Evangelical leaders deliberately used broadcasting to manufacture approved masculine heroes

Evidence

For Cole, the cure for the anti-hero syndrome could be found in Christian broadcasting. Christian media could offer godly heroes for popular consumption. “Sick and tired of the world system creating the ungodly as heroes, making the bad good, and the good bad,” Cole created and chaired a Committee for International Good Will with the purpose of making “the godly of the land our heroes.” The group offered annual awards to exemplary men such as Pat Robertson. However, if Christian broadcasting offered means of instilling the heroic masculine ideal in the hearts and minds of Americans, evangelicals had cause for concern. At that critical moment, Christian media figures weren’t entirely up to the task. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 297

Categorization

• XREF: The deliberate manufacture of hero figures through media parallels the book’s broader thesis that consumer culture transmitted the militant masculine ideal.