In Texas, Teens Want Their Mtv

Terra Wade is a varsity cheerleader. But on this Saturday night, perched on the edge of a truck bed in the First Baptist Church parking lot, she’s not very upbeat.

“We should all paint our trucks and protest,” she says, as a dozen of her fellow teenagers surround her, hanging out with little to do except chat, gossip and flirt.

On Sept. 1, their West Texas town is losing its MTV - dumped from the local cable system after a petition demanded that the rock music channel be replaced by the Trinity Broadcasting Network, a Christian-oriented station.

Wade, 17, is helping to organize a counterpetition to overturn the decision announced earlier this month. But it’s not just about MTV, she says. It’s about respect.

“I’m not saying that MTV doesn’t have anything on it that’s not bad,” she says. “But I’m not going to do something stupid because I watch Beavis and Butt-head.” Adults, she adds, “are going to keep cutting us off more and more until we sit around waiting to leave this place.”

While parents here say they want to keep their town safe and their kids out of trouble, many teens say the efforts have gone too far, and that losing MTV is the last straw. They argue that adults keep taking away activities they enjoy without offering alternatives.

Especially during the summer, when there’s far less to keep young people occupied. The closest movie theater is 30 miles away in Abilene. Albany doesn’t have its own mall. Allsup’s Convenience Store is the only store that’s open all night. There are no pool halls, arcades, bowling alleys or fast-food restaurants, except for a Dairy Queen.

Police have restricted in-line skating to a stretch of sidewalk surrounding the courthouse. Kids used to play roller hockey in the parking lot of a supermarket, but police asked them to leave because the lot is private property.

“It’s like you’re in jail,” says 17-year-old Roy Henry Balliew. “You get watched when you’re in school. You get watched when you’re on the streets. We get watched all the time.”

“Everybody’s scared to go out because they think they’re going to get in trouble,” says Sam Tidwell, 18. “It’s really pretty boring here.”

Teens say watching MTV is one of the few things they can do without being under a watchful eye. Many say they are outraged. In this rural area, MTV is one of the few links teens have to a larger world.

“A lot of us are good Christians,” says Kyle Bartee, 19. “Just because we watch MTV doesn’t mean we’re bad people. I don’t see how MTV is going to affect us.”

As Jake Cleveland, 20, sits at home watching MTV on his 48-inch screen, he asks, “If they get rid of MTV now, what’s next?”

Not all teens here think the MTV ban is a bad thing. Tara Jones, 14, says that the song lyrics, dress and images on MTV can have a negative influence on young people.

Jones doesn’t buy the argument of censorship. She says of people who are opposed to the MTV ban: “You know that they’re not representing Christ, because they’re just trying to represent themselves. I think we should just do away with TV. If everybody had it off, more people (would) know Christ.”

Wade disagrees. Besides being a cheerleader, she takes honors classes and faithfully attends Sunday services at the Church of Christ. She watches MTV, but her hair isn’t dyed funny colors and her makeup doesn’t consist of dark eyeliner and lipstick.

Wade says she is not the kind of teen who complains without taking action. She is one of two teens on the Drug and Alcohol Free Task Force. The task force, along with other organizations such as 4-H, has tried sponsoring community dances and youth events, but teen turnout has been low, she and others say.

“I’m against drugs and alcohol,” she says. “But it’s just not cool to go to those (4-H and task force) parties. Who wants to go to parties with a bunch of elementary school kids and adults?”

One recent night the teens congregate in the church parking lot around 10 p.m. Someone mentions a 4-H dance and the suggestion is met with sarcasm and laughter. James Alexander scans the parking lot and says, “None of these kids have any criminal records. I don’t see how MTV is affecting us.”

Alexander, 27, says he doesn’t mind hanging out with teens who are almost half his age. As a young adult without a wife and family, he says he doesn’t have much to do, either.

“There are no activities for young people. If you gave these kids just a place to hang out instead of a parking lot, they would come,” he says.

Constable Larry Macon agrees that it’s hard for teens to find something to do, but his job is to make sure they stay out of trouble. “There’s absolutely nothing for kids in this town to do,” he admits. “And a lot of it is the grown-ups’ fault. But when it comes to drugs and alcohol, there is no tolerance.”

For Macon, ticketing minors for possession of alcohol is a last resort; he tries talking to the teens first. “We’ve got the best kids in the world in this town,” he says. “But I think right now we’ve had a few more than our share of troublemakers.”

The teens say they know the troublemakers, and they know which peers use drugs. They try to stay away from them. Some teens openly admit to having a few beers once in a while. They say if they were offered other alternatives, they would have more to do than drink.

Jake Green and his friend Brandon Parsons, both 17, say they “get harassed quite a bit” by the police. “We’ll just be sitting in the parking lot talking and we’ll have police drive up and say, ‘We’re gonna search your cars,”’ Green says.

“They’re just sitting there waiting to bust us,” Parsons says.

The next night, teens gather at the church parking lot again. Nearby, a patrol officer pulls over Green in his fire-engine-red pickup. His offense: exhibition of acceleration, a $50 fine.

The teens creep to the edge of the parking lot and peer past the Morehart Mortuary. They shake their heads and say, “Oh, man, it’s Jake.”

The crowd breaks up, and just a few young men remain. Bobby McCoy, 18, is a member of the First Baptist Church. He regularly attends services, but he didn’t sign the petition against MTV. “I watch baseball and MTV,” he says. “If kids do what Beavis and Butt-head do, then their parents didn’t raise them right.”

He says MTV is not the cause of teen problems, but that members of the community are using the network as a scapegoat. And watching the Trinity Broadcasting Network is not going to make him any more moral, he says. “I’m not going to find God through TV.”

By 1 a.m., McCoy and the four other guys in the parking lot are ready to call it a night. They need to get some rest before going to church in the morning.

Before they part, Paul Fitzgibbons, 21, sums up a youth’s life in Albany: “It’s almost illegal to be a kid around here. It’s really hard.”

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: WHAT DO YOU THINK? Some cities are pulling the plug on MTV. What do you think of this? Is it a good idea? What would you do if Spokane and nearby cities and towns banned MTV? How would it affect you? Call Cityline at 458-8800 in Spokane or (208) 765-9894 in Idaho. Then press code 9894 to leave your comments. We might use some of them on an upcoming Our Generation page.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Kristen Go The Dallas Morning News