Television wastes human mind

Paul Bowers, first-year print journalism student

Tagline: Pleading the First

9.12.07

I do not own a television.

Call me strange, call me Amish, but I just don’t see the need. I can already hear the question from incredulous readers: “How do you live?” Easily. I get by just fine, the same way I live without crack cocaine.

I have abstained from all television—excepting for a few admitted instances of secondhand contact—for roughly seven months now, and the question I propose to my TV-fanatic friends is, “What have I missed?” Their usual response? A resounding “Not much.”

As odd as it may seem, I could not care less what MTV has to say about my musical taste, and I could go my entire life without watching “The OC.” The boob tube has become a staple in the American living room, but believe me when I say that there is more to life than “Seinfeld” reruns.

I am by no means an expert on the subject, but I don’t believe it’s even that entertaining anymore. From what I hear, “Saturday Night Live” is no longer funny, children’s programming is rife with innuendo (e.g. “Teletubbies”) and actual script-writing has been replaced by “reality.” I’ll concede that there may have been a brief glimmer of hope for television while “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” was still on the air, but, like grunge music and Strom Thurmond, television probably died in the ‘90s.

Nor is it necessary to watch television in order to stay informed about current events. A much more comprehensive understanding of news items can be obtained by doing precisely what you are doing right now: reading the news, whether in print or online. Whereas television news stations bring their viewers out-of-context sound bites and distractingly attractive meteorologists, print journalists have more than a two-minute time slot in which to thoroughly explain a news item or issue.

But the real problem with television goes beyond the expected complaints of a self-righteous print journalism student. It is the same problem I see with any form of entertainment or information—and here I include radio, books and, yes, newspapers. All of these media can be lumped under the category of “input.”

As humans, I believe that we are made to do far more than absorb input. We are here, at least partly, to think and create on our own terms. If all we do is take in what is presented to us, then we wind up like so many lost souls whom I have known and encountered. We become products of our environment, spouting quote after quote from our favorite movies and wrapping our lives up in the most trivial of microcosms, whether literary circles or music scenes or television discussion groups around the office water cooler.

I want to challenge you to go for a week without TV. Step outside and look at the squirrels. Walk down the hall and meet someone new. Write a poem; paint a painting; sing a song. Most importantly, write your own script.