tv

A man named George Global once said “If it weren’t for electricity, we’d all be watching television by candlelight.” I found this quote to be funny and insightful. How many hours each day to we spend watching television? On average, I’d say I spend about two to three hours a day watching television. That varies depending on the shows that are on and what else I am doing at the time. On May 3, 1990 naturalist Bill McKibben spent several months video taping and watching television from ninety three different channels carried in Fairfax, Virginia. I can only imagine the state his mind must have been in when he finally stepped away from the television to wander into the light of the sun. The first thing he did was go into the woods and swim in a lake. After several months of T.V. watching, I would have dove head first into a freezing lake as well. In his essay “Television and the Twilight of the Senses”, McKibben argues that television dulls the senses and acts as a tranquilizer to the stresses we face in life. Although there may be some truth in his argument, television is not as big of a problem as he makes it out to be.
Is the way television portrays reality the same as it occurs in real life? For instance, McKibben describes the difference between watching a baseball game in real life and watching one on television. He says when you’re actually at the game you can hear “the sourceless, undifferentiated babble that comes from forty thousand people talking, laughing, rustling sacks of popcorn, a sound that the crack of a bat breaks so cleanly through, refocusing everyone’s attention” (McKibben 112). However, on T.V. we only see certain angles and every once in a while the game is interrupted by a commercial. A similar situation happened to me. A couple years ago I went to a Green Day concert. At the time, I didn’t even really like the band, but after the concert I became a big fan. A couple of months later, Green Day released a DVD/CD of a concert they did in England that same year. The DVD was called Bullet in a Bible and I got it the day it came out. Their singing routine was almost the same to the one they did in the Giants Stadium in San Francisco when I saw them in concert. However the feelings I had watching the movie and actually being at the concert where very different. At the concert, I could hear the music playing in my ears as if I were right in front of the stage, though in reality I was pretty far away. I couldn’t actually see the band members’ faces, but it didn’t matter because it wasn’t about watching; it was about listening and sharing a momentous experience with thousands of strangers yelling and standing in the freezing cold for the same purpose. Watching the DVD didn’t seem as overwhelmingly powerful as seeing the concert live. The field of view was minimized and the environment wasn’t the same as the concert. But just because my concert experience was so greater doesn’t mean that buying the movie was a waste. Because I got the movie I was able to see behind the scenes footage of how they came up with their new album, how they prepared for the concerts, and what it felt like to them to be on that stage in front of all those people. Watching it also helped me remember certain things about the concert that I wouldn’t otherwise have noticed. Although seeing the DVD was certainly not as amazing as seeing the band perform live, the way they were portrayed and glorified on that film was no different from the way they were seen through the eyes of their devoted fans.
McKibben’s prolonged exposure to television may have actually blinded him from the way T.V. is seen in day to day life. When people think of T.V. they have an image of someone sitting on a couch eating nothing but potato chips for hours and hours. In reality people usually multi-task while the television is on. They talk to friends on cell phones, pay their bills, go online, or prepare dinner. The only time they are ever really focused on the T.V. is if their favorite show is on or they are watching it with someone else. Even then, they usually only watch the T.V. for an hour or two and then leave to do something else. Let’s face it; too much of anything is bad. For example, if you were to see the effects of eating only potato chips for several months strait, who knows what kind of physical ailments would occur. Why should doing the same for television be any different?
What would the world be like without television? Odds are we would still find ways to distract ourselves from outside life. Computers, cell phones, and radios would become our new forms of television. The reason T.V. is so popular is because it fills the void of silence that elapses from time to time. We need noise in our life, mostly because we’ve become afraid of silence. It is like being stuck in a waiting room with five other people you don’t know. You have nothing to say to each other and an awkward silence seems to envelope the room. That’s why most waiting rooms and elevators have music. The music helps to cover up the silence you would otherwise be faced with. Television can cover up the loneliness, stress, and other worries you may feel.
McKibben claims that television is like a tranquilizer and people become too attached to it, but in reality it can motivate people to go out and help the world around them. One example of this is the show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. For four seasons this show has built house and helped families who suffered from low incomes, houses that were falling to pieces, and personal tragedies. The “Extreme Team” gave them a new home and a better chance at life. This show has inspired others to go out and help in similar ways. When people watch this show, they don’t stare at the television like zombies waiting for the next commercial; they connect with the families on the show and start to appreciate their own lives. T.V. can also make people aware of the difficult conditions others have to face everyday in third world countries. Foundations and charities greatly benefit from the support they are given thanks to the broadcasting power of television. T.V. also shows us what is happening in the world through the news. Each morning you can find out about recent events that occur locally, nationally, and in other countries. It’s interesting to think that in one hour a man in New York and a man in California can both know about something that happened in last night in another country. Television helps us connect to those around us and also help those who need aid.
Although television has become a big part of the way we live our lives everyday, it does not consume our lives. There are other things that can be equally entertaining and influential. For example a while ago I started writing blogs for fun on a blog website. To help come up with topics for my blogs I went to a writing website called www.creativewritingprompts.com that had over 200 prompts. Prompt number seven said “Electricity is a recent discovery. Think of twelve things to do when there is no power.” For this blog I wrote
“Oh no! The power's out. Luckily it's daytime so I don't have to bring out the flashlights. Hmmmm . . ., well I was watching TV. What should I do now? I can go outside and ride my bike. Of course I'm all alone and Em's not here. Riding your bike is fun, but not when you’re all alone riding in circles in the driveway. I could read a book. Let's see, I have Gone With The Wind, Lord of the Flies, Secret Garden, hey look a Stephen King book, a fairy tale book, an art book, Goosebumps, Far side Gallery, The 500 Best Urban Legends Ever!, Macbeth and Frankenstein, Jaws, 4 different ghost stories books, and my senior English class's Interactive Reader which has at least 12 stories I haven't read yet. Alright, those were some good books to read, but I've only listed 2 things I can do. I can also draw or paint. I can write another story in my 5th storybook. I can play cards. I can play the piano. Wow I'm half way there. I can play a board game, though I think it might be hard considering the fact that I'm all by myself. I can drive somewhere in my car. That means I can drive to the mall and buy some more books. I can listen to my CD player. Let's see that's 9 things. Alright 3 more things. Well, I guess I could clean my room . . . I can call my friend Maggie over on my cell phone. Then who knows what we might do. We could throw paper airplanes off the balcony. That's always fun. We could go swimming. We could . . . hey the power's back! Well, so much for all of that. That airplane idea sounded like a lot of fun. I think I'll call Maggie now . . .”
The fact is there are many things we can do besides watching television. It’s just that we use television so much we forget about all the other things we could be doing instead.
Television impacts our lives in many ways. Because this impact is on such a large scale, some fear that it may actually keep us from doing other, more important things in life. To McKibben, the more important things in life are being active, seeing friends, and living in nature. It’s one thing to watch T.V. from time to time, but another to watch it so much that you forget to enjoy the other parts of life. When you do watch it this way, it is easy to blame television for all of your problems. What people forget is that the T.V. in front of them is just a box. It can be turned off just as easily as it can be turned on. It does not control you or make you stay inside. The decision to watch T.V. or go hiking in the woods with your friends is all up to you.