In the film “High Fidelity,” the character Rob Gordon asks, “Do I listen to pop music because I’m miserable, or am I miserable because I listen to pop music?”

This line raises an interesting question: At what moment does art stop being an expression and become a reflection? In that question, the word “miserable” could be replaced with any adjective, but the most poignant question in this week of our return to campus is this: Are we dark because of entertainment, or is entertainment dark because of us?

The question is as old as the days of Tipper Gore and the Parents Music Resource Center crusading against entertainment corrupting the minds of children. To their credit, they did solidify the parental warning stickers on your favorite albums.

But putting personal politics aside, history dictates that all evidence must be analyzed. If some people called for warning labels on entertainment, if there are ratings on television programs, if you have to be accompanied by an adult to an R-rated movie, then someone in the world believes entertainment is affecting us.

Art used to be considered an expression and representation of a culture, but today any person can pay less than a week’s wages to be transformed into a superhero through a video game. Less than $10 shows you a movie with more bullets than a shooting range. And this is all in post-vaudeville showings of entertainers like Alice Cooper and Marilyn Manson. So should we start putting fluorescent warning labels on everyone who listens to Gwar?

The answer is not in stopping art but in heeding it. Art has not changed. There simply is nothing new under the sun. Art’s availability and form, however, has changed. The passive viewer of the world may find it hard to relate art’s dark side to the real world; that is, until humanity’s dark side touches them personally.

Our expressions will always find a place through our art. We do not have the privilege to create whatever is considered entertainment without the responsibility of analysis. Relativism is the key because it allows the expression of societies light and dark. But without consideration of what our own art is, we will always be shocked by what our reality becomes.

When the dark side of reality hits us, we can only look to the warning signs we created.