THE JIG

Britney bombed. Sarah Silverman is mean. Usher is mad. Kid Rock threw punches with Tommy Lee. Justin Timberlake left a party with Rihanna.

Here's the thing: I don't watch MTV. I didn't watch this award show. But thanks to the amazing power of American news and the wonder of YouTube, I - along with millions of others - have become privy all the lowdown dirt on music's biggest night last weekend.

But this award show was pretty important in my opinion. Intrigued? Good, here's why:

For the last 10 years or so, MTV has changed its approach. They went from making money by selling 3 minute commercials for artists to making money by pitching a lifestyle. For a decade, MTV (and others like it) have held up stars like Britney and Silverman and Kid Rock as if to say, "Here, American teenager! This is the life. This is success...look how many cars they have! Look how people applaud when these stars come onstage!"

And while most teenagers don't seriously consider a life in the entertainment industry, they have been force-fed images of what MTV programmers consider the "good life" and, believe me, that takes root.

We see this in a lot of forms - young people deciding to lead lives of anarchy where nothing is really right and everything is cool. We see teenagers who've decided that money really can make you happy. We've got college students who scream their lungs out protesting a war when they're totally cool starting up a slugfest at some nightclub with a stranger who looked at their significant other in a questionable manner.

The wheels are coming off, gang. The pretty and the rich and the talented are being crushed under the weight of the vices made possible by their very successes. I hope students look at the MTV Awards and realize that the jig is up. This thing - this idea of happiness they've been seeing for years and years - isn't working.

I think our youth pastors ought to be talking about this award show for months - not as some sort of fuel for a Jesus-doesn't-want-you-to-drink campaign, but rather as a startling reminder that our culture is screwing us. It's teaching us things that are going to handicap our spirits and put our families and finances and very existence at risk.

Do any of those people mentioned in my first paragraph seem very glamorous now? No, they look empty. They look like lives-at-risk.

I'm not going to be the annoying Christian guy who says, "MTV awards? I don't care about stupid stuff like that!" We better start caring and noticing those rare times when media really does reveal the ugliness of a life lived for self.