Disco Fever Sweeps the World

IN BROOKLYN, New York, last December an international gathering of students was discussing social activities in the 20 countries from which they had come. “Are there discos (discotheques) in your country?” they were asked. “Are they very popular?”

Hands flew up around the room. “Discotheques are very popular in my country,” a student from Portugal answered. Similar responses were made by persons from Mexico, the Philippines, Jamaica—country after country. This popularity has come with spectacular suddenness.

It was in the mid-1970’s that disco exploded on the entertainment scene. Then, as though carried by a mighty tidal wave, it swept world wide.

Its Tremendous Impact

In some areas, practically every kind of place imaginable is being turned into a disco, and many have rushed to cash in on the profits.

In a recent year, total disco revenues are put at about $5,000,000,000 in the United States alone, ranking it second only to organized sports in the entertainment field. In the U.S., in the past year, the number of discos reportedly increased from 10,000 to 18,000, which means that over 20, on an average, have been opening every day. Some 40 to 45 million Americans have gone to a disco at least once; 17 to 19 million do so regularly.

Even if you don’t go to discos, your life may be touched in many ways. Do you like to skate? Well, roller rinks are now rapidly converting to disco. By the end of 1978, estimated Discothekin magazine last summer, 1,000 of the 6,000 rinks in the United States would be Roller Discos. The magazine said that this would expose “an additional 3 million people each week to disco music.”

Do you watch television? The heavy disco beat can be heard in the background music of commercials and dramas. It throbs over the airwaves of radio stations. It is played during the half time of football games, and is piped into stores. While shopping, you may find whole sections of department stores with racks of clothes designed especially for disco dancing.

Even totally unrelated businesses are attempting to cash in on discomania. According to Discoworld magazine: “There exists a pharmacy actually called Disco Drugs! Seems to be a chain of drugstores throughout southern California, having nothing whatsoever to do with the disco concept, except that the popularity of the term attracts unknowing customers.” The same magazine tells about boxes of Disco Chips appearing on the bread shelves in New York city.

What Is Disco?

Discotheque—disco for short—was until recently an unfamiliar word. The World Book Dictionary defines “discothèque” as, “a night club where phonograph records are played for dancing.”

But disco involves more. Discoworld, one of the magazines born in 1976 in the heat of disco fever, explains: “In one way, Disco was a seventies version of returning to the juke box. Only this time around, the juke boxes were louder and larger and more grandiose than ever before.”

So the term “disco” does not identify only a place for dancing, such as a night club, but also refers to a distinctive type of music that is designed for dancing.

But what makes a modern discotheque different from former places for dancing? And how does disco music differ from other music?

Distinctive Music and Places

What gives disco music its distinctive sound is the very heavy bass beat, which throbs repetitively at 4/4 time and about 120 beats per minute. The music also has a lyrical “hook”—often as simple as something like “I love you”—which is repeated over and over again. The bass speakers are usually down near the floor so that dancers literally feel the driving, insistent beat through their entire bodies. Thus totally deaf people can dance to the music because, even though they can’t hear it, they feel the beat.

Generally, at modern discotheques disco music is played. But this new type of music is not the only thing that distinguishes discotheques from former places for dancing. They also characteristically have frenetic, flashing, colored lights, electric images reflecting from mirrored walls, and sparkling ceilings. All of this is designed to create a psychedelic experience.

Yet the heart of today’s disco is its sophisticated, high-powered sound system, which may cost tens of thousands of dollars. The phonograph records, too, are the product of modern technology. These records are the electronic mix of different instrument groups that have recorded their parts separately and at different times. This procedure is called multitrack overdubbing. The fancy overdubs and crisp edits are what make disco records attractive to many. As Discoworld noted: “Live disco performances just don’t measure up to their technologically souped-up studio versions.”

Also, the role of the disc jockey figures in the success of a discotheque. There is an art in moving from one song to another without a break in the beat, and in knowing exactly what piece to play when. Spinner magazine notes regarding a top disc jockey: “By using the right record psychology and lighting, he can create an acceleration that brings people to a pinnacle of frenzy and decelerate to the lull of a lullaby without losing their interest.”

Beginnings of the Fever

The disco sound was born in recent times in New York, being derived from a combination of black and Latin music. It first became popular in the summer of 1974. About the same time, a new disciplined dance performed with a partner was also developing—The Hustle. This is the dance that gave life to disco. It is somewhat similar to the lindy or jitterbug of an earlier generation. Then, in 1975, songwriter Van McCoy wrote the catchy musical hit The Hustle, and disco fever started to rise.

What really sent disco fever skyrocketing, however, was the movie Saturday Night Fever, first released late in 1977. By last year it had grossed $130 million (U.S.), making it one of the biggest box-office hits in the history of motion pictures. The sound-track album has sold an unprecedented 15 million copies, surpassing The Sound of Music as the highest grossing album in recording history. And disco fever seems to keep on rising.

Why Do People Go?

More persons are dancing than at any other time in recent memory. Why? What draws them to discos?

Writing in Harper’s magazine, Salley Helgesen perhaps summed it up well. “Listen to me,” she said, “discos are going to be the next IBM. It has to happen, people need to make up for the satisfaction they lack in life, and there’s nothing else out there.”

It’s true that many people derive little satisfaction from their work, from school or from any other facet of their lives. They desire to find escape, to shed inhibitions, and discos provide the opportunity. As one disco operator said: “For a couple of hours a week, they can let it all hang out and just move and let the music fill their heads and push out everything else. For a little while, they can get away from their lives.”

Understandably, we all need some relaxation, a change of pace from regular activities. But are discos a wholesome place for enjoying relaxing entertainment? The students from 20 countries, mentioned at the outset, expressed concern. The men were branch representatives of Jehovah’s Witnesses, attending a five-week refresher course in Brooklyn. Did they have reason for concern about Christians going to discos?

What Are Its Roots?

THE roots or sources of anything generally have a lot to do with what is produced. What, then, about disco? What are its roots?

You may be surprised. Consider the cover of the January 1978 issue of Discoworld. Advertising one of the articles inside, it announces:

THE PARTY PEOPLE DISCO’S GAY ROOTS

Is that startling to you? Yet it is true that homosexuals have had much to do with the development of discos. And they continue to be a major force behind them. The new book Disco Fever published a list of discos, and observed:

“Some readers will recognize that many of the discotheques listed are gay discos or gay clubs. ‘Billboard’ magazine [a prominent entertainment trade journal] has estimated that at least 50 percent of the discotheques in the country are gay, which is not surprising since the disco movement got its primary impetus from the gay community. Invariably, as news about a new gay club with great sound and decor gets around, straight people who want to dance start knocking at the door.”

No efforts are made to conceal disco’s homosexual connections. To the contrary, the Detroit Free Press notes: “Disco probably will be remembered as the first cultural happening where gay participation was openly publicized.”

Yet more than that, there sometimes seems to be a certain pride about such gay connections. Richard Peterson, a Vanderbilt University sociology professor whose specialty is the social implications of contemporary music, observed that in the disco world being gay “is not only acceptable, it’s even sort of chic.”

There have indeed been great changes in standards of sexual morality in recent years. And discos mirror this change to a greater degree than perhaps any other feature of modern life. Pointing up this fact, Horizon magazine of May 1977 said:

“In the dancing of men with each other and women with each other, the disco represents a really drastic change in social convention and sexual attitudes.

“It is neither a secret nor an excuse for gossip that some of the best discos in America and Europe were started as gay establishments that began to open their doors to anyone who wanted to dance. . . . The fact that some discos are gay or ‘mixed’ is casually noted in night-life features of the major newspapers, which take for granted freedoms that until very recently were the basis of scandal.”

A Matter of Concern?

Rather than be concerned, many applaud the changing sexual standards. They are glad to see inhibitions set aside and welcome the new sexual freedoms that are so manifest among the disco crowd. But those who have high regard for the teachings of the Bible are concerned. Why?

Because, rather than approve, or even condone, homosexuality, the Bible condemns it. In his law to the nation of Israel, God stated: “You must not lie down with a male the same as you lie down with a woman. It is a detestable thing.” (Lev. 18:22) How serious was this matter?

God’s Word answers: “When a man lies down with a male the same as one lies down with a woman, both of them have done a detestable thing. They should be put to death without fail. Their own blood is upon them.” (Lev. 20:13) Yes, that is how God viewed homosexuality.

Has God’s view changed? Consider this apostolic admonition to Christians: “Surely you know that the unjust will never come into possession of the kingdom of God. Make no mistake: no fornicator or idolater, none who are guilty either of adultery or of homosexual perversion . . . will possess the kingdom of God.”—1 Cor. 6:9, 10, The New English Bible.

Yes, God’s Word plainly reveals that homosexuality is wrong, and that those who become involved in that way of life will not enjoy God’s blessing. In view of this, can you see why Christian overseers would express concern about the spreading popularity of disco?

Yet disco has other roots. What are they?

Roots of the Music and Dance

In the opening article it was observed that disco music is of recent popularity. But authorities say that its origins can be traced to earlier times. In a September 1977 feature article, “Evolution of Disco Music,” Discoworld says:

“What holds it all together, what makes it Disco music, in fact, is the beat.

“And the Disco beat, to the uninformed, did not begin one fine morning in 1965 . . . nor even when Van McCoy first dented the charts a decade later with his version of ‘The Hustle.’ That beat—the basis of Disco music—is Africa talking.

“Talk about roots. When you go to a Disco today, you are basically participating in a 1977 version of ceremonies that were going on eons ago on the West Coast of Africa. Certainly, Disco music has been spruced up with the latest technological geegaws such as twenty-four track recordings, synthesizers, eardrum-busting amplification, overlayed strings and cooing vocals. But strip away all those accessories and you’re grooving on the same beat that no doubt was moving the ancestors of Kunta Kinte.”

Does having an ancient African origin in itself make disco music objectionable? Obviously not, no more than if the music had an ancient Asian, European or American origin. What does bear on the matter, however, is the purpose of the ancient music. What kind of dances were performed with it?

Disco literature has commented on those ancient dances, and their purpose. In fact, the wild abandon of those ancient dancers is held up for modern disco dancers to imitate; they are urged to cast off the inhibitions that they may have. Discoworld of May 1977 says:

“The natives danced to exorcise devil-demons and evil spirits from their frenzied bodies and to coax Mother Earth to yield new crops. In spring they danced during ‘fertility rites’ so women would grow healthy children to perpetuate the species. They danced to celebrate new life and even to prepare for death. But no matter what the exact purpose of their dancing was, all dance was really a display of worship of their gods, worship that either paid homage to the gods; sought the gods’ good will; or tried to allay the gods’ wrath . . . The energy often became so intense that a young virgin girl or lamb would be sacrificed in the hopes that the blood spilled would appease the gods.”

Then, in advice to the modern disco dancer, this magazine article goes on to say: “It’s just a matter of letting yourself go. You must liberate your mind first; then your body will follow. When I dance I almost astral project and leave my body.”

Another issue of Discoworld also draws attention to disco’s roots “among Voodoo worshipers, primitive tribesmen, the Brazilian Macumba, and the Kalahari Bushmen,” and then advises: “Your body is a complex of energy forces blending into one another and connected to even larger cosmic energy forces. This is how the ancients saw it and how we’re beginning to relearn this. Try to become aware of every sensation while you dance until you gradually lose awareness, and blend with your surroundings.”

Do disco dancers heed this type of advice? Do they commonly let go in wild abandon? Note what the new book Disco Fever says: “With discotheques came disco dancing—a form of dance totally divorced from the discipline of the Hustle, yet completely at home with it on the dance floor. . . . Disco dancing—whether it is called free-styling or free-form—is doing-your-own-thing dancing.” Yes, it is an uninhibited, anything-goes style of dancing.

But is this objectionable? Is it wrong to adopt a style of dancing that the ancients used in the worship of their gods? Yes, for true Christians it is. Why? Because those gods of the nations were condemned by the Creator, the God of the Bible. He did not approve of the ancient fertility dances that were designed to stimulate the sexual passions of both participants and observers. Lamenting the situation that developed among the Israelites of old, the Bible says:

“They too kept building for themselves high places [sites where licentious rites were performed] and sacred pillars [phallic symbols of the god Baal] and sacred poles [representing a Canaanite goddess of fertility] upon every high hill and under every luxuriant tree. And even the male temple prostitute proved to be in the land. They acted according to all the detestable things of the nations whom Jehovah had driven out from before the sons of Israel.”—1 Ki. 14:23, 24; Isa. 57:5-8.

Yet, is there really basis for comparing what goes on in modern discos with ancient places where sexually arousing fertility dances were performed? Let’s take a closer look at disco.

The Kind of Places Discos Are

AROUND the world, millions of people every week are seeking out discotheques for entertainment. What kind of places are they going to? Are they all much alike?

Not necessarily. There can be considerable variety from one disco to another, for as Discothekin magazine says: “Disco is simply music and dance, and can be shaped into any form desired. People dictate the success of a club, and if the owner/manager is astute he can determine his clientele merely by defining, via the music, the atmosphere he desires to create—be it the Seventies, the Forties or even the Gay Nineties.”

There are even kiddie discos for children; others are designed particularly with their grandparents in mind. Regarding persons who are a little older, the Detroit Free Press observes: “It hasn’t been hard updating their lindy steps into the hustle and their fox trots into the foxy trot at subdued disco-supper lounges.”

Some places are classified as “restaurant-discos.” They may be restaurants during the earlier evening hours. But later at night they serve as discotheques. This enables the restaurateur to generate additional receipts during hours in which his restaurant would normally be closed. In Europe, most discos are places where one can dine and drink as well as dance.

So not all discos are the same; the name can be attached to quite differing kinds of places. But what is the essence—the very substance or soul—of disco? What life-style does it promote? How is this reflected in its music, its dancing, its dress, and so forth?

Disco—What It’s All About

Kitty Hanson, who has researched and written extensively on the subject, says of a modern disco: “Under the glittering canopy of lights, the floor seemed to heave with the pounding of feet, and the air began to crackle with sheer physical energy. Then the room exploded. Cries and calls and a thousand wildly waving arms filled the air as the music virtually lifted the dancers off their feet and off the floor. It was a simmering, sizzling moment of pure primitive emotion. It was the essence of the disco experience.”

What is this “pure primitive emotion”—the essence of the disco experience—that is elicited from dancers? Show Business, a professional trade journal, gives us an idea in its article “A Dynamic Decade of Disco,” saying:

“An aura of acceptance surrounds the disco trend . . . Antiquated sexual mores, which were successfully battled during the sixties, have yielded to a new sexual freedom in which people deal with their desires honestly and participate without guilt.

“Gays are dancing side-by-side with straights, and neither could care less. It is this multi-faceted freedom that constitutes the soul of the disco, and its heart is the pulsating disco beat.”

Free, liberated sexual expression—abandonment of restraints—that is the essence, the soul, of disco. Surely this is reminiscent of ancient fertility dances where worshipers broke loose in frenzied, passion-arousing movements that may well have culminated with participants engaging in sexual intercourse so as to coax “Mother Earth” to yield new crops.

True, not all discos necessarily encourage the casting off of inhibitions, but disco is identified with such a ‘sexually-freed’ life-style. “What differentiates discomania from most of its predecessors is its overt tendency to spill over into orgy,” explains Esquire magazine. “All disco is implicitly orgy . . . By offering the instant and total gratification of all sexual desires in an atmosphere of intense imaginative excitement, the disco-inspired orgy promotes the dawning of an exalted state of consciousness, of literal exstasis, or standing outside the body.”

Emphasis on Self

Some may think of disco particularly as a disciplined form of dance featuring the Hustle, and for some it may be that. Yet this really is not what disco is all about. Rather, the attention of dancers is generally focused not so much on dancing with someone else, but on doing one’s own thing—‘getting down’—as the saying is. The scene is one of sexual exhibitionism.

This self-indulgent thrust of the disco culture has been observed, and some thought-provoking comments have been made. Note the editorial “Disco, Narcissism & Society” in the New York Daily News of March 19, 1978:

“Separated by walls of deafening music and swept up in a frenzy of bright lights, dancers do their own thing seldom touching, never looking at each other, or even speaking. It’s a lot like standing in front of a mirror shouting, ‘me, me, me, me . . . ’ endlessly.

“This pure self-indulgence reflects a dangerously deep-rooted philosophy in our society. It preaches that anything an individual feels like doing is 100% right—no matter how it affects anyone else.

“The attitude shows up in our soaring divorce rate, our legions of broken families and in countless books and movements keyed to self-gratification and self-esteem.

“There is too little room for love in the philosophy that permeates the disco world. And that is a pity, for those who have forgotten—or never known—the joys of giving and sharing are missing the richest part of life.”

The Esquire article of June 20, 1978, has a similar thrust, being entitled “The Disco Style: Love Thyself.” “That disco has been built on a revival of ‘touch dancing’ or that it is focused on a step called the Latin Hustle,” it says, “is either wishful thinking by instructors at the Arthur Murray schools or just bad women’s page journalism. The truth is that today’s hip disco dancer is into the kind of one-man show that John Travolta puts on in the most exciting sequence of Saturday Night Fever.”

Since the movie Saturday Night Fever has had so much to do with the phenomenal growth and spread of disco, let’s consider it. What kind of life-style does that movie feature and, in effect, promote?

“Saturday Night Fever”

The main character of the movie lives for just one thing—to shine at the disco on Saturday night. The sexual escapades of the disco crowd are featured, including oral sex, which is performed out in the car during interludes to the dancing. The language is of the filthiest kind. Yet all of this is presented as normal—the way of life among those who go to discos. In a news article, “Why Teenagers Should Not See ‘Saturday Night Fever,’” New York psychologist Dr. Herbert Hoffman says:

“What Travolta and his friends are teaching teenage boys is to become sexually involved with girls without any romantic feelings whatsoever, to use girls as sex objects, to depersonalize the entire sexual experience.

“The ideas that teenagers will carry away with them from this movie can tragically damage their entire lives.

“Young boys will be out to ‘score’ with the opposite sex, with the idea that a relationship with a girl is an accomplishment to brag about to friends in order to enhance group standing.

“Young girls will be convinced either that promiscuity may be required to insure popularity, or that men are after ‘only one thing.’ In either case, their opportunity for deep and lasting emotional involvement is jeopardized.

“It’s a sick movie to allow susceptible teenagers to see.”

Yet millions of youths around the world, often along with their parents, have flocked to this movie, making it one of the biggest box-office successes in history. As noted, it features what disco is all about. But so do other aspects of the disco scene.

Music, Dress and Drugs

As its popularity grows, there are few people who are not familiar with the sound of disco music. Many well-known songs of earlier decades have been blended with the pulsating beat of disco. As they get used to these tunes, even some older persons who liked the originals find enjoyment in listening to the updated versions. But again, what is often a dominant thrust of disco music?

Reporting on one of the popular disco groups, Discoworld says: “On ‘Baby I’m On Fire,’ from their current album, ‘Arabian Nights,’ the three women pant and purr ‘Oooh, I’m on fire.’ A phallic saxophone enters, turning the song into a fabulous soundtrack for a Times Square peep show.” Then the magazine adds: “The sex-charged style of the Ritchie Family falls within the sphere of the main thrust of today’s disco music, which is to celebrate pleasure.”

Disco’s blatant exploitation of sex, including attempts to arouse listeners sexually, was also noted in Time magazine. Its article “Gaudy Reign of the Disco Queen” said: “Back in 1976 . . . she got a gold record by simulating orgasm 22 times.”

Disco album covers, too, give an idea of the type of music they contain. Nudity is sometimes featured, although sexual exploitation is often more subtle. Discoworld says of one cover: “The stances of Jaqui and Dodie, combined with Ednah’s, create a three-letter symbol which on casual observation is invisible to consciousness, but instantly perceivable at the unconscious level: S-E-X.”

The dress styles of the disco crowd are also in keeping with the emphasis on sex. The book Disco Fever shows a photograph of a dancer at a New York disco. Her dress is slit to the waist and her leg is uplifted, showing an inside view of almost her entire thigh. The caption reads: “The scene . . . sums up the appeal of disco.” Paulette Weiss, staff writer of Stereo Review magazine, says of those caught up in the disco experience: “I’ve seen women strip off their clothes on a dance floor.”

In keeping with the disco emphasis on so-called “pleasure,” drugs flow freely at discos. Recently a drug arrest at the best known disco in New York city hit the headlines. But the New York Daily News observed: “The discovery of drugs in Studio 54 will come as no surprise to anyone who has spent time in the place, according to regulars. Cocaine and marijuana reportedly have been exchanged, sold and used openly there since the place was opened in April of last year.”—December 15, 1978.

Sound and Lights

Sound and lights are generally considered vital to the disco experience. The sound is not simply heard; it is so overwhelming that it is felt.

But can sound that powerful be dangerous? A recent news report from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, said: “The possibility that discotheques are hazardous to health has caused the government to hold off issuing licenses to 20 establishments in the southern city of Porto Alegre pending a medical investigation.” The question may well have been about noise levels, and understandably so.

Last year the sound was checked at discos on Long Island, New York, in the United States, and inspectors found 18 establishments that had noise levels of over 95 decibels for more than 30 seconds. Each was forced to post a warning sign at its entrance: “SOUND LEVELS WITHIN MAY CAUSE PERMANENT HEARING IMPAIRMENT.” Medical research indicates that noise levels commonly experienced at discos can cause lasting damage to certain people’s hearing, particularly those exposed to such noise levels on a regular basis.

The lights, too, pose a possible health hazard. How so? Well, certain discos have laser light systems. “If the beam enters your eye,” says Professor Paul L. Ziemer of Purdue University, “you could get a burn on the retina—a permanent blind spot.” In addition, the strobe lighting, which flickers in time with the music’s beat, can produce dizziness, nausea and hallucinatory fits. Among those who have issued warnings about this is the British government, which did so in a booklet on safety in schools.

Does this consideration of disco—its roots and the kind of places discos are—help you to see why those Christian overseers gathered in Brooklyn, New York, last December were concerned about the growing popularity of disco?

However, many people enjoy disco because of the very things about them that others consider hazardous. They believe that any risks are minimal, and that they are worth taking to enjoy what they consider to be a pleasurable time. Really, how great are the dangers? Does going to discos pose risks to a person’s lasting welfare and happiness? These are matters for us to consider.

[Blurb on page 11]

“Sex is monopolizing disco. . . . Dirty disco is making money—a lot of it—and more record companies and radio stations are jumping on the bandwagon.”—US, January 9, 1979.

How Christians Should View Disco

IS IT wise for Christians to go to discos? Is it wise for them to see such movies as Saturday Night Fever? In many households questions such as these have been topics of conversation, and have given rise to some concern.

Some Christian overseers have spoken about these matters from the public platform, even before large convention audiences. Generally, they have pointed to the danger for Christians who might go to such places. How do you view their advice? Do you consider such Christian overseers ‘fun spoilers,’ persons who are needlessly concerned about the recreational activities of fellow Christians?

What Others Advise

Well, what is the advice of ones who know disco from the inside—the publishers of Discoworld? A 15-year-old from Chicago, Illinois, wrote to the magazine: “I used to attend discotheques until two weeks ago when one of my teachers from school caught me and told my father. I am planning to start going again after things cool off. Because to me the most enjoyable form of entertainment is dancing to the sounds of DISCO.”

Discoworld published the girl’s letter in its May 1977 issue, along with this reply:

“Dear Lidia,

“A girl at your age attending a disco is really not a good idea. There are harsh realities in the world today and if confronted by one of them it may cause a dilemma for you and for your family. I am sure you have a record player at home and enough records to dance to your heart’s desire. If you need a crowd, invite the rest of your friends over.”

“Harsh Realities . . . A Dilemma”?

What “harsh realities in the world today” may one be confronted with by going to discos? How may this result in a “dilemma” for a girl and her family?

A basic harsh reality is that the soul—the very essence—of disco is freedom of sexual expression. The atmosphere at such places is designed to lower inhibitions. A person who is now one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, but who formerly used drugs and went to discos, said: “There were times when I could get higher in a discotheque than on drugs due to the effect of the strobe lights, the throb of the music and the hypnotic air.”

Another Witness, who regretfully had to be expelled from the Christian congregation because he became swallowed up in the disco experience and committed all forms of fornication, later acknowledged: “It’s a jungle. Even if you go there with your wife and want to enjoy a little dancing, she is undressed and raped in the minds of the men there even before you get her out on the dance floor.”

So the harsh realities are that going to discos exposes one to sexual encounters, as well as an atmosphere that lowers sexual inhibitions. Of course, that is what many, perhaps the majority, are seeking. However, a true Christian heeds the apostolic command: “Flee from fornication.” (1 Cor. 6:18) But, frankly, how can Christians really be heeding this command and at the same time be frequenting discos?

The involvement in immorality is not some remote possibility. It is a very real possibility. Reports are received regularly about its happening to those who go to discos. And what often follows? You know—unwanted pregnancies, venereal diseases, broken families, emotional troubles, fear, confusion, not to mention a bad conscience. Confrontation with such harsh realities can indeed cause a dilemma, yes, a really sad situation for a person and his or her family.

For What Are We Living?

There is a vital fact that Christians must face: Not everything pleasurable is good; God may even be displeased with what we enjoy. Consider Moses of old, of whom the Bible says: “By faith Moses, when grown up, refused to be called the son of the daughter of Pharaoh, choosing to be ill-treated with the people of God rather than to have the temporary enjoyment of sin . . . for he looked intently toward the payment of the reward.”—Heb. 11:24-26.

There can be enjoyment, yes, fun, in running with a crowd that engages in a pleasure-oriented, loose way of living, which characterizes the disco life-style. But is that way of life truly of lasting benefit? Did God’s servant Moses choose such a life-style? No, but because he loved Jehovah and desired the reward God offered, Moses refused that temporary enjoyment of sin.

Recently a Witness in her mid-twenties, who formerly had been involved in a morally loose, drug-oriented way of life, was asked about her previous way of life. “I can’t say that it wasn’t fun,” she answered. “I didn’t stop doing those things because they weren’t fun—even though underneath I felt a certain insecurity and unhappiness—but I stopped because I came to learn what was pleasing to Jehovah God, and I wanted above all else to please him.”

So what is really important to you? Is it pursuing temporary fun, something of no lasting benefit, but which may even run you up against harsh realities? Or is it pleasing Jehovah, winning his approval and eternal life in his righteous new system? Where is your heart?

Interestingly, the second-century Christian Clement of Alexandria wrote on this matter of worldly entertainment: “No one who has his senses will ever prefer what is pleasant to what is good.” As Christians, may what we choose for entertainment not be simply what we consider pleasurable, fun, but may our choice be determined particularly by what is good.

Music and Dancing—Need of Caution

However, some Christians may feel deprived, as though they are missing out on something. ‘Not all discos are such bad places,’ they may argue. ‘What’s wrong with having some fun?’

As noted earlier, the name disco can be attached to quite differing kinds of places. Some “discos” may be restaurants, the music and dancing perhaps even being rather incidental, or not even featured during normal dining hours. Such places, and perhaps even others, may feature a form of music and dancing that Christians find acceptable. But these “discos” would not reflect the disco life-style, which conflicts with the precepts of true Christianity.

Jehovah God surely does not condemn entertainment. His word speaks approvingly of music and dancing. (2 Sam. 6:14; Ps. 87:7; 149:3; Matt. 11:17; Luke 15:25) But because true Christians recognize the very real dangers of sharing in such things with persons who do not respect Jehovah’s laws, many wisely choose to enjoy them alone or with fellow Christians. But does this necessarily remove all the potential for trouble? No, it doesn’t. Music, for example, can be harmful even when listened to alone. These comments of a woman, who is now a Witness, illustrate this:

“Popular were songs about fun and freedom. Doing ‘what you want to do’ and ‘whatever feels good’ were depicted as the way to live. Constantly allowing these thoughts to be carried into my mind and heart, I was deeply influenced by my musician ‘friends.’ Though I never personally spoke with them, they became some of my closest associates. My schoolmates and I became almost as familiar with our favorite musicians as we were with our next door neighbors!

“Because I was no longer a girl, yet not quite a woman, I overflowed with emotion, imagination and idealism. Therefore my feelings and outlook were easily ‘tuned in’ with those of my musician ‘friends.’ As they ‘cried’ out their songs, inside I cried too. As they ‘laughed,’ I laughed. Before long, this powerful impact upon my feelings led me to great harm.

“I wanted to experience romantic love, to be showered with the affection that the musicians seemed to have. My conscience, weakened by this worldly thinking, was then no protection for me when I started dating. I tried marijuana and LSD in order to feel ‘in with the crowd.’ My actions, without my being aware of it, were influenced by the desires my musician ‘friends’ had instilled in me. When one boyfriend didn’t prove to be my ‘true’ love, I hoped to find another. Where was that blissful relationship the music had described? I went from relationship to relationship. My boyfriends could not fit into the mold I had cast for them. So I spent many hours, days at a time, in tears and frustration.”

Music affects us. And much of today’s disco music can have an adverse effect. So use discernment when you listen to music. Dancing, too, even when done with fellow Christians, may present potential hazards. When in close contact with members of the opposite sex in the “romantic” atmosphere of music and dancing, feelings can easily be aroused. And especially when good motive is lacking, real trouble can result.

Such lack of good motive proved a problem in the first century during the “love feasts” early Christians held. These feasts evidently were social gatherings arranged for the enjoyment of good food and upbuilding association. But persons lacking proper motive exercised a corrupting influence, apparently turning these wholesome gatherings into noisy, boisterous affairs of self-indulgence.—Jude 12; 2 Pet. 2:13, 14.

Similar situations have developed during social gatherings of Christians in modern times. The introducing of improper disco music and dancing has contributed. We need to be careful to prevent this from occurring, being on guard that persons with improper motives do not slip in and take advantage of such occasions to corrupt others. Not only Christian elders, but all, young and old alike, need to feel the responsibility to keep any semblance of the disco life-style from being manifest among God’s clean, holy people.

As Christians, we need to heed the apostle Peter’s admonition: “Therefore since Christ suffered in the flesh, you too arm yourselves with the same mental disposition . . . For the time that has passed by is sufficient for you to have worked out the will of the nations when you proceeded in deeds of loose conduct, lusts, excesses with wine, revelries, drinking matches, and illegal idolatries. Because you do not continue running with them in this course to the same low sink of debauchery, they are puzzled and go on speaking abusively of you. But these people will render an account to the one ready to judge those living and those dead.”—1 Pet. 4:1-5.

Its Last Waltz?

Unlike members of this rapidly sinking system who have no hope, Christians have true purpose and a goal in life. Let us reflect this fact by the wholesome, upright way that we live. Reject the disco scene! It is empty and sick, and serves as just another evidence of the nearness of the system’s end. Anthropologist Jamake Highwater unwittingly pointed to that fact, saying:

“Dance is the most transparent indicator of attitudes which the culture produces, because we can’t lie about the way we move. . . . (the disco scene) reflects a fear on some level that we’re a terminal people and that this is the last waltz. When I go to Studio 54 [a well-known New York disco], it reminds me of what I imagine the last dance would be like on the Titanic.”

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“There can be enjoyment, yes, fun, in running with a crowd that engages in a pleasure-oriented, loose way of living, which characterizes the disco life-style. But is that way of life truly of lasting benefit?”