards are real.

My family raised me well, with discipline and understanding, they made sure I got a good education, that I worked hard at everything I did, that I played sports and met all kinds of people from different countries and cultures. They gave me the skills to live a good, successful life, and only a fool would ignore those lessons and believe what Hollywood tells him about history, love, and life in general.

Unfortunately, these days not all children are receiving such a healthy upbringing. Parents are working more and spending less time with their children. Instead of doing productive things with their children, many parents simply put their kids in front of the television or computer and leave them alone.

And don’t forget, children imitate their parents. People think that children learn bad habits from the media, but most bad habits, and good ones, are learned from our parents.

A common belief in America is that if parents read to their children every night, then their children will grow up loving to read. But recent research shows that the most important factor in determining whether children will enjoy reading is not if their parents read to them or not. The most important factor in determining how many books children read is how many books their parents read for themselves.

If children see their parents reading books, then they will read books. If children see their parents sitting on the couch and watching television or listening to music, or cursing, or smoking, or ignoring their family, then they will do the same.

And, unfortunately, if children see their elders being paranoid and angry about a silly action film, then those children will grow up to be paranoid and angry too.