I got rid of my TV!! :) (Page 2 of 3)

Well, I was actually upset about a particular incident which has now resolved itself.  As usual, I was upset about nothing.  You had to go and reply before I had a chance to delete the post!

The Internet does take up more time than I'd like, but often it's what I'd deem fairly productive.  I'm going to try and schedule some "non Internet" time too, so I"m forced off if I need to be.

I hardly ever watch TV.  99% of it is garbage.  There are only a few programs I watch regularly, like The Fairly Odd Parents and Myth Busters.  Most TV shows use the same plots.  Sitcoms like Friends are the worst, because it's just about people sleeping around and being mean. 

Almost everything, including children's programs, is full of ridiculous propaganda, and the characters are almost always stereotypes, ie, the bumbling clueless husband and his smart competent wife, the cool black kid and his dorky white friend.

I don't listen to the radio because it's more annoying.  All the stations just play 10-20 songs over and over, and most of them aren't even tolerable.  Right now the whiny, angsty crap is in.  The top 40 charts are fake, the record companies decide who's a star and which songs get air time, not the people.  I'm surprised that more people don't realize how set-up the music industry is.

ya, i still watch t.v. sometimes, so much i feel is ... not for me - but i've caught a few good programs here and there ...

on the women's network, there's good programs sometimes - like psychic witness, most haunted, and there was another one - i've only caught a couple of shows, but it was interesting 'cause it showed real psychics doing their thing, and it showed how the police in different places, like the US and UK use psychics for help - pretty cool stuff ...

there was a documentary i caught on the New VR in Toronto that dealt with reincarnation - very cool - there was a psychiatrist doctor lady who they were interviewing, and she dealt with children who remembered their past lives, they were all between 3-5 years old or something like that, and in that program, they were focussing on 2 cases, one was this Christian family whose kid had memories of being a pilot in WWII - remembered all sorts of facts, like his name, his partners name, the plane he had - all sorts of stuff that a kid that age you would never expect to know - and then his parents ended up doing some research and confirming the stuff their child was saying - but it behooved his Dad especially 'cause his Dad was brought up not to believe in reincarnation - so he was having all sorts of problems with this - the whole program was really interesting ...

then there's a program on CBC called Passionate Eye and they do amazing documentaries sometimes - one of my favorite documentaries that I've seen on there was called Big Sugar and it talked about the Sugar Industry in the US and the whole history of sugar and how it use to be like the oil of today, back in the 18th century ... i wrote a lil synapsis about it here:

http://k-os.forumsunlimited.com/index.p … topic=6968

i've seen lots of things on television that have the potential to be so eye-opening for people - this stuff is all out there - and i think maybe the frequency with which it's coming up is increasing - but really what does that mean or do in big picture terms - in small picture terms ? i don't know ...

the ELF thing with television - i know i do get headaches from television if i watch more than a couple of hours in a row, which i don't tend to do much - but headaches with too much television have always been a problem, ever since i was kid i can remember that ...

I do not use TV as a learning tool.  There is nothing (educational) on TV I cannot get in a book or a search engine on the internet.  Yet, I use TV for entertainment (perhaps three or four hours a week).  Sometimes I feel like watching a stupid show and just laugh at stupidity.  I cannot stay alert or aware 24/7.  Although I have improved considerably since I used to watch TV probably 3 hrs a day.

Regards,

lee

True in a sense.

But books definitely aren't the be all and end all. Go into any large book store and you'll find that for every trashy tv program that exists you'll find there's also a thousand trashy books. Even in the so-called good book sections like the "mind-body-spirit" (or whatever) sections , you'll still find there's tons of books full of crap and disinformation.

I'm certainly not trying to say that tv is better than books. Give me a good book any day of the week. I personally spend far more time reading than I do watching tv. However, I don't think tv is always quite the evil thing some people on this forum think it is. There are definitely people out there making tv programs that are really worth watching (either for education or just entertainment). They may be few and far between, but they definitely exist! (of course, the people who dont have a tv have no idea about that because they never see them! ).

I also think there's a lot to be said for images sometimes, and particularly visual interviews. Seeing somebody interviewed on tv is a completely different experience to just reading an interview in a book or an article. As they say, a picture paints a thousand words, and I think there's some degree of truth to that.

For example there's a new David Attenborough nature/wildlife documentary just started on BBC1 in the UK called Planet Earth, and much of the footage (which was actually taken using military camera technology) is just incredible and aweinspiring.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/planetearth/

There's just absolutely no comparrison between reading about it in a book to seeing it all brought alive in full motion video and sound.

In my opinion tv is only a problem if you can't control your habit, or can't control your urge to just turn it on and channel surf for no reason.

Personally I know that 99% of tv is trash, (and hell, I even occasionally watch some of the trash just for light relief and entertainment!...hey, so shoot me!!:) ) and you know what? I think that's totally fine, I'm not going to apologise for that or make excuses. But I will I admit I do get a little annoyed sometimes that some people in this forum like to keep on insinuating that there's something extremely wrong with people who still have a tv set in their house!

Well I can completely agree with you on that 100%. Thankfully in the UK commercial breaks aren't nearly as bad as in the US (and on BBC channels we don't even have commercial breaks!).

I've only ever been to the US once back in 1995 when I lived for 3 months in Colorado and I watched a fair bit of tv back then. The constant commercial breaks used to drive me mad. I mean you guys have commercial breaks 2 or 3 minutes into a program, and then you'll have breaks every 10 minutes and then even a commercial break just before the credits roll. It's completely crazy, and that was back in 1995. maybe things have got even worse since then. Here in the UK we have an average of 1 commercial break every 15 or 20 minutes. It's still annoying but a lot better than what you guys deal with.

My current tv is actually a few feet to the left of my computer, and so if I'm ever watching a program with commercials, I'll either go and make a drink, or I'll immediately check Noble Realms or some other website on my computer, but I will never ever waste time watching commercials!!

Anyway, to sum up. Yes tv's generally do a lot more harm than good, not much argument there; however, that's mainly to unconscious people who don't know any better.  For us Noble Realmers, I personally don't see much problem with having a tv, particularly for entertainment purposes. We all need light relief sometimes.

That's the same with everything though isn't it?  It's peoples nature.  If you look at every single post on this forum - you can see the person behind the text...and to some extent their ego as well.  Same goes for books when you read them - regardless of whether the book is fact of fiction - you can still see the persons ego in the text.  Also it is true for film and TV.

Some people just go to a greater extent than others.  Like I say - I don't watch TV (broadcast TV that is, I do watch a few TV programmes though).  I haven't watched TV for a good few years now - even though I have a really great expensive TV which I just brought.  For the first few years, I would take every oppertunity I could to tell people how "I don't watch TV", "TV is junk" - and point out many of the negative aspects of TV.

But then I realised, telling people that constantly was all the doing of my ego.  Now I mention it if the topic comes up - but even then, only sometimes.  Mostly I don't say anything unless people ask me about it.  Different attitudes from different people - I don't think either attitude is better than the other.  People naturally "defend" themselves (you done so in this very thread - nothing wrong with that) - more so on the 'net than in real conversation - because it is difficult to know if a post is aimed at you personally.

Like with everything else - ego spouting, TV watching, Ice Cream eating, sports loving etc. the main times they are problems is when they come from unawareness, and an unconscious mind.  But I think that is pretty much what you are saying anyway...