phoenixandrew

Full disclosure, I have no strong religious beliefs.

Having gotten that out of the way, I used to watch "Davy and Goliath" in the early 70s on New York's WOR channel 9 every Sunday. I was in first and second grade then. I liked the show but the "Kum By Yah" episode was the only one that didn't sit well with me.

The episode consists of Davy and his friend Jon responding to a challenge from their priest to come up with an activity for the community that would bring some attention to the Church. After some prodding from the dog Goliath, they come up with a plan to have a singing dinner bell choir. The priest agrees to the idea on the condition they find one more person to join them. Jon suggests to Davy they recruit Francisco, the new kid on the block.

Francisco is a kid who has a pet Mynah bird named Jo-Jo who can talk. Davy foolishly tells Francisco that his dog Goliath can talk too. The audience knows that Goliath can only talk in Davy's mind but the rest of the characters can only hear him bark. This leads Francisco to think Davy is some kind of weirdo and causes him to bully and mock Davy, almost leading the two to come to blows. Davy angrily decides to quit the choir, leading the very ignorant community to blame Davy for ruining the event and not Francisco's rude behavior towards Davy.

As you can see, I have a problem with this episode. According to Christian teachings, it is wrong to hate your enemy and, also, goes against the spirit of Kum By Yah. My position is if you are part of a group where there is one person causing trouble, you have to decide if you want to continue being part of that group or quit. I don't think you should be forced to be part of any group if you're not getting along with someone. If the community was unhappy with Davy threatening to quit, they should have blamed Francisco and not Davy.

My personal take is that episode should serve as a lesson on allowing new people to join your group without knowing anything about them. This episode left a sour taste in my mouth.

A textbook case of blaming the victim.

I watched the film via streaming on the Eventive app on Apple TV. The first moments of the documentary was hard to watch. Several times I considered turning the TV off and not watching it. You, the viewer, are basically like the fly on the wall where interns and nurses are constantly called to rooms in ICU to assist dying patients trying by a long shot to rescue them from sure death either through CPR or electro heart shocks before deciding their pulses are not coming back and they are declared dead. Many times the interns and nurses lose it and get very emotional when they are unable to save lives. You actually see one body getting zipped in a body bag, stored in a refrigerated truck and buried in a mass grave. Later on, the movie focuses on three specific people. An intern and two severely ill Covid-19 patients in ICU on ventilators. One is a school security officer for the NYPD, the other one of the hospital's nurses who is pregnant who caught covid from her patients. While in ICU, she gave birth by C-section. The film also focuses on both their families and how they are coping. Throughout the film it is hard to predict if either of them would survive. I predict this film will be a strong candidate for an Oscar for Best Documentary.