{"id":260,"date":"2005-10-25T17:28:08","date_gmt":"2005-10-26T01:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tgdarkly.com\/blog\/?p=243"},"modified":"2005-10-25T17:28:08","modified_gmt":"2005-10-26T01:28:08","slug":"bad-genes-tv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/2005\/10\/25\/bad-genes-tv\/","title":{"rendered":"Bad Genes TV"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Sunday night apparently was “bad genes” night on the TLC<\/a> television network. There were two shows about people with terrible genetic conditions: one about this girl<\/a>, who was “born without a face,” and the other about this guy<\/a>, who was born with a condition that made his skin sluff off at the slightest bruise. They struck me as remarkably different portrayals people cope with bad circumstances.
\n
\nIn “Born Without a Face,” the family of the little girl with Treacher Collins Syndrome comes across as simply amazing in their unconditional love and acceptance of their little girl. From their Caringbridge journal<\/a>, it appears they are Christians, which doesn’t surprise me. They ooze faith, determination, and affirmation of life, despite they incredible pain and difficulties they must face every day.<\/p>\n

“The Boy Whose Skin Fell Off” is billed as a celebration of a full life in the face of disability. Johnny Kennedy, the man featured in the film, faces his impending death with jokes and joi de vive<\/em>. Kennedy displays an angular Brittish wit of the sort that allows a James Bond character to spout wry double entendres while hanging upside down over a tub of ravenous sharks. For example, when a gorgeous Brittish actress who works with Kennedy’s charity foundation gives him a tearful hug, he sneaks a peek down her blouse and winks at the camera. We’re supposed to feel that Kennedy is living with gusto.<\/p>\n

But the Kennedy story left me empty. The gusto seemed put on, the witticisms a shield against reality rather than a way of making peace. Kennedy seemed the true existentialist, one who understood that carpe diem<\/em> leaves you with nothing as the diem<\/em> slips by, that there is nothing but the grasping for its own sake. I found that sad, not uplifting, like reading Ecclesiastes as a mere statement of the way things are instead of as a pointer to meaning in God.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last Sunday night apparently was “bad genes” night on the TLC television network. There were two shows about people with terrible genetic conditions: one about this girl, who was “born without a face,” and the other about this guy, who was born with a condition that made his skin sluff off at the slightest bruise. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p824rZ-4c","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidopderbeck.com\/tgdarkly\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}