This is NOT Entertainment

I've thought about discussing something for a long time, and the time is right, now. I want to talk about the state of television, which, from my point of view, isn't all that good. There are so many shows that depict things that are in bad taste, and it saddens me that so many people have no problems with that at all.

Take "The Big Bang Theory", for instance. I've never watched the show, so its popularity is something I can't begin to understand. I do, on a regular basis, hear an audio clip that's part of a promotional spot for the show on TBS. That audio has one character talking about needing somewhere to wriggle his naked...well, you know. There's also a reference to his "junk".

I do watch "Family Guy" and "American Dad"; the episode of the latter that is a spoof of the Bond films is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. But, both shows often depict a certain thing that happens sometimes when a person has an upset stomach. I've never seen the humor in that.

It's lazy writing, made all the more painful to watch because the writing on both shows is often so good.

I want to say, at this point, that I'm not one of those people who think that television was perfect in the past. A lot of shows that were very successful in decades long past do not hold up well. But some of them hold up very well. The series M*A*S*H has just returned to the cable network TV Land and I'm having a lot of fun watching it again for the first time in several years.

One of the research projects I had to do when I was in college the first time, getting a degree in Communications and Media Arts, was to study the long term effects of watching television. It was at that time that I really came to believe that, speaking metaphorically, "you are what you eat". Meaning, that if you consume a steady diet of garbage, it does change who you are as a person.

 It changes the way you look at the world. It changes how you deal with people.

I try to limit my television watching to something along the lines of three to four hours a day. The only time I go over that limit is if I find a good movie to watch on Turner Classic Movies. There are days when I sit and watch two or three movies in a row. But what I'm watching is very high quality material.

I hope I've given you something to consider.

And as always, thank you for reading.