The opiate of the masses
There’s a saying, "No one ever died wishing they had spent more time at the office." I’m betting you won’t die wishing you had watched more television.
For most of my life, I didn’t watch television. I didn’t make time to watch it. I preferred to read, play with my plants, work in the yard, take walks, hang out with friends, watch the moon rise, play with my cats, do home improvement projects, watch the sun come up or go down, look at birds, lizards, butterflies, bugs, stars, or critters, bake things, clean the garage, or do just about anything else.
(An aside several years after writing this piece: It wasn't until a two year bout with amplified depression that I watched television. Then I favored programs about transformation of any kind or shows I found amusing. I watched television because I couldn't seem to read, interact with people, or do much of anything I used to regard as productive. I didn't take antidepressants, but I did watch anti-depressing television.)
I’m not saying television isn’t amusing or even occasionally interesting and informative. It is endlessly amusing, as it is intended to be. But life is full of all kinds of amusements that offer you a more direct and creative experience of yourself and the world than television does.
Of course, these real life experiences require that you do more than just locate the remote, but the returns are substantially greater. John Lennon noticed, "Life is what happens while you’re making other plans." Life is also what happens while you’re watching television. Unfortunately, you’re missing it.
Manipulated by the medium
Most of the amusements offered by television are in the same category as the calories you get from soft drinks. These are called "empty calories" because they take up the space of food, but provide no nutritional content. Television takes up your time, just like real life does, but it often doesn’t enrich it.
Television watching involves you in mass meditations, as you sit, transfixed, following the program with thousands of other souls. Many people believe in the power of mass meditation for good purposes. There are planned international prayers for peace or other kinds of uplifting group focuses, carefully timed to evoke the maximum affect of collective concentration of consciousness. Few of us think about the powerful effects on the national psyche of the daily group meditations conducted by television programs and news broadcasts.
Everything on television is carefully contrived to hook your attention and manipulate your thoughts and feelings. It is a powerfully seductive medium, and the people behind the scenes work diligently to keep you coming back with cleverly crafted content, words, and images. Individuals horrified by the idea of drug addiction pay no notice to their addiction to television.
Television isn’t free, even if you don’t subscribe to cable. You are constantly being sold something and you are constantly paying, but what you’re spending is your time and attention—two of your most precious possessions. People who bristle at the audacity of a telemarketer taking up a few minutes of their precious time turn over whole evenings to televised marketing without a moment of indignation at being so skillfully controlled.
Health benefits?
Reality television programming is popular because real life is fascinating, especially if you don’t have time for living it due to all your hours in front of the TV. Television inspires a sort of once-removed sense of connection with people. Instead of living real lives and interacting with real people, television watchers live vicariously through captivating extended pseudo-families comprised of the casts of sit-coms, soap operas, and Survivor. It’s all the drama and craziness of real life without having to deal first hand with any messy or growth-promoting reality.
It is not surprising that no study of television watching has ever found associated health benefits—physical, mental, or social. Quite the contrary, in fact.
Watching television doesn’t contribute to bodily fitness, since it requires only slightly more physical exertion than being dead.
As a babysitter, it’s one that doesn’t set very high standards for problem-solving or interpersonal skills, since it is estimated that in their first eighteen years of life American children (and you grown-ups, too) are exposed to approximately 200,000 acts of violence and 16,000 murders.
Nor are the values television reflects and encourages our most commendable ones. The 360,000 commercials children see during their first 18 years serve to reinforce the conviction that happiness is found in the kinds of things only money can buy,
Tuning into real life
TV Turnoff Network encourages families to reconnect with life and each other by turning off their televisions for a week in April. A week is a very short time to interrupt an entrenched habit. According to scientific studies, it takes about three weeks to adapt to something new. But undoubtedly the philosophy behind TV Turnoff Network’s very short program break is that people might be willing to try it since the pain won’t last long.
It’s a gesture families can make toward getting back to real life, but it’s so abbreviated that they can quickly put it behind them without having to deal with the long-term consequences. And without experiencing the long-term rewards.
Saying no to television is a disorienting jolt, like kicking any addictive habit. You’ll probably wander aimlessly at first, stunned and confused, in withdrawal. You’ll feel too tired to do anything. You’re missing your favorite show. Wonder what’s happening with them. You’re bored. What else is there to do?
I can guarantee there are dozens of things you’ve said you want to do but can’t find time for. Many of you resent losing hours a week to your job and your commute. "If only I didn’t have to work—the things I could do!" Turning off the television gives you back a big chunk of your time. Regaining the life you lost to lounging on the sofa will give you back your energy.
There’s a whole world waiting for you once you kick the TV habit.
Real reality programming, 24 hours a day. We’re offering you your own
show. I can’t think of anyone who could play your life better than
you. We want you to start right away. What do you think? Have we got a
deal?