Telivision

A

akivory

Joined
Feb 5, 2001
Messages
808
I am wondering if I am alone in trying to avoid watching television. A year ago we unplugged our TV from the cable and moved it to the basement. It is hooked up to CD player but rarely gets watched. I am pleased to say the results have been altogether positive. We have a 12 year old and two young foster daughters in our home and were concerned about how they were being influenced. We get out a lot more and our daughter has become an avid reader.
It will probably creep back in again but for now I am now enjoying living in what my daughter calls the stone age.
 
My TV broke probably ten years ago now and I've never bothered to fix it. I have a very nice projection home theater system, but you can't get any reception on it. I haven't watched TV in a decade. Every once and a while, I get to do so, very often if I'm staying in a hotel room. Each such experience only reinforces the correctness of my decision stop watching. I remember that TV used to have some intelligence and some quality and that there were about two minutes of commercials for every fifteen minutes of programming. Now it seems like there are about two minutes of mindlessly-stupid "programming" for every fifteen minutes of commercials.
 
I have a 4 room satellite system, but wife and 4 kids dominate them! So instead of me watching whatever they have on (I don't do MTV, cartoons, old rerun movies) I get my radio. Oh well, radio sits next to the beer fridge!

To answer the question, nope I don't watch TV, but for different reasons than above.
 
We don't watch tv much either. No specific reason, just that there isn't much on. Even with cable we don't get a single channel that shows uninterupted or uncensored movies, and most series suck. I spend more time on the computer now...
 
Gollnick said:
I haven't watched TV in a decade. Every once and a while, I get to do so, very often if I'm staying in a hotel room. Each such experience only reinforces the correctness of my decision stop watching.
Click to expand...

LOL kind of reminds me of Crocodile Dundee when he saw I love lucy on the T.V in the hotel room. :D
 
Haven't watched it in years and not once did I think twice about that decision. Like others, whenever I am exposed to TV, it only makes me want to avoid it more. I find more satisfaction in reading a book, playing guitar or researching / discussing things on the internet.
 
We have 2 T.V.s in our house..they only get watched during NCAA basketball season. I have found out that even the evening news is worthless biased drivel.
 
I find that the TV is off and has been replaced by everybody on their own computer.

Now if the TV, Radio, CD Player and the Computers are off, then thats saying something.
 
Although it seems popular in some circles to sneer at TV as an evil, mind-numbing drug, I don't find it so.
Of course, I'm rather picky about what I watch; spending much more time with Discovery and History than I do with network programming.
Still, the networks put out some good stuff amid the drek.

I'm quite fond of the Military channel as well. I admit I spend a good deal of time surfing the net and watching TV at the same time.
 
The only thing I miss is Antiques Roadshow and PBR bull Riding On Sunday afternoon. Two weeks ago I was stuck in a hotel room and found myself watching Ken Burns ww2 series. I will buy the series when it comes out on DVD.
There are many wonderful programs but I find my time is precious. My mother got rid of our TV when I was 6 years old in 1960. I will be forever grateful. A friend was up visiting and we talked about how little time we spent indoors. Although we were had little ,of five children , I am the only one with out an advanced degree. One of my brothers is a scientist and another is a senior electrical engineer at a nuclear power plant a prominent historian.
It is all about time.
 
My father once said the best parenting decision he ever made was when he decided we kids were watching too much TV and he limited us to one hour per day. Within a month, we were watching maybe an hour a week. Forty years later, none of us watch regularly.

I looked up one day when walking into the house and noticed the lead-in wire was unhooked from the antenna. I have no idea how long it had been like that. When I thought about it, it could have been years.
 
If I couldn't watch TV, I'd have a massive stroke and die. "My Name is Earl" and "Scrubs"...I just couldn't live without the humor.
 
i also have to get my dose of humor off the idiot panel(not box's anymore for those who dont watch-lol)

earl,is awsome-
a new one called big bang theory is also sooo funny
 
Our TV broke a while back and I tried to talk the wife into not getting a new one. She wouldn't go for it, so I have to listen to the damn thing while she's still up and I'm trying to sleep at night. TV is almost all mindless crap. I read once, in Neil Postman's excellent book, 'Amusing Ourselves to Death,' I think, that while you're watching TV, your brain actually turns off more than when you're asleep. You use more brain waves dreaming than watching television. That should tell you something. When you're watching TV, you aren't really in control of your brain anymore, the TV is.
 
I like the mindless crap on TV. It's a good way to relax in the evening. My job is very mentally demanding (senior aerospace engineer) and after working a 10 hour day I don't want to do anything more mentally demanding than watching an episode of the Simpsons. Now if you spend all day every day watching mindless TV, you have a problem but some mindless TV every now and then is just what the doctor ordered.
 
555 said:
I find that the TV is off and has been replaced by everybody on their own computer.

Now if the TV, Radio, CD Player and the Computers are off, then thats saying something.
Click to expand...

Aint that the truth!:D

We moved our TV to the basement last year and have never had more than local broadcast channels. Just that move alone reduced our minimal TV diet to almost nil. I agree with many that there's so little worth watching and so little time.

However, our kids are all addicted to computer/video games. We have now instituted a one hour limit on "screen time" for them all. This includes computer ,TV, video games, Nintendo DS, etc. It has done wonders for the level of bickering and fighting and the legos, bionicles, transformers, barbies, and polly pockets are all getting a much nicer workout (as are the kids' brains!)

We still do watch a few movies every week, our library has a GREAT DVD selection, but there we have control of when it starts and stops.

J-
 
I don't watch T.V. much no news and miss all the advertisments , I was watching a series called Stargate I thought it was pretty good , turns out I was watching reruns of the 10th and final season I kep waiting for the McGiver dude to pull out his SAK , never happened. I have to say that T.V. is a sign of the changing times sure is diffenrent from the first time I saw a TV at a neighbors house once in the 50s
 
Well, me and Gollnick are in the same boat. I left home almost 12 years ago and never bought a TV. Got married, had children, still no TV. We read a lot. Our children are learning to enjoy reading. I'm online maybe 4 hours a week, mostly on the weekends.

steve
 
Years ago, I realized that after football season was over that the wife and I had watched only two hours of TV in a month, so we cancelled cable. Then we watched nothing. Eventually we were TV-less for years. It was only hard for us during various sports seasons.

We have a TV and satellite. I don't know how many channels we get, but we only need about six. Here's what we watch: 1) Baseball-religiously-GO TRIBE! 2) Pro or college football. 3) wife watches NASCAR :confused: 4) NCAA men's basketball finals.

I tried History, Military, etc, but they're a "light" version compared to reading about the subject. Based on the commercials for shows that they play during sports, I think I'd hang myself if I had to watch them.

The most interesting thing when we had no TV were the responses we got when we told people we didn't have a TV. There were only two:
1) "What do you do in the evening?" or
2) "Well, we don't watch much television." (always said in what sounded like a defensive or guilty tone.
 
My TV broke 12 months ago and I didn't bother to get it fixed. I've got a large monitor that I hook up to my laptop to watch DVD's though.

I noticed the improvement in my writing when my thought processes weren't being polluted by TV sports commentators and newsreaders.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top