Got to move these Color TeeVees

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

Attack another country month starts an opening volley on TVLand (OK it is a stretch but roll with it)

This report from A. C. Nielson says that most USians watch almost 6 hours of television daily, on average. (34:39 per week).

Frankly, I find that statistic appalling. Not only is it a waste of time it is not healthy, mentally or physically.

Do you find that statistic appalling? Have you been able to quit? I mean REALLY quit where someone talks about a Pop TV show, you go...*blankstare*nope can't help you with that one.?

Do we have any TV clean brains out there like mine? I quit the one eye back in 2006. After the last episode of Six Feet Under, and Judging Amy (hands down best TV on at the time) was cancelled, I vowed to finally 100% kick the tube. When there is one on in a doctor's office or bar, I sit with my back to it, unless there is my fav sports team playing out of town.

Same goes for theatrical releases. I have seen 6 films in theaters over the past 10 years. To me it is just a waste of time. But Television is the true opiate of the masses.

Television creates consumer junkie/whores out of those who consume televised content, and has for generations. Do you see this in yourself?

In 2001, I was a Nielson family. For shits n giggles, I picked 2 random FM and AM radio shows and filled out the forms as if I listened to radio from 8AM to 8PM. DFW SMSA.

Both shows jumped from the middle of the pack to No 1 in their market (one was Howard Stern). Then, next cycle, they went back down. All that shift in ad value in a major market created by one diary?

I am not saying I am better than you because you are a slave viewer and I am not. What I am saying is that I have bettered myself as a result of rejecting all the things TVLand offers.

Comments

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

I almost don't watch TV, save for the occasional football game (yes, I'm talking about soccer). I get most of my info from the internet nowadays. Mind you, the internet could be equally sheeple-izing as TV, if not even more. Depends how you use it.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

TV, internet... you're not really dodging anything here, bro-dawg.

Let me count the ways

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

commercials, previews, 'entertainment news', retarded adult cartoons.

[readherring.livejournal.com]

+1
You beat me to it.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

I think you might be talking about the commercial/24-hour-news type of television. I mostly watch the documentary channels like Discovery, History, Science, etc. I don't deem them a waste of time, frankly.

[soliloquy76.livejournal.com]

Ditto.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

AND... the associated advertising.

See, you are so used to it you didn't even acknowledge it was part of the viewing experience.

[soliloquy76.livejournal.com]

Download your TV shows from the interwebs, you'll cut that time by 1/3 by skipping the ads! :P

I think the last movie I saw in a theater was The Hangover. I don't go to the theater anymore because it's always a terrible experience. The prices are insane, it's full of advertising, too many rude people who don't know how to turn off their phones, shut up, or get babysitters.

[abomvubuso.livejournal.com]

Even when logged in with a user subscription, the Colbert Report still keeps running those endless stupid commercials >:-[

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

I probably watch on average of 1 hour of tv a week, or less.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

I know some friends that really control the amount of TV their children watch. Same with video games too. They're not "tiger-moms" exactly, but the kids are a joy to be around: well behaved and no sassing mum and dad. ;)

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

I totally agree on this type of parenting. Kids don't have the capacity for mastering filters as we adults have, so starting to train that early is really important.

[hydropen.livejournal.com]

I'm sure people use to think this way about some novels back in the 20s, as in those pulp magazines and dime novels. Television is a great way to transmit information, like books, but it depends on the individual to get the most out of it. Not that I'm saying most of what's on television is great, but the criticisms should be towards broadcasters.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

I started watching tv differently in the 2000's, and particularly since I moved to the US. I watch very focused (prolly about 6 hours a week or so). I *never* watch anything live and always filter commercials out on the dvr.

The things I follow I'm not ready to leave, my scifi and fantasy shows, a few cooking programs and some documentaries. But I take pride in actually mastering filtering out ads and commercials to 99%

I am far more on the internet or reading books than watching tv in my free time. I think the amount of time doing anything may not be the issue (within reason of course), but rather the quality of what we do. By that I mean...the quality we *ourselves* put on what we do. The most sorry excuse for waste of life is when ppl do shit out of laziness and without truly enjoying it even, or getting anything out of it.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Do you find that statistic appalling?

I'm more impressed than appalled, to be honest. I don't know if I could find 6 hours in an average day to watch TV. As it stands, the DVR exists so we don't have to do that.

Have you been able to quit? I mean REALLY quit where someone talks about a Pop TV show, you go...*blankstare*nope can't help you with that one.?

In that I couldn't tell you much about the most popular shows, sure. In that there are many shows I enjoy and that I have no interest in quitting television completely, no. Everything in moderation, or something.

[prisoner--24601.livejournal.com]

We got rid of cable television over three years ago. Honestly, it was one of the best decisions we ever made. Between the 24 hour "news" channels, having so much garbage that our kids wanted to watch, and too much channel surfing after a hard day, it felt like it was getting too intrusive.

Don't get me wrong, we still find ways to time waste, zone out, and screw off. We play games on our xbox. I probably spend way too much time messing around on the internets. If a particular show sounds interesting, we either download it or watch it on the computer - although really, if you have to actually make the effort of getting it, it tends to cut down on what you watch. We rent/borrow DVD's across the street.

I don't particularly think we're any better/morally superior/more productive than people who have cable, but it has sure us a lot happier.

Preach. Television, what is it good for...

[montecristo.livejournal.com]

I haven't watched anything on my television other than DVD's of movies since 2003. Before 2003, I used to watch two shows a week, "Enterprise" and "Gilmore Girls" with my daughters and wife. When they left they took the good TV with them. I replaced the television but I just wasn't all that into turning it on and watching it, except for the occasional movie on the DVD player. The things on televison strike me as more and more purile and time-wasting the older I get. In 2004, I moved, and again got cable at my new place, but this time only plugged it into the router for the computers.

"Television is mental bubblegum!"
-- Sr. Thomas Miriam (my senior class advisor and English teacher in highschool)

Re: Preach. Television, what is it good for...

[luzribeiro.livejournal.com]

You forgot to mention that television is a conspiracy by the government to brainwash us all into submission to give them all our money through fraudulent taxation.

[devil-ad-vocate.livejournal.com]

I have a question. Who the hell is Kim Kardashian? Really!

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

Who?

[readherring.livejournal.com]

I gave my TV away in 1985. Since then, someone occasionally has felt sorry for me and given me a set, which I would keep in storage for a while before dumping it.

I'm not elitist about it. I don't hate TV. I don't watch TV because I hate how it sucks my time and attention. I'll still watch it in a hotel room or at the gym. (or at a bar, or through the back windshield of the minivan driving in front of me...)

But now I spend equal time hosing around on the internet. Again, I hate myself for it. (and that's one of the reasons I stopped posting here so often) But in a society where everyone else is glued to a screen, it's tough to find an alternate social event with friends every night. So back to the screen I go...

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

I hear that. The religious folks with their ideas of Lent and Ramadan are on to a good idea. I like to take a month a year where I fast from all of my habits. It's like rebooting your brain. I fall back into some of the habits, but I usually leave one or two behind every year, or at least break the habitual aspect of it.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

I blame most problems on people who think that Family Guy is funny.

So true

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

<3

[surferelf.livejournal.com]

We "cut the cable" in aught-seven and freecycled the last TV several months ago. It did not make as big an impact on my life as I thought it would. Mostly, I find that I am no longer able to finish the crossword puzzle in the free weekly while waiting for lunch at the takeout Chinese place, because it always uses actors or characters from current popular TV shows as clues.

[onefatmusicnerd.livejournal.com]

There is some pretty amazing television today, Rome, The Wire, Survivors, Battlestar Galactica, Stargate, Foyle's War. These shows are easily more intellectually challenging than the early nineteenth century romantic literature.

And ads, what the hell is Netflix for if you are still watching ads.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

Now I will agree The Wire was one of the hard ones to give up, but since they put each season out on DVD it was a no-brainer.

What is Netflix? *don't answer that*

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

I watch Real Housewives, Project Runway and Jeopardy! I think that guy who plays The Mentalist is really cute too.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

oh stop it, Lenny

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

I stopped reading after "unless".

(or did I?)

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

should it have been 'except for'?

colloquialism is colloquial

[3fgburner.livejournal.com]

I no longer own a TV. Recycled my 25-year-old Toshiba CRT when signals went digital.

[il-mio-gufo.livejournal.com]

hmmmm....without TV being available to the masses, then i'm afraid there'd be wayyyyyyy too many intellectuals in this country. probably more than i'd be able to handle :/

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

DailyShow/Colbert Report

South Park, when its new

and movies. i love movies.
but not on a TV. always on a computer.
TV's are like a tape cassette.

[il-mio-gufo.livejournal.com]

i know folks who might say the same of a computer; the do everything by their smart-phone! *gasp*

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

I quit TV for a while and it had its advantages, although I do tend to just replace with internet or games, so it's wasn't any physically healthier for me. Then I discovered torrents and realised that there is heaps of good TV getting made now. Now I download the four or five shows I like and watch them without ads (that's the real poison). I've also decided to start watching more local news so I understand the narrative of my national zeitgeist better; I found that when I was only feeding off mainly international news narratives I didn't fully understand what the people around me were talking about. Given that I do enjoy discussing politics, I need to know what memes my coworkers are repeating. Having said that, I'd watch 6 hours a week; 6 hours a day is definitely not good for you. At least it's getting better; in the 1950s the average American watched 9 hours a day, I don't even know how you'd fit all that in. When I teach about the 1960s I always start by explaining how American society had been opiated by television and paralysed by communism and that explains how people could ignore the bubbling civil unrest growing in the cities. Of course, terrorism has filled the fear role in the last decade, and arguably the internet has filled the role of television, but being a far less passive medium I don't think it is as stupefying.

As for cinema, there is shitloads of good cinema out there; just get away from Hollywood, they make some of the most terrible movies in the world. I've realised Hollywood is generally only good for movies that you want to turn your brain off and say "duh" to. I like that occasionally, but it's not a good idea to judge the state of modern cinema based on what's being advertised in your local area. Cinema is like music, the good stuff is not getting flogged in the commercial realm.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

and how many cups o coffee have we had this morning, Sunshine?

:D