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Kill your tv!!!

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Christopher O'Brien

Christopher O'Brien

Back in the Saddle Aginn
Staff member
I stopped watching the boobtube seven months ago. Wham! Cold turkey. I admit: The symptoms of withdrawal were painful—my eyeballs twitched and watered, I felt isolated from the programmed reality view and worried that I was no longer worried. But my mute button finger regained feeling and full-functionality, my center of focus shifted from the ridiculous to the sublime and I slowly began to feel unfettered, invigorated and at ease in my own skin. I found I had magically manufactured extra time and I was able to finish all those projects that never seemed to get done—read those books I wanted to read. MAN! Do I feel GOOD! It is as if a great weight has been lifted out of my reptilian brain. My thoughts have become pure and clean, I no longer subconsciously lust for fast-food, shiny cars or anorexic pouty make-up models. I have stopped wondering whether I need drugs that start w/ X or end with "IA" or "Z." I have climbed to the mountain top with its big antenna and have ventured down the otherside to a new sparkling land of my own process. I am FREE, FREE at last.

KILL YOUR FUCKING DOOMBOX w/ prejudice—before it's too late!
 
I totally agree. I moved to a place where there isn't satellite or cable and I haven't watched TV since 2007. Interestingly enough, that's what got me interested in podcasts and led me to find The Paracast.

I don't miss it at all :)
 
congratulations!!! i am almost free of it too. my only road block is my girlfriend who has to have it on as soon as we get up in the morning and when we climb into bed at night.

now if you can get the fluoride out of the water and food you eat.
 
Yeah, the TV IS such a brainwashing tool, huh? I'm not quite there yet.

But I DO Mute all commercials, DVR all shows I watch and fast-forward thru the commercials, watch DVD's.

I get my news from the Net. Only watch actual TV for weather-related news when needed.

CONGRATS! :)
 
I watch specialized channels (OASIS or DISCOVERY) channel in HD. Camera work is nothing short of spectacular.

IMHO, good TV requires $$$ and is no longer a democratic environment except for some excellent PBS programming.

Current environment is a high-definition Sanyo projector (1080p) displaying on a 110" wall-mounted screen. Yamaha sound processor pulsing out Dolby pro-logic IIx through paradigm 7.1 speakers.

Sit back with your drink in that kind of setup and you're travelling (If you can get your son off the !@#$ XBOX !!)
 
Our TV is in the basement, in the guest room, and all we use it for is watching movies and such. We got a converter box, but it's still sitting there next to the TV and I haven't gotten around to even reading the instructions. We stopped watching several years ago, and don't miss it a bit. Sometimes visitors seem a bit uncomfortable when they notice we don't have one in the living room, and they comment on it.

When we do watch, at other people's houses or in restaurants or wherever (the goddamn things are everywhere) it always seems oppressive and vapid, like some deranged alternate reality that leaks into our own. Our local airport has dozens of the cursed things, all tuned to Faux News. It's a depressing way to start a journey.
 
I catagorically disagree. Sun Tzu tells us "Know your enemy, know yourself and always be victorious". Watching tv is like having a direct feed from the corporate masters. You just have to learn how to stop watching tv and instead start observing tv. Makes a world of difference.

BTW, I don't think any of the big American "news" stations are really about news. BBC, CBC, THOSE are news stations. How can you tell? They're BORING AS HELL. Hardly any flashy graphics or high-tempo music or other distracting crap, just a person's head talking at you, telling you shit that happened recently... you know... the NEWS.
 
I guess if I considered the "corporate media" to be my enemies, I might feel some compulsion to keep an eye on them. Instead, I just pity da schmucks. I managed to outgrow fear and loathing about 30 years ago. It was a most liberating accomplishment.

I, too, like the BBC. Pretty much straight up news, without the obsession with Washington, DC. That is very refreshing. Long ago, when I lived on the East Coast, I listened to the Beeb on shortwave. That was cool. Their website is one of my main sources of news now.

Also, there are many very cool and wonderful things on the tube, if you take the trouble to sort through the mountains of crap. I just don't find them to be worth the trouble. Our local library has lots of great stuff on DVD and even old VHS tapes, so we don't miss the best of what PBS has, for example. At least not for very long. I hear the National Parks series is excellent, so I'll have to get on the list for those.
 
I love how this board used the same old clichés of the Agitprop, yeah! godspeed brave internet warriors fighting against the corporate amerikkka, speakin true to the power::)
 
Double Nought Spy said:
I hear the National Parks series is excellent, so I'll have to get on the list for those.
Click to expand...

I've seen a few episodes and it is great IMO. TV isn't ALL bad. I DVR pretty much everything, so I don't need to listen to ANY advertising and I cut out about 20 minutes of junk. It's great!!

My opinion is that there are some good shows out there, but of course it is a subjective thing. I watch Discovery, History, Documentaries, PBS,The Science Channel, National Geographic, Animal planet, and a few more depending what they are showing. Not saying that everything on those channels is great or even good at times, but overall I do find some interesting shows. I even watch Lost. And I occasionally like to watch sports, something I could not afford to see otherwise. Do what you like. I'm, certainly not tied to my television. But I can see why some people would want to free themselves from it. Moderation is the key to everything.
 
I gave up the TV in 1995 when the oj simpson trial was in full swing.
It was the biggest circus i had ever witnessed. So i pulled the plug.
I do not miss it at all. The only time i see it is in the odd hotel/motel room, it is far more crappy than i remember it. I'm especially surprised and disgusted at the star status giving to the people that deliver the news.
Good Radio news is the way to go i think.
One thing irritates me when i see it, is the continual stream of text and pictures scrolling across the screen while i'm trying to watch the programme i have selected. Can anyone say? short term attention span.
Cheers John
PS
How did OJ'S trial go? :)
 
boulders and sticks said:
How did OJ'S trial go? :)
Click to expand...
Which one? :D

When I watch TV, it's generally the old classic movie channel. No commercials, and it's not constantly strobing at me with MTV-style editing. I find black-and-white to be kinda soothing, and everything moves at a slower pace.

I find I prefer strumming my guitar or chucking my yo-yos around to watching the box.
 
i like my Apple TV. i can watch youtube stuff, movies, my photos, listen to internet radio, podcasts etc all on my 46 inch sony bravia.
 
Good gawd, the OJ trial! I was in California for a few days when that mess was reaching its anticlimax, and the obsessive drivel that spewed from the tubes there was just amazing. Of course it was absurd everywhere else, but the LA market was saturated with every bit of idiotic twadle anyone could cobble onto the awful spectacle. It was unnerving, and I had not yet stopped watching TV at that time, so I had the typical American immunity to most of the nonsense.

A few years ago, I found myself in a hotel room with little to do. The free internet service was not working, and I had not remembered to bring something to read. I turned on the TV and started surfing. Finally, after doing several laps of the cable channel selection there, I settled on a rerun of Family Ties or something. Yeesh! Used to be, for several years there, you could usually find the Blues Brothers playing on some channel if you had cable.
 
I have watched very, *very* little TV since sometime in the 90s. After a while the newness of not watching it wears off and you find yourself in an entirely different set of "traps" and whatnot, but you're still probably much better off.

I tripped out not long ago when I decided to check out some TV and I no longer knew what the local channels were... everything was all mixed up from what it had always been around here, and the old local "time and community info" channel was replaced by TV Guide channel.
 
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