Want To Come Out and Play?

I’m not sure she’s capable of any real feelings.
She’s television generation. She learned life from Bugs Bunny.

-Network

As some of you who read this know, I do not have cable. Nor do I have any kind of box that allows me to see any local channels whatsoever. This makes me happy. Very, very happy. I have a DVD player and a television, they just have no connections to the outside world. I certainly don’t live a life of boredom though sometimes I am an outcast in light conversation. People often ask if I have seen a commercial and I say no. I am just fine with not having a clue what they’re talking about. Perfectly fine.

It is not that I see TV as inherently evil. It’s not some sort of religious statement or anything crazy like that. My happiness with my odd state of being in modern day America comes from two things. First, it started out as a way to save money. No cable bill. Second, I did not used to watch the telly. Did I want to go back? I spent years watching it (I went from non-watcher, to mega watcher, to non-watcher) with just about no gain except the occasional HBO show that absolutely rocked.* However, that’s the beauty of DVD. No commercials to zip through or silence. No commercials that make me want to keep up with the Joneses.

I think one of the things about most small screen programming that gets me is how it desensitizes. I know this is not a new revolutionary thought. Not one bit. It really struck me several weeks ago when I went to Little Mama’s house and we did watch TV. It was a Friday night, not too late, not too early and all that appeared to be on were cop dramas. Lots and lots of guns. Lots and lots of shooting one another. Lots of people dying. Every time you see one of those people die, a knot does not rise up in the throat. You don’t think about their mother or their father or their other miscellaneous loved one. You do not strike a balance with why death is so important to the living. The taking of most human life should evoke an emotional response. When you see it over and over again, it stops meaning anything. When children grow up seeing these things plus the news – what must their minds be thinking? Or not thinking? Many of the shows are not badly acted but not enticing either. I had no desire to know what was going to happen in the end. Instead, I got on her laptop and brought up Netflix. How about a little bit of the Office to lighten the mood? Again, no commercials, just good comedy with a splash of real feeling. Based on what I’m looking for in life, comedy with a just a splash of drama (not drama queen drama, the real thing, the stuff that should matter) is just the right speed.

What concerns me is not so much that people watch TV regularly. Though I am concerned they clearly watch too much of it. There is more than one reason obesity has skyrocketed, why the new thin is actually still overweight. What also concerns me is the impact on today’s kids. When I was growing up, it used to be the norm to go out and play. Not a playdate. You simply would go outside, walk (or run or ride your bike – without a helmet) to a friend’s house, knock on their door and literally say “do you want to play?”. Your day was set. And little, if any of it was spent indoors. I am pretty sure this occurrence has gone the same way as banana clips. However, unlike banana clips, I don’t know that we should be thankful.

I guess all I’m saying is that if we allow TV to be such a big part of our lives, we are bound to lose sight of a few things. Other things… wonderful things. I’ll leave the challenge up to you, though. Turn off the receiver a bit more and get out, get living. Go do the things people on reality shows are doing, don’t just watch them do it. (Though behaving like trash is no good either… if that’s how you want to behave, I beseech you to please go back to your regularly scheduled programming.) Go live life. Trust me, I know there are times when TV comes in handy (and I really do love the occasional series on DVD). I also realize that the boob tube holds it’s value in the sense of providing us access to national news, big news… the kind of news we need and/or really want to see (being able to see the end of the World Series last year was amazing… and being able to watch 9/11 unfold still feels like it was necessary). My hope is that more people begin to realize that the people and books and nature around you hold so much more promise and wonder than any amount of flickering blue light can offer. Get up, move your body, you will feel better. I promise.

And you just might also start spending more time thinking for yourself. Living for yourself, seeing the world in a whole new, different way.

*The Simpsons, Family Guy, South Park and the Chappelle Show are (or were) awesome too.