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You Can Call Us Crazy...

We don't have a TV in our house. I have lived without a TV for the past five years. And really, I don't miss it one bit.

We started working out at the local gym, if you can call it back. When we started one of the perks was that it they have lots of TV and the Dish Network. It was like a little reward for working out. Sometimes, we even went to work out at certain times knowing that a certain show show would be on.

But now, I find that I am bored with TV even then. I have a few channels that I check each time, but if nothing interesting is on, I really don't want to watch it. I have now started to take my book along, so I can read if nothing interesting is on. I can only watch people renovating their kitchens and patios so many times or see people cook with ingredients I have never even heard of, let alone purchase at my local grocery stores.

My students think I am nuts when they discover we do not have a TV. "How can you survive?" they ask. "When I get my own place, that is the first thing I will buy," a few always comment. After I explain that we do watch movies on our laptop and we get all of our news on the Internet, a few always decide that it is not so strange them.

But those comments make me sad. Have we really come a the point where people think something like a TV is essential to survival? What would happen if there were no TV? It makes me wonder about the digital turnover that is supposed to be happening in the near future. Would it really be all that bad if not everyone's TV worked?

I hope I can stir a few if not all of my students to think a little bit about what is really important in this life.

Comments

Unknown said…
I think I have only looked at your blog once before, so it was interesting to read your thoughts on TV. I lived without one for 2 years and loved it too. I found I really didn't miss much. My students are six and seven years old. During our unit on needs and wants, they tried to argue that a TV is a need. According to them, a TV is a need because you "need" to know about things that happen in the world and you "need" to know what the weather would be so you know how to dress. I hope reading this doesn't distress you, but regardless, it is an interesting thought.
February 6, 2009 at 9:02 PM
Rachelle said…
kudos to you. I have a tv complete with 75 channels, but only because it comes with my apartment. However, I can get everything I really want off the internet (even the few TV shows I do really like are just one click away!) and with that I don't end up sitting in front of it all night flipping through shows I don't really like anyway.
February 19, 2009 at 12:21 AM
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