I don’t know about you but I love watching those old short films from the 50s, 60s, and 70s that were designed to terrify my mom and dad into living a safe, upright, drug-free, patriotic, and community-centric life.  These were the short films that were designed to make sure that everyone understood just what exactly the wages of sin were. 

What I love about these films is just how melodramatic and judgmental they often were.  It wasn’t enough, apparently, to point out that people occasionally made mistakes.  No, instead, every mistake had to be accompanied by a very judgmental narrator saying things like, “No, Jimmy didn’t think before ran across that street.  And now, he’s dead.”

Seriously, if I had been raised on a steady diet of these films, I would be even more of a fragile, neurotic little thing than I am now!

One of my favorites of these films is presented below.  Clocking in at nearly 12 minutes, the classic 1955 scare film Six Murderous Beliefs is designed to make sure that we understand that not only are young people stupid but they’re dangerous as well.  The film presents 6 examples of people foolishly believing one of 6 beliefs that are (as the narrator informs us), “wanted for … MURDER!”  My personal favorite is the second example just because I’ve had the exact same conversation with my sister Erin.

(I also love how, during the first example, the pilot so clearly despises the jock who doesn’t want to wear a parachute.)

And remember … “One of these beliefs might be about to murder you!  So watch carefully…”