Cable TV is so useless

[Captain Morgan]

This is a rant, but this could also be in the Movies/TV section.

<Captain steps up onto his soap box and begins his rant>
I was an addict. I used to watch cable TV for no reason at all. I always had to get my fix of useless TV programs everyday. When I was bored, the TV came on. Then one day I realized that I'm paying almost $50 a month just to watch these stupid shows and documentaries. For years I thought that having cable TV was important so that I could watch the news for important events and watch the latest Star Trek, and various movies on cable. (By the way this rant includes airwave broadcast and satellite TV as well). Then one day I realized that I hated to leave home anytime for the fear of missing a show and get upset because I missed the show (I could tape the shows of course but usually the VCR got programmed wrong (by my wife, not me oh no)). At that point, it was time to cut the cable off. I've been cable free for about 6 months now, and I couldn't be happier. If there is a show that really warrants any attention I can just rent the show and not pay to watch commercials throughout the show. Plus now I can waste my time in other ways such as posting stupid threads like this.

The point is movies, TV shows and even documentaries aren't inherently useless, but 90% of stuff on TV is stuff that I don't care about and only watched because it was there. I was paying $50 bucks a month for three TV shows and the ability to watch the news. What I got was 200 channels of crap and more commercials than I could stand. The funny thing is commercials don't bother me if the medium is free. i.e. radio has commercials but you don't pay to listen. But with cable and the rest, you are paying to watch and be subjected to more commercials than you could count in an hour. Well more than I can count in an hour (does it scare you that I work in a nuke power plant?)

42 Days of Christmas said in the forklift training video thread:

I think it is admirable that Ookla can recognize that that particular short film was spiritually damaging to him.
Many people I know are not self-aware enough to recognize how media is effecting them unless it is something really extreme to them.

If you think about it, the stuff on TV can shape your viewpoints, and feeds you information that corporations and the media want you to know. While it is possible to get more than one viewpoint on TV, how much of it is truly your viewpoint. All media is tainted by the corporations that own them. CNN is more liberal and can help shape your viewpoint to theirs. FoxNews on the other hand is considered conservative. For example, both media organization can and often do report the same incident with President Bush with different flairs, could be a bad report from CNN and good report from FoxNews. Commercials on the other hand, try to convince you that you need their product or service and you can't live without it, and after a few hundred times you start to think that they may be right. Do you really need this kind of brainwashing in your lives?

I challenge everyone to go without TV for a month and see how it changes them. Your daily activities will change as you spend more time doing things with your family and friends. If you need the news, you still have the internet. If you like to be able to sit in front of the TV to not think and just relax for a bit then rent a movie that you choose because you want to watch it, and not what somebody else programmed for you. By giving up cable or the dish, you will find that your bank account will thank you, as well as having much more quality time with your family and friends. Of course you will still want to waste your time, as the reason we are all here, but try to waste your time differently than watching useless cable TV. I think you'll enjoy you free time all the more.

<Captain steps off his soap box and opens the floor for the debate>

[JP Dogberry]

Not much of a challange. Save Anime, DVDs, Movies and one show I started watching two weeks ago (and the occasional five minutes in between doing things when someone else has it on) I havn't watched TV in the last year.

I spend the time idly surfing the net, chatting to people, and moving my cursor in circles on the desktop instead. If this is an improvement is left for the reader to decide.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

I dont generally watch a lot of TV and when I do I find myself watching cable more than anything else. I watch a lot of "instructional" tv like the Discovery channel, Animal Planet and the food network. It seems to me that the good television is only availible through cable. I can and do go weeks without watching anything. Personally though I dont feel like taking that challenge, but have fun guys.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I got out of the habit of TV watching when my TV wouldn't get even broadcast. Seriously, when I was staying at my parents' I would occassionally stay up just to stay up and watch TV. i'd be wiped out the next day and have no good reason for it. I hate TV.

[42]

I tend to leave the TV on just to have noise in my apartment. I don't see my roomates very much and my ferret isn't very noisy.
However, I find that I can only safely leave the TV alone on a few channels. Food Network and Home & Garden TV are the first two choses. I'll leave is on the Cartoon network sometimes, though some how their show disturb me. I avoid newsstations as they depress me, and most other channels don't interest me.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I tend to leave the TV on just to have noise in my apartment.

See, that's what my vast mp3 collection is for.

[Spriggan]

You Sir have offended my God, I demand satisfaction.  Pistols at dawn.  Though, since I don't live in NE, Rican will be takeing my place.  Fell free to shoot more then once.  

[stacer]

We have cable in my apartment, but it's just the basic of basics--we pay $10 a month (total) to get the broadcasts and about 4 other stations. Which, split by four, comes down to practically nothing. Sometimes even with so few channels, it's hard to turn it off, though. We've thought about turning it off, but there's always a roommate or two that objects to that. So we end up deciding over again that we just have to have more control, and turn it off more often.

Since school started again, I really haven't watched that much tv. If I have an evening that I just want to relax, I might turn the tv on while I knit, but I figure at least I'm multitasking. I've gotten into audiobooks lately so that I can listen and knit at the same time--better stories than what you find on tv.

[n8sumsion]

When my wife and I lived in Germany, we went without a tv for several months, and we really didn't miss it. I got my news from the internet, and we enjoyed not having the distraction offered by tv.

However, now we have a little boy who would be absolutely devastated if he couldn't watch The Wiggles every morning. No way are we going to yank that away from him just yet.

My wife and I do have a rule we set for ourselves though. We don't allow channel surfing. We find that if we start surfing, we'll waste a couple hours in front of the tv not watching anything we really want to watch. Now we'll watch tv if there's something specific we want to watch. We waste a lot less time this way. Even better is when we record the shows we want to watch so we can watch them later at our convenience and fast-forward through the commercials.

So I won't join in on the challenge, my son's probably not ready for it yet.

[Skar]

I haven't watched TV, even broadcast, on a regular basis for about 9 years now.  

I am convinced that there are Einsteins and Teslas and Jeffersons and Franklins and Churchills etc... out there who were mentally derailed by TV before they were old enough to know better.  Now, instead of researching things they find interesting, or actually going out and doing anything at all they just sit in front of their idiot boxes in a light induced trance getting fat.  I honestly think that TV is one of the worst things that ever happened to our culture.  

I supposed the argument could be made that the really smart and motivated people who really could add something to the human struggle give up TV on their own.  But I don't know about that.  The pattern of "no thought" seems so addictive, heck, for me, WAS so addictive, I wonder if even a brilliant and powerful mind couldn't be ensnared irretrievably if it was introduced early, and no limits were put on its consumption of pap from the idiot box.  My parents were draconian with their "TV limits"  Thank heavens.

Would Einstein have spent his time noodling away on math problems if the option to spend every waking moment consuming mass media  was available and socially accepted?

[MoreDew]

During the past 3 and a half years, I haven't had cable or even an antenna to watch tv.  I thought I would miss tv, but to my amazement, I found that I didn't miss it, and that I was using my time more constructively.  I felt that I was free from a sort of enslavement.  Sure there are shows I like to watch religiously (Wrestling, Star Trek, CSI, and Futurama) but I can always go to a friends house to watch those.  The motivation for my wife and I not having tv is because we can't justify spending $50 crap that's on and we wasted too much time watching worthless shows.  Also, we couldn't believe some of the crap that's on.   My son who is 2 years old doesn't like tv.  The only show he'll pay attention to is Teletubbies, but other than that, he only wants to watch DVD's.  However, for the last 5 months since my wife and I have moved in with her parents, all I do when I'm at home is watch tv.  I find that watching tv is a great way to escape my reality.  I think I would go postal if I didn't have tv here because there is nothing else for me to do.  My in-laws would drive me nuts.  So for the sake of my wife and son, I do them a favor and watch all the tv I can to keep my sanity.

Even though I agree that tv is mostly worthless, it does still serve a purpose as in my case.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

My in-laws would drive me nuts.  So for the sake of my wife and son, I do them a favor and watch all the tv I can to keep my sanity.

I'm gonna have to recommend a hobby.

Like, anything
Try writing/drawing/learning to code/scrapbooking/playing an instrument/whatever

seriously. I've never accepted the "nothing else to do" excuse. I mean, if you want to watch TV, then watch it. But don't tell me there's nothing else you can do.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Then again there are some people who wouldnt bother a person watching tv who would bother a person reading, or painting or writing.... after all the TV seems more immediate. I could see using TV as an excuse to avoid being bothered by people all the time.

[MoreDew]

and that's one of the main reasons that I watch TV, because my in-laws are reluctant to interrupt me when I am watching tv.  It's funny that way because I'm more likely to be interuppted when I'm studying, reading, etc. except when I watch the tube.

[Captain Morgan]

n8sumsion said

However, now we have a little boy who would be absolutely devastated if he couldn't watch The Wiggles every morning.

My son was 2 when we cancelled our cable. He to was devastated when we cancelled the cable. He loved to watch the disney channel every morning for his fix of the wiggles. So we bought the Wiggles on DVD to watch when he behaves himself. Granted the selection isn't quite as good as what was on Disney, but now we have control when he watches verses being a slave of Disney programing.

At work I get asked all the time if I saw a certain show or commerical. Of course the anwser is always no, but people I work with cannot seem to fathom why I wouldn't watch TV. I just don't like being slave to mass media. I feel free. I like to watch my cursor spin around on my computer screen. So instead of watching TV, I develop projects to do to increase my creativity. Currently I'm working on building a Tesla Coil. That's going to be cool. And it will protect me from Sprig or Rican when the want to duel for offending their TV gods. A few Million volts of High Frequency electricty will get you every time.

The challenge is dificult for most people, and it looks like most of the time wasters here have found other things to do than watch TV, even if they pay for it. (That statement isn't all inclusive).

Is there an argument as to why we should pay for cable and why it is good. Most informational TV can be found on the internet and you can talor the information to your needs or wants.