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TV Nation
By David Glenn Cox
I recently read an article by a transgender woman complaining about a comic skit on the "David Letterman Show." I watched the bit on YouTube and my first reaction was to say, hey, it is in bad taste, but that’s Letterman. Then, upon reflection, I pulled the lens back a little further. I could see her point and I could understand why she was offended, but really, what do you expect from a pig but a grunt?
Back in my middle-class days I subscribed to cable TV and then to satellite TV, and no, there is not snow in the dish, it’s August and I’m in Atlanta. But through the circumstances of poverty and unemployment I have been without regular television for nine months now. I rediscovered the truth of the old proverb that for everything we lose there is something else we are given. I wrote about apartment sitting over the New Year's weekend and how I was revolted by television, no taste, poor taste, bad taste and lacking grace.
The calluses built up by lifelong television viewing have worn away and I swear, as God is my witness, that I’ll never go back. Watching television is what you do when you’re not asking yourself, "What am I doing with my life?" There was a joke I used to tell when I lived in Alabama that "The Beverly Hillbillies" was my favorite show on public television. It is a sad commentary to surf through fifty channels and Tom & Jerry cartoons are still in the running of what to watch.
If you watch television then you already know that all men are stupid, inept, careless and lazy. Men always make a disaster out of home improvement projects, unless they're in a Home Depot commercial. Women do housework in designer clothes and even cocktail dresses and their homes are always beautiful and spotless. For all women on television, their bust lines are their most important feature. If the woman being portrayed is smart and sensible, she will have a small bust line. If the woman is being portrayed as sexual, add to the bust line and subtract from the IQ line. This holds true in most commercials. If the product is for house cleaning, small bust, but for perfume and cosmetics, you get the picture.
In our TV nation, your two children are a preteen girl and a ten to twelve-year-old boy with slightly shaggy curly locks and a toothy grin. They are always happy and well dressed, unless it is a situation comedy in which case they are loud and sarcastic, but they are still well dressed. They are never Goth, overweight or pierced. They never play their stereos too loud or have emotional problems, they are perfect. The Brady kids never go out of style.
Over the weekend I saw an advertisement for a new program about young lawyers; doesn’t that sound just so interesting? Then they added, from the producers of "Gray’s Anatomy." My ex-wife watched that one; I always referred to it as doctor-model hospital because all of the doctors looked like models from a sports wear catalog. It was a soap opera providing venues each week for the doctors to take off their clothes and begin new romances, and now there's a new show about young lawyers. However do they do it? Such creativity and such a stretch!
I’m afraid my transgender friend will be even more disappointed when television becomes more sensitive to her situation. That is, if history is our guide. Remember Jimmy JJ “Dynomite!” Walker? Yes, black children are always cute, and the smaller they are the cuter they are. But they are also always wisecracking and non-threatening. “What you talkin 'bout, Willis?”
Then there are the so-called reality shows which are anything but real. That's like calling playing poker a sport. My favorite is the national karaoke championship called American Idol. This is the top rated show in the nation, where amateur, would-be lounge singers perform songs that you would turn off if they came on your car radio. The real winners of the contest are the judges, earning huge contracts to judge what is basically the Pillsbury bake off, because if you’ve seen one crescent roll you’ve seen them all.
Please don’t think that I’m being condescending of TV watchers, because I was once one of you. I’m just as guilty as the rest of you, except I won’t let them talk to me like that anymore. I won’t be screamed at in advertisements. I won’t be told I can lose weight by going through the Taco Bell drive through. I won’t listen to stupid, insulting jingles for products that don’t work. Any product that tells you it makes exercise easy is lying to you. Do you understand? Exercise isn’t supposed to be easy, that’s why they call it exercise!
That’s what television is all about; it is one big lie from Alpha to Zed. It tells you what you need and what you want to be happy, when it is keeping you from what you need and what you want to be happy. How many relationships might be saved if the TV was put in the closet and couples played cards or went for a walk instead of zoning out in front of the idiot box? It should be remembered that when TV is called the idiot box it is not because there is an idiot inside the box!
With the money spent on cable TV you could take a class, join a book club or a gym. Plan a vacation, do things with the kids, go roller-skating or ice skating, write a book. Make love to your partner, the possibilities are endless. Wasn’t there something that attracted the two of you to be together before television came between you? The ancient Romans in their great empire and love of language developed a word for it. They called it life:
“The quality the distinguishes a vital functioning being from a dead body or inanimate matter.”
You’re not missing anything on TV while you live your life; you are missing your life while watching a poor imitation of it on TV.
It’s January, a time for resolutions, why not take six months off from television? You won’t miss anything, I promise, and what you gain in the bargain will amaze you.
“Let every man be master of his time.” Macbeth
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