The Obsolete Man

Here is a link to CBS, where you can watch a really interesting and provocative episode of The Twilight Zone, namely "The Obsolete Man", Episode 65, which ran in 1961. Unfortunately, the link includes commercials, but it is a very good quality format, in its glorious original black and white.

This particular episode stars Burgess Meredith, and in the words of the CBS website, the plot is summarized: "In a future state where religion and books have been banned, a librarian is judged obsolete by the Chancellor and sentenced to death."

Of course, there is an interesting twist in the plot, and a "moral of the story" - this time a prescient lesson about totalitarianism and the inevitable result of a culture hostile to the Christian faith and to books. It's especially interesting, given today's politically correct culture that antithetically spins Atheism as benign and religion as toxic and dangerous. Of course, 1961 was much closer in time to the establishment of the twentieth century's large atheistic and anti-intellectual tyrannies, whereas modern-day apologists for Atheism assume that we've all forgotten where the Atheistic state inexorably leads.

And note the program's use of readings from the Psalms. You won't find such remarkable things on network TV these days. Such politically incorrect portrayals of the "culture of death" have become as "obsolete" in today's cultural climate as Rod Serling's cigarette commercial at the end of the program.

Submitted for your approval...