Have you ever tried to go without TV? Have you ever been forced to go without TV? Was it liberating or did the withdrawal almost kill you? Did you fall off the wagon almost immediately?

Has TV enriched or impoverished your life? Are there any benefits you get from TV that you couldn't get anywhere else? Are there any drawbacks to your TV habit that trouble you?

My mom used to punish me by revoking my TV privileges. Once I ran away... didn't get too far before the cops brought me home, but "no Star Trek for you tonight, young lady!" had been my motivation.

This isn't a total cold-turkey situation, but before satellite TV I agreed to house-sit for an undetermined number of years for friends of mine who live at the end of a dead-end dirt road... no cable. I really thought I was going to die, being the TV addict I am, but I was surprised to find that as long as I had a VCR I got used to having only one local channel. I was truly amazed to discover that about myself. My friends were gone twelve years.

Interesting topic! Good opportunity for soul-searching.

The first year I went away to college I didn't have a television. I discovered that if I wanted to watch something I had to either find someone in my dorm who had one, and who wanted to watch the same program, or go over to the student center and campaign for enough votes to watch my program - almost impossible during any major sports season. I learned to hoard my tv-watching credits and save them for things like the Oscars, major miniseries and important tv movies, and the like. If a series wasn't terrifically popular on campus, I probably lost track of it.

The next year an indulgent grandmother gave me a slightly used black and white portable set, which I happily carted to school with me. Imagine my surprise when I found myself turning it on only occasionally. Gradually, my tv watching grew again, but never reached the addictive heights of the years before my Year Without My Own TV.

When I was a kid ( mid-late 70's ) I was a TV junkie. I'd buy "TV Guide" and look through it and note what looked good for the coming week.

When I got into high school and college I watched a bit less TV due to having something akin to a social life -- but I still watched more than most people I knew.

The weird thing is that now that I'm 41 and married and don't go out much at all I don't watch TV that much -- at least not network or broadcast TV. Too many choices, not enough quality ! To paraphrase Springsteen, " 257 channels and nothin's on ! " I'm more likely to watch a movie on cable or and old TV show on DVD. I'm lucky if I can find one regulary scheduled show a night that I'm interested in watching.

I laughed when I saw the cover story on this week's 'Entertainment Weekly -- "TV is king !" I really wish it was, but "the king" was assassinated by 1) "reality" television, 2) Networks not taking chances on new and different shows, 3) Freakin' repeats !! -- No one wants to compete or creatively counter-program against "event" television ( NCAA Basketball, Oscars, Olympics ). Memo: NOT everyone is watching these shows -- how about putting something worthy on another channel so you have a choice other than crap or nothing.

Any other former tube addicts who find themselves not watching nowadays ? Not so much because you feel bad about watching too much, more because there's NOTHING TO WATCH !!

I gave up TV for a week, for a school project. I didn't miss anything.

I went to work camp one summer and spend 3 months without television. The camp was at a remote location with no phone connection and no electricity, generators had to be used. I didn't miss TV at all. However, as soon as I got home, I got hooked again.

I went away another summer to go backpacking and I didn't watch TV for 2 months. And I didn't miss TV either. Sadly, as soon as I got home, I got hooked, again!

A couple years ago our TV died on us. We didn't have it in our budget to replace it immediately, so we did without one for 2 months. Our house was clean. We played games together as a family. We read. We took bike rides and hikes as a family. We considered not buying another one, because we were functioning really well without one. I don't remember exactly what made us break down and buy a new one, but we did - and the whole family was hooked again instantly. We talk about getting rid of this one, or at least getting rid of cable, but I don't think we will. We're all quite deeply addicted. Wow. Typing that made me a little sad.

Interesting. I moved to the country 3 months ago and went from having cable, to having only 3 channels, two good and one "sparkly." (I now watch "Survivor" through multicoloured dots.) We have the option of getting a satellite dish, but I was already watching way too bleebleeblahblahboo with 30 channels. I was worried what 200 might do to my brain.

So far I'm happy with the 3 channels, and watch a lot less TV, while still seeing all my favorites.The best thing is, I now get a lot more sleep, because there's nothing on after 11. Yay!

On the down side, the overall quality of my watching has dropped considerably. Particularly Saturday nights. Sometimes my choices are: Hockey, curling, and a rerun of a second-rate crime show. A discerning person would just turn off the TV, and sometimes I do just that, but you know what it's like - sometimes you just want the TV on, and almost anything will do. Why is that?

Wow, babealu, that is sad, but I can totally relate, having gone through a similar experience when my children were small. Why is TV so addictive? I wonder sometimes. It's just pictures in a box, but when it's on, it's hard to look away sometimes.

Back in the bad old days of my youth, in the years BC (Before Cable), we got the three network affiliates, plus a PBS station on UHF, through my folks' huge old console TV. When the picture tube went bye-bye, they didn't really see any reason to get another (and considering the quality of TV in the late '70s, can you blame them?).

In the days leading up to the first launch of the space shuttle Columbia, I scraped together enough cash to buy a second-hand B&W TV, and improvised an antenna out of two hangers and some foil. The image was grainy, and had a tendency to roll, but at least I got to watch a for-real spaceship take off! (Those of you who grew up with it probably don't understand why I was so excited by this...)

I still didn't really get hooked that hard until many years later, when ST:TNG (and then DS9) hit the airwaves. That sucked me into watching those, at least. Never did watch undiscriminatingly, and the introduction of PS2 and XBox to my life has decreased the TV-watching even more - why waste my time watching other people do things, when I can figure out the correct combination of actions and words to really sink down to the Dark Side in KotOR? :->

Sorry to quote myself, but just in case people reading this were thinking, "Yup - definitely too many channels" I wanted to point out that my original post read "watching way t o o
m u c h TV with 30 channels." Where the bleeblee word came from I don't know. For some reason I can't edit it out either. I've reported it and am awaiting an answer.

As I understand it, Melina, back when these good folks were still Mighty Big TV, they were suffering a series of spam attacks from a rival site, whose name now translates as "bleebleeblahbloo". I think they left it in because they can't conceive of someone watching too much television... :-)

I'm going to be forced to go without soon. My apartment is being renovated, so I'm moving into an empty unit for a month or so. And I won't be getting cable during that time. I should start preparing myself, or at least stocking up with tivo with goodies I can watch. Or, god forbid, stock up on books.

I got angry at Comcast one year and cancelled my cable. We went three months (during the summer) and it wasn't bad. We watched the occasional network show, but I think that the fact that it was summer and everything was in reruns made it easier for us. I didn't miss it too much, but my son (in elementary school at that time) was having Nickelodeon withdrawals so we got the cable back. I still love TV, but don't watch as much as I did before that summer.

Netflix has changed the way I watch TV. I just rent shows and watch them when I get the chance. I could get Tivo, but I'd lose any social life I have if I did.

It's true. It's easier to ignore TV in the summer. It can be hard for people like us Canadians, living in a northern country with so many long, dark, cold nights to fill over the winter - maybe that explains our addiction to both TV and Tim Hortons coffee & donuts! When it's dark at 5 pm, and twenty below outside, it's so nice to sit back and watch Lost or CSI Miami or anything at all set in a place full of light and bright colours and blue water. Plus we get just plain bored! (OK - not everyone is bored. I am, not being one to go snowmobiling or curling.)

I kinda go up and down with my television watching. There are months (years? yes, maybe.) where I am in front of the tv constantly and have tons of shows that I want to watch. Then there are months (sadly, never years) when I have a bit of a life and don't even care that I am missing my shows. Right now I am pretty much ignoring network television for HBO, Showtime and Netflix. But soon enough (you know, after the Sopranos) I will be thinking of getting rid of those channels b/c I am never home anymore. Hellooooo summertime!

But, I am horrified by the thought that my signif. other wants us to get rid of the tv altogether when we have kids. That scares me to death. I mean, can't I just keep one hidden, in the bedroom or somewhere, that they can't watch? please? It's all about moderation I think (sadly, I am not always so good at that, therefore she might be right).

All during the school years, my parents forbade us to watch TV during the weekdays [maybe it was only like 30 minutes a day or something]. But my brother and I constantly sneaked in some TV.

College: No TV or Cable (they didn't offer it in the dorms until after I graduated). Thank goodness for Internet because I ended up getting some shows on online.

After I got my current job, I ended up renting a room in a house with no cable. After the summer, I sucked it up and bought a TV tuner for my computer and an antenna.

Now, I have analog cable (all the channels possible without premium). It's on all the time. I hate it, but it's the addiction people..

About ten years ago, I was sharing a house with a couple of roommates and we went two years without a tv. I'd go out to movies or watch once a month or so at a friend's house.

Interesting result. Once I had adjusted to very little tv in my life, I became hyper-sensitive to on-screen violence. It made me really, really jumpy. And when tv came back into my life it took maybe three days to get desensitized again. It was weird.

All the way back in 2000, we were unable to pay our cable bill and it got cut off. And wouldn't you know it, it was during the premiere of Gundam Wing on Toonami... Damn near died, I tell you!

We had nothing but static, although if you were truly (honest to goodness desperate for a show) you could turn to channel 118 and catch a really jacked up signal for WB-62 (Kansas City). I know because I did watch the blurry, messed up WB 62. (I was desperate! Desperate, I tell you!)

Sometimes, on channel 3 (at least when I hooked up my Sega Genesis or Nintendo 64) you'd catch a wayward radio signal.

It lasted for two weeks and rather than turn the damn thing off, I retreated to Super Smashbrothers and Super Mario 64... Thank goodness for video games. My mom and sister retreated to music.

When the two weeks were up, we got our cable back (hook, line, and sinker) and I had my beloved Gundam Wing! Honestly, those two weeks were the most dull days of my life.

Back in the school days I was a total TV junkie and watched pretty much everything that was on. Later in the university (I'm still a student) there were months that I was watching only in the weekends. In the previous semester I made an internet connection and downloaded many of my shows - I decided it was a big mistake, since I was barely studying, so now once again I'm watching only when I have more spare time. I don't think being without TV is that bad - you simply find other things to do, you go out more, meet your friends, read books, etc... Sometimes I think I could do better without TV at all (but this statement is being forgotten about once new episodes are on).

Last night, thinking about TV and why it’s so addictive made me think about something I rarely see mentioned in discussions of TV, and that’s the idea of TV as companion.

Many times over the years I’ve heard people who live alone, both men and women, admit, usually somewhat sheepishly, that at night they sleep on the couch with the TV on. More often, people have told me that they always switch the set on the minute they get in the house. They just like the sound of voices.

This reminds of some time ago when for 3 years I lived alone. It was a difficult time, for various reasons, and I became very dependent on TV to help me get through the evenings and weekends. Not that I didn’t have a job, friends and family, but I was often alone.

One winter evening, I had planned my evening around two of my favorite shows, but suddenly the cable went out. I was shocked at how panicked I felt, with the TV-less evening stretching ahead of me. In desperation, I dug through a closet and found some old rabbit ears, and ended up watching some lame local show through static till the cable returned. Even while I was doing it, I was disturbed at the realization of the extent to which TV had become my security blanket, and I decided I needed to work on finding some more productive ways to fill my evenings.

All this gave me a lot of insight into why people use TV as an antidote to loneliness, and why so many people would never want to give it up.

You make a really good point, Melina Detroit. I'm home alone during the day and the TV is constantly on. I'm rarely sitting in front of it - I go about my daily business - but it's always there - keeping me company. I turn it off as soon as the kids come home from school, so that they can do their homework, and there are many days that it doesn't get turned on again until after they're in bed. It's not even good company. I am very vocal about hating pretty much everything that's on during the day. But it's my routine. And if Mr. Babe stays home from work sick and has control of the remote, it throws my whole routine out of whack.

Addicted to TV? I closed on my first home yesterday and at this very moment I swear to God I have in the front seat of my pickup truck a TV, VCR, power strip and remote controls. It's the very first bunch of "stuff" that's getting moved, before clothes or furniture or a toothbrush. I'm dropping it off tonight before I go back to my rental to finish packing.

I can honestly say I'm not addicted to "primetime" TV. I do make it a point to watch a few shows (4 or 5 every week), but I don't watch anything else. Most of the time I'm out of the house anyway, and when I'm actually in the house I'm either studying (I'm a Law student) or online. I don't have a laptop (yet, but June is near! Ahem.), so when I'm on the computer (which is in a commonly used area in my house so that my brother can use it as well) I can't watch TV. And let me tell you: that has made a huge difference in my TV-watching ways. What usually happens is, I'm surfing the net (ahem), a show I want to watch is on, I say "I'll shut off the PC in 5 minutes", 5 minutes become 15 and then I end up not watching the show at all.

For the record, I do have a TV in my room, but that's only due to my DVD collection. I can't exactly watch Hellraiser: Inferno (love! Hellseeker, too. Obviously, I'm not right in the head.) in the living room.

What I am addicted to?

Late-night TV. Infomercials, cheesy 80's B-movies, reruns of awful shows, bizarre documentaries (that's what they air in Greece, at least) and so on.

But mostly infomercials.

Of course (since I'm not an insomniac, and I do need my beauty sleep) I can't really watch late-night TV regularly, so I only do it when I have exams (I can only study at night, and of course by "study" I mean "watch crap on TV until my eyes glaze over"). Seriously, some of the best times of my life were the 2 months of watching two episodes of early Melrose Place every single day (from 3 am until 5 am), while studying Public International Law, Tax Law and Intellectual Property Law. Sweet! I will also go on record as saying I've watched "Raw Justice" with David Keith and a young Pamela Anderson twice, but I've never watched, say, "Raging Bull". If they ever air it at 4 am, though, I probably will.

Seriously though, for me TV is a good distraction when I'm too bored to do anything productive (although it's a second to listening to music, which I infinitely prefer) and it's also good to help me clear my head when I've studied too much and it's way too late to do anything else. Also, I usually watch TV during my daily 30-minute exercise (especially when I'm watching infomercials about steppers or exercycles or something like that. Ahem.).

That said, I'm not sure I'd be able to survive without a TV period. Without watching actual TV shows, OK. Without watching DVD's (sometimes, of TV shows as well) either? No way.

My T.V. addiction has died down a lot now that I no longer have shows that I Have!To!See! - Frasier, Friends, X-Files, E.R. etc. I'm much more likely to watch a video than a show I'm meh about.

We tended to do that until we had kids. I grew up in a house that ALWAYS had a radio or music on in the background so when I got my own place I ended up always turning the TV on whether I was watching it or not. Now that we have young kids we make a point of turning the TV off whenever we’re not actively watching something because if we don’t they’ll literally sit in a vegetative state staring at anything that’s on.

Also, in college I was a huge sports fan. NHL, NBA, NFL, I was one step away from the guy who’s paints his face to watch the game. Then after graduation I spent six months in Europe where no one cares about any of those leagues. Since then (years ago) I don’t think I’ve watched more than 5 minutes of a hockey or basketball game on TV. I still watch the NFL, but not nearly with the same devotion I used to.

I also TiVo everything now and watch it at my leisure. Of course it means I make my comments on page 48 of the episode thread, but I guess that's the price I pay.

Last weekend there was a fascinating interview on CBC radio with a man who wrote a book about how television has affected us. He contends that TV is extremely bad for us as a society. It's not our brains he's primarily worried about, but our bodies. He says that it doesn't matter whether you're watching Jerry Springer or National Geographic. It's the endless hours of immobility that are killing us, young and old alike, and the fact that young people watching the box get next to no brain stimulation - much less than if they were, say, reading a book. He actually feels that this is leading to both an undevelopment of our young peoples' brains, and a large increase in violence in our society.

To listen to, he's much less hardline than he sounds, and was very funny and interesting. He made some really good points. And yet I won't be giving up my TV any time soon. My goal is moderation. (Mostly. As someone I know once said, too much moderation is excessive. )

I wish I could remember the author and book title, as I had planned to look for it. I thought the title was Remote Controlled, but so far can't find it.

Well, I'm sure that guy had a point, but there have been times when I spent hours exercising while watching TV. Stretching while watching Discovery Science, running on the treadmill while watching a marathon of half-hour stand-up performances on Comedy Central.

Honestly, I think TV gets a bad rep. Yeah, a lot of it is trash, but you'll find plenty of trash in literature, cinema, and music as well.

This is my rule for TV-viewing: if it doesn't make me cry, laugh, think, or just leave me breathless from excitement, I don't bother watching. Yet my TiVO to-do list is about eleven pages long. Veronica Mars, Thief, Farscape replays (because I'm too cheap to buy the DVDs), and about a dozen or so cartoon series (mostly anime from Cartoon Network's Adult Swim line-up). Four full hours spent each week watching The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. And when SpikeTV starts replaying s1 ST:DS9 eps again, the amount of time I spend watching will only increase.

I'm not addicted to TV, but I am addicted to *certain* TV shows. And rightly so, IMO, because these shows are actually good.

Very true. I live alone, and if I am home and not asleep, the TV is on, even if I'm not watching it. Also, I get insomnia sometimes, and when that happens it seems like the only way I can fall asleep is on the couch in front of the TV. Sad but true.
When I moved earlier this month, the first thing I did after moving all my stuff into the new place was set up my TV, DVD/VCR and cable. That was also the last thing to be disassembled and moved out of the old place.
I wouldn't say I'm addicted to TV, but there are shows I am addicted to. Lost and House are two of them. But if I'm bored/depressed/need a distraction or whatever, I'll watch pretty much anything I can find that doesn't seem too stupid, American Idol being the exception to the "too stupid" rule :)

I grew up in a situation where I had NO access to network/cable television until I was about sixteen. I think this has made me much more addicted to TV today then I would have been otherwise, as access to television was something I always coveted growing up.

I won't say my life revolves around it, but I probably do have more of a tolerance for watching crap, and I watch some TV every day. However, because I'm aware that if left on my own I'll probably flop on the couch, I try to do something else when the television is on, like knit, so that the television 'doesn't count' (I'm not watching TV, I'm exercising...), and when I went to college I refused all offers of a television, knowing that it would probably lower my grade point average significantly if I had one.

Actually, one of the things that has really assisted in keeping me from watching as much TV as I might want to is TWoP, because I know there are a certain number of shows that I can read instead of watch!

This is one of the wonderful, addictive things about TV. You can be sitting at home, bored, depressed, listless – you turn on the black box in the corner, and 10 minutes later you’re laughing, crying, excited, amazed. Well, not usually, but the possibility is always there.

The very best thing about TV: For me, it would have to be that fantastic honeymoon period, when you’ve found a show you love, that’s like no other show you’ve ever seen, and you’re a few episodes in. You mark it on your calendar, plan your evening around it, and when it’s on, you’re just riveted to the TV. You don’t even answer the phone. I love that part! This is how I felt during the first two seasons of Survivor and the Amazing Race, the first few episodes of Lost, and various other shows. I still love them, and don’t miss an episode, but the novelty has worn off – the honeymoon is over. Sniff.

Another great, more serious thing about TV: World events, but specifically disasters. Nothing can compare to TV’s ability to make us feel connected, part of things. To make huge events real.

I remember on 9/11 – we were sitting in our office, when someone ran in to say what was happening in NYC. We thought it was a bad joke. Then a relative called and we realized it was real. Someone ran home and came back with a little TV and rabbit ears. We sat in the boardroom for the rest of the day, watching in shock as events unfolded before our eyes. We weren’t disturbed, since no one called or came in to the office. Outside the streets were deserted. Everyone was watching TV.

On a somewhat lesser scale (although not for the people involved) was Katrina and the aftermath. Even though I live in Canada, everyone was watching CNN constantly. My most memorable moment was watching the long line of Army vehicles finally arriving in New Orleans, and knowing that some help had finally arrived. Just as on 9/11, when I kept feeling like I was watching a scene from “Independence Day”, I felt like I was watching the cathartic end of a movie, with the cavalry arriving to save everybody. It was surreal, yet disturbing, the way reality and entertainment were blurring together.

In both cases, after a few days, the addictive factor of TV became a problem, and I found myself talking to friends about how we couldn’t STOP watching TV. We were all feeling anxious, depressed. We had to face the fact that endlessly watching these events wasn’t helping anybody. Still, I don’t regret that I was able to be part of them, through television.

The very worst thing about TV: Lying on the couch at night, catatonic with fatigue, knowing you should have a hot bath and go to bed, but instead lying there, inert, watching whatever drivel is on, too stunned to press the OFF button on the remote. One interesting discovery, though – no matter how comatose I am, there are still a few shows even I will not watch. They will drive me to haul myself off the couch and drag myself off to bed. For me these include: all team sports, Maury/Jerry Springer, any show that involves spouse swapping or rent-a-nannies, and anything involving Jennifer Love Hewitt. (Even at my lowest, I do have some standards.)

I am SUCH a TV addict. I will freely admit this.

To point:
Last night my husband initiated love-making while I was watching Top Chef. And I actually took a moment to think to myself "They replay the episode next week just before the new episode...so I can catch what I'm missing then." Isn't that awful? I feel guilty typing it!

Seriously, I know that TV is my security blanket. It's pathetic, but I'm being honest. There are times when I just want to escape from the world & reality, and TV is perfect for that. But it also means that sometimes I'm tuning out my children/husband/home...and that's not okay. It's something I give thought to, and I actively try to work on.

Reality TV is my biggest addiction...Survivor, Dancing with the Stars, What Not to Wear, Top Chef, The Amazing Race, etc. I love them! I couldn't care less about talk shows, or soap operas. But give me an sitcom (good or bad) that I can just sit and laugh at! And among my VERY favorite shows are the "101 Things Removed from the Human Body" type programs! I know, I know...gross. But fascinating!!!

That is classic! There aren't too many TV addicts who haven't thought, "Sex....uh, can it wait until after Lost?" Our poor husbands...I wonder if they know!

Mr.Babe is an addict, too, so it's kind of a given. I've never actually mentioned this to anyone, though... Ah, the anonymity of the internet.

DITTO! OMG! I was thinking this very same thing the other day. And may I add - 4) Moving the damn show all around so that it can't be found.

How the hell are you going to make a call about a show's worthiness by showing it four times and moving it all around the dial? Stop w/ the stupid reality shows already? I think were covered. Seriously.

I know that I seriously don't bother investing much in new network tv shows anymore. They don't care enough to; why the hell should I?

But I am an addict. I recently crashed a DVR and spent an unreasonable amount of time trying to resurrect (unsuccessful as yet) the programming.

In my own corner of the universe, there is no new Batman Cartoon.

Interesting comment. When I was younger, I had a rule for myself: If I had to choose between a really good TV show and some kind of event IRL, I had to ALWAYS choose the real life event. I decided that when I was a teenager, and stuck to it for years.

Just over the last couple of years, I'm finding it harder to stick to this. Maybe because I'm not as energetic, and sitting is always easier than doing? Last week, I was watching a show on TV and a friend called. I knew she wanted to discuss an ongoing problem with an ailing parent. After looking at the caller ID, I was actually walking away from the phone, deciding to watch the show undisturbed, till Mr. Detroit said, "Oh, come on. Talk to her. " I did, and was glad I did. Later, I felt bad. I guess it's time to extend my rule to phone calls as well as activities. (Except during Survivor and the Amazing Race. They're on another plane entirely!)

Ha! Back in 2001, our family went through the same thing for about 8 months. Me and my sisters were going through the standard 6 channels one day and to our delight, picked up a neighbors MTV 2 satelite signal. It was awesome.

I was a party recently and I started to get bored, thinking to myself "you know, I could be at home watching a rerun of Frasier right now". But I attribute that more to the lameness of said party than being a tv addict.

But at times, I think I do watch too much tv, but that usually only happens when I'm in the "honeymoon period" like Melina Detroit described. I went through that with Veronica Mars and America's Next Top Model last year. I remember going out shopping and to dinner with various friends and family, being really pissed that I missed an episode. Or worse, having to baby-sit my niece and nephew, but like someone said upthread, I have rule with myself to choose family and friends over tv.

I come from Finland, which is one of those sane countries that subtitles everything so we do not have to endure dubbing, which I think is the oral form of rape. Right now I am spending six months in France, which is one of those countries where oral rape is legal and funded by the state.

My TV-watching has literally plummeted since I have been here, but I don't mind. I have been reading a lot, I actually finished my thesis, and I have been able to enjoy the wonderful city of Paris. I have also watched all of the movies that I have wanted to see for a long time but couldn't. I also have TWOP to keep me company and to remind me how unbelievably dumb Tru Calling really was.

Just to show that you can take an addict away from the TV but not the TV from the addict, my boyfriend back home, whom I miss just as much as non-dubbed television, has been preparing a whole heap of tapes for me to watch when I get back. Yay!

You are so lucky! There was nothing on jacked!up!WB then. And you get MTV2! Oh man, must have been awesome to randomly turn to MTV (2) and actually see a music video. And for eight months. Sweet! :)



Ha! My French professor said that lots of shows and films dubbed in French (in France) actually have little if anything to do with what they were actually saying in the original. So it's kinda of like watching Foreign Film Dubs on Whose Line all day. :)

...Or so he says. I dunno, never been to France.

Hell is a place where they make you watch The Sopranos in French and Melrose Place in German. Amen.

I commend you. I feel the same way about TV but I have no husband or children, so although I understand the "escape" sentiment, I don't need to be so concerned about giving others around me short shrift. In fact, I just moved from a shared-house situation to my own home, and one of my first thoughts was "Woo-hoo; guilt-free TV!!". I call it my "feral" state... what I do or don't do affects no one but myself. I kinda like it. But that's just me.

"Feral" state - I have to remember that name. But I do know, and love, the feeling. I got remarried a couple of years ago, after several years alone, and wondered how this would affect my eclectic, and sometimes just embarrassing TV viewing habits. To be honest, I was afraid it would put a big crimp in them. What's worse than trying to indulge your guilty pleasure/addiction, while someone sits there rolling their eyes?

Fortunately, my husband and I have developed an unspoken rule....neither comments on the other's viewing habits, no matter how inexplicable. If I'm watching a show he hates (which I'm glad to say is rare) he'll go watch something else on our other TV, without a single snarky comment or glare. In return, I do the same for him, when he watches Poker, or (gag!) WWF. (OK - that last one's a toughie. My eyes want to roll so badly!) It's working beautifully so far.

Get the 'F' out.

No seriously. It's WWE. :)

See, now I wish I could get respect like that in my house. We're alway snapping about viewing habits, but that's another topic.

Nagurikorosu You're so right! Thank you. It's not the World Wildlife Federation that has me almost rolling my eyes, so it must be the WWE, although I couldn't say what that stands for, just that it involves lots of sweaty men in tights bashing each other. I know the word "Wrestling" is in there somewhere.

I freely admit I am not a particularly generous person, or kind, or service-oriented. I am very selfish indeed, and that is not a good quality when you're applying to college and you want to show admissions officers that you're a wonderful person who will enrich their campuses. So instead of coming up with some treacly, disingenuous "how going to [insert university here] will help me change the world" essay that anyone who knows me would see was complete bullshit, I wrote about my patron saint, Saint Clare (because my first name really is Clare.) Saint Clare is the patron saint of television (scroll down halfway, or do ctrl-F "television.")

You read that right. I wrote my college essays about what I've learned from watching TV.

Aw, shucks... :) You're welcome. I used to watch the WWE, when it was WWF. During the change, they printed these little t-shirts with, "Get the 'F' Out." It was so cute.



Bwah! So wrong, so wrong. XD



I am going to respond to that. Just in another thread maybe. :)

In preparation for my two year old daughter's annual physical, I was counting how many words she can say clearly and understandably. (Yes, you really have to report this on a little questionnaire.) I had gotten close to fifty and was quite pleased, until I realized that at least 10 to 12 of them were PBS children's show characters, because she is addicted to SPROUT (PBS's cable channel). So, along with ball, mine!, no!, and thank you, she can also say, Barney, Dora, Kipper, and Elmo.
Hmm. Do I underestimate her vocabulary, or just 'fess up that I am a bad, bad mother in the eyes of the American Pediatric Academy. Tough choice, right there.

It's amazing how children are like sponges, just soaking up everything around them. I know when mine were small, it was always a struggle to make sure they didn't watch too much TV. It's tempting to let them watch till their eyes go square, knowing it will keep them quiet and sedated, yet obviously that would be so bad for them, physically and mentally. So it was always a balancing act.

Honestly, I'm glad I don't have small children now. It used to be hard enough to get them away from the TV with our (wow!) 12 channels. Now, with infinite channels, Internet, video games, etc. it would be so much harder.

I had a bad TV night on Saturday. I was tired, didn't want to go out. The perfect night to curl up and watch the set. But, with no cable, my choices at one point were: Hockey, Golf, or a show about Hockey. Followed by Curling. So I took a nap, read a book, did dishes. I'm fighting hard not to give in and get a satellite dish. That's like crack for a TV addict. So far so good.

Back in the 80s I boarded my pony at a barn full of TV addicts. Normally, we would have an instructor come in on Thursdays to teach dressage, but once North and South started to air we had to change that because everybody wanted to leave early so they could be home in time for the show - that included the instructor.

I thought I'd revive this thread because this is something I've been thinking about a lot recently. I have always been a big TV person and have gone through periods where I definitely relied on TV to be a proxy for social relationships (for example, I can remember 2 different times in my life when I moved to new cities & didn't know anyone there, and all of a sudden I started becoming much more interested in ensemble-cast dramas (how else to explain my unflagging watching of Jack and Jill? I think I was their only viewer there at the end...)). But recently I've realized that I have come to have a much more compulsive relationship with TV -- i.e., I have to turn it on every day, even when there's nothing in particular I want to watch, and it's so hard for me to bring myself to turn it off. I have started thinking about tv as a true addiction. Then I ran across this article.

One interesting thing that stood out to me was this paragraph:



But then the article goes on to say that even people who feel dependant on TV or describe themselves as "tv addicts" aren't true addicts in the clinical sense. What do you all think about this? It seems that there is an addictive quality to heavy tv watching, but then again I'm no psychologist.