Does anyone else hate watching TV?

[Symarip]

This isn't a dig at people who do enjoy television. More power to you. But I have to admit, every time I open a thread based on some show on TV I find a small (or sometimes big) reminder of how unappealing television is to me.

Anyone else feel that way?

[undeterred]

1. When I can't watch I find I don't miss it.

The only television I ever watched is in the evening. Now I am working evenings so I am not able to watch and I don't miss it.

Occasionally there are good shows but they usually get cancelled!

[Symarip]

2. I think that's what did it for me

I used to watch tv religiously but then the military put me on night shifts. I started reading books alot, and combing the net. After a little while, I started going to school again on the side to get my degree and since then, I haven't really looked back. It's been probably 10 years since I watched any type of prime time show.

[undeterred]

4. During college I never watched television-

I missed the late seventies. But reading and studying does more for the mind than most programming.

[ElboRuum]

3. No, not really.

I've never really understood "TV hate" in the first place.

I suppose it might help to say WHY you hate television, rather than just dropping it there and hoping someone relates.

For example, I don't hate TV but I do hate certain things about it. For example, I despise the idea that entire decades have to go by before a trend comes and goes. With stations numbering in the hundreds, is there not room for anything besides reality television? But this is rampant in all of commercial entertainment, the deification of a safe formula of entertainment rather than a culture of risk taking for embracing new and innovative entertainment.

I also detest commercials. I believe that our culture is not harmed so much by the crappy shows you may see, but rather the continual bombardment of people hawking shit you don't want, don't need, and can't afford. I am convinced that we would not be so consumerist if we didn't have to deal with the constant appeals of advertising going into every sensory organ we own.

But I can always find something I enjoy. So, I guess the question is, are your interests so "out there" that in the entire of the cable dial, you can't find one thing that you like?

[Symarip]

6. Hm, I agree with alot of your points

For me, it's the internal requirement of the viewer to need these actors, producers, et al, continually entertaining us. The emotional investment into a one way transmission. And condensing what you stated above, alot of it is crap. Especially reality TV which usually isn't based in reality at all. But even good ol' fashioned drama stories and comedies seem low on substance. And you have to sit in a waiting room of shit (with commercials) to finally, maybe get to something good. And eventually that 'good' is going to suck because nothing stays good forever.

Sure, all that's bad with TV can be found in movies and the internet, too. But the good news there is a movie ends eventually and the internet requires human interaction allowing many choices over content.

So is there good tv? Probably, but it's not worth sitting passively through all the crap to get to it. At least, I don't think so.

[ElboRuum]

9. Well, if "wading through the crap" is part of the issue...

Then your point confuses me, perhaps I'm not reading it properly.

TV and movies are really the same thing. A movie ends, yes. But so does a TV series. They only go on as long as people find value in them. Personally, I like the idea of investing a half-hour or hour over the 2+ a movie requires, because let's face it, time is pretty much a luxury item for me anymore. Movies have the same issue with formulaic premises and trends (right now it's "let's remake everything that's ever been made so we don't have to take any chances on new stories... and Marvel Comics superheroes brought to life, yes, more of that).

And as far as the quantity of drek, uselessness, frivolity, and superfluousness, ya just cannot beat the internet. Its problem is that the whole thing is like the electronic equivalent of Jackass. Amateurism worn like a badge of honor. Blogging? Amateur columnists. YouTube? Amateur filmmakers. All of these social networking sites are just substituting online messaging and posting for having a real life involving real people and doing real things and having real conversations and interests. Yes you have many more choices, but when you get down to it, I'd rather have a choice between two lumps of crap than a thousand lumps of crap. With a thousand, I feel obligated to look through those thousand lumps of crap just to make sure there is no non-crap within the thousand lumps of crap. How much time do people think I have?

Too many choices overwhelm. Too few choices frustrate. Even on this very site, you have to wade through 100 average to shitty OPs to get to one really good one (no offense to anyone of course, not every post is going to be a magnum opus). And if you stay on the Greatest Page, you're only seeing the ones OTHER people have said are good, but we know that that's just the DU equivalent of pop culture, our own home-grown version of homogenized entertainment.

I guess what I don't understand is how you are making the distinction and singling out TV while everything else you mentioned is equally if not moreso crap? What about TV is truly different?

[redqueen]

5. TV snob!

:P

Like the world, it is both profane and wonderful. I just avoid the crap I don't like, and I'm good. When I fail though, I can get pretty annoyed, yeah...

[Roon]

7. I gave up TV when I first got the internet in 1995

Although i loathed the television long before the internet came along. I don't even have a TV in this house! I do have a TV card in my tower so I can watch the broncos play, but that is it.

[Skittles]

8. yes

I've never been a big TV fan - I can turn it on and watch a show or two but I never follow a series or get upset if I miss something

[timtom]

10. K & R

I cannot watch TV. I'm good for about 35 milliseconds and then it's off to watch the paint on the walls.

[trof]

11. I HATE it! I still do it, but I HATE it!

I just can't stop myself.
I'm a masochist, I guess.
:-(

[tigereye]

12. my husband does -

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

13. have not watched it for years

don't miss it a bit

[Deja Q]

14. Only for shows I don't care for

which is 99.9999999991% of them

[astral]

15. I can watch it occasionally, but I won't own one n/t

[Digit]

16. I just am tired of all the commercials

It is the same with the radio...too many commercials.

There are just a couple of shows I will watch, and one is being cancelled.

[Tom Kitten]

17. It sucks nowadays

I mean it really really sucks! They took off all the shows I liked and show infomercials telling you about the shit stuck to your bowels "like spackle or paste"! More like shit which is all I see! The news sucks, even PBS sucks most of the time! And I don't even have cable or else I could tell you about more things that suck! As far as I'm concerned youtube is my new tv, along with the other internets...!

OK, rant over O8)

[luv_mykatz]

18. I gave up watching t.v. in 1980, when Regan won a second election.

I was so mad, I almost kicked in the screen! That would've made a huge mess, so I managed to stop myself. Also, I read Jerry Mander's "Four Arguements For the Elimination of Television". His ideas made sense to me, although I know some people here will think he was too radical. I actually tried his experiment of watching t.v. with the sound off. It was very revealing. Also, Reagan's destruction of the Fairness doctrine and selling off of the air-waves to a small group of companies contributed directly to the formation of what many of now refer to the Corporate-Owned Media. It has led to too much conformity of opinions expressed on t.v. and has also definitely resulted in a lowering of content quality, as well.
Finally, t.v. is a huge time-sucking black hole. It is too easy to sit there, wasting what little spare time you do have, and end up at the end of the evening wondering why you did that. Meh! Forget about it. Find other things to do.

[Tom Kitten]

19. I hear ya!

For eight years during my youth I could not stand to listen to that man! So I just turned the TV off during my college years which is too bad because he did a lot of damage back then...Finding a job in Corvallis was hard back then but at least he gave us government cheese!

And welcome to DU!!! It's great finding another acerbic wit from Oregon! :toast:

[Mollis]

20. I hate watching a lot of TV

but there area certain shows I am hooked to, so I watch them every week. And that's about it.
But the rest of the nonsense is so annoying, I wish it would go away. There are some really stupid shows out there.