http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/12/04/docto...=rss_topstories

Just got this link in my news page, and I have a very interesting reaction to it.


On the one hand, I agree 100% with the findings, and is one of the reasons I don't watch T.V. anymore, and plan on only having a T.V. so that I can play my wii


On the other hand, I'm really pissed off that they are asking congress to make laws about it. I realized some 4 years ago now how bad T.V. was, and I did the simple thing of turning it off and stopped paying for cable. When my fiance's family got Tivo, I was like, whatever... but now I use it a lot so that I can watch the two or three good shows on tv when I get home late from work, and skip past all the things I don't feel like seeing.

Making laws against this stuff is just moronic. And I think the important message that the "docs" have to say is being lost by trying to have congress pass laws.

I also stopped watching TV. My TV is only for my xBox 360. I was able to save $100 because they now make TVs without tuners! So my TV is incapable of being used to watch actual TV. It's such a nicer TV than my old one that did have a tuner.

But yeah, if they pass a law then the kids will get brainwashed with Internet and MySpace ads. Laws are usually not a substitute for good parenting. I suggest that whenever any of you have kids of your own that you remove from your house all TVs capable of receiving a TV signal, and don't order cable or satellite TV. That way they can play all the violent video games without the brainwashing. Oops! I mean, play all the wholesome Mr. Rogers video games with Marilyn Manson, Nirvana, and Slayer on their iPod...er...Mozart and Beethoven... Ah screw it, we're all doomed! Anyone up for a game of Gears of War while I headbang to "Reign in Blood" and drink beer?

I don't think its a matter of "brain washing" as it is a matter of normalization.

T.V. makes you think that this is the best stuff worth putting out there and has a "everybody is doing it" part to it, that I think other media doesn't, because its been so well divided and niched.

Its depressing how few good tv shows there are these days. Sometimes I wish people would stop trying to push the envelope and instead try to do the same thing but "better"

For example... Prison break, while not the best show on T.V. I think is really good because the "main plot" is to the viewer, just a background story. (sort of liked that aspect of the movie Signs as well)... And then Heroes is just X-men rewritten a bit with a twist of mystery. But the shows that try to "push the envelope" seem to just be about dirtier bathroom humor and nastier pictures and don't really add much to the realm of "ways to tell a story"

Laws like this don't work. Roark pointed out why.

Roark, sure! But let me get the rum, and put on some Maiden for myself.

As far as TV goes...I watch very, very little. None of it on the standard channels. In fact, the vast majority of television I watch through the year is baseball games. The rest? Stuff I just feel like, mostly sci-fi shows like Doctor Who. Not exactly a regular TV user. Just no point to it in my eyes.

Although as a side point, I find in general the entertainment industry does too many sequels and "low risk" productions for my taste. It creates an endless cycle of what is expected, and leaves all the innovation to people who rarely will get enough coverage to create a new "low risk." And even if they do, the new "low risk" will just be a crappier version of the innovated thing because you can't copy well, without being a little innovative yourself.



I find it laughable that they even try. Just gives a bad image to the concept that watching things over and over again might actually affect you on a deeper level than just what you buy.

Addendum: This article is pretty bad. When you read stuff like this, a few things to keep in mind.

1) When they say other countries do things so we ought to, yeah... In some Western countries (Britain for example) they are developing a system to monitor your license plate so they can create a database of every location where every citizen driver 24/7. Just because another country does it doesn't mean it's a good ideaNot a rational argument. Plus other countries have different legal systems where they can legislate natioanl religions and so forth. We have Bill of Rights and Constitution, which most others countries lack. Apple and oranges.

2) They talk about Congress should do this or that without noting if Congress even has the authority. Is there a clause in the US Constitution that grants this power? Probably not, but I gag every time some whiner beg Congress to do something without even checking if it is permissable.

3) There's no discussion of hidden costs. What is unseen? Often times, for example, some anti-crime bill may stop some criminals but make it more difficult for citizens to prevent crime. So you have this hard to measure cost of missed opportunity that no one sees. Could a law like this have similar costs?

4) Beware of committees. I'm reading this article from the 60s about the "Free Speech Movement" at Berkley University. A bunch of student radicals organized against the university. Eventually it resulted in a student committee representing university students across the country. They released a statement that university administrators ought to be there to serve the desires of the students and faculty, not run the university. The media trumpeted this with big headlines as the de facto opinion of students across the country, that this large trans-university organization represented the mainsteam views of all college students. It ends up that this committee was only about a hundred people, and when they voted on that statement, maybe 45 people were still left at the meeting. (This is from memory; my exact numbers might be off.) So really it was the opinion of only 45 college students that designated themselves to attend the meeting, not the mainstream aggregate opinion of all college students. But it was useful for the media to push the agenda of most journalists, so it was blown out of proportion. I'm sure the AAP is more reputable thann the Berkley FSM, but still, let's wait for more doctors to weigh in on this and then let experts on law make the legal advocacy. Let's let the doctors stick to medicine. What makes this committee smell really fishy is what they advocate as the cure. Why are the doctors going straight to Congress instead of making suggestions on what parents can do? Why aren't they telling parents to throw the TV out the window? That smells very very fishy to me! That is until I actually read the report. Maybe this is just the media filter at work, cherry picking the parts of the report they like best like they did with the FSM. It is interesting that the Congressional lobby suggestion is almost the last recommendation in the official report, following after suggestions about what doctors can do directly, what parents can do, and what teachers can do. Why aren't the media headlines "AAP recomends parents stop letting their children watch TV"? That would be more in synch with what the AAP appears to be saying, but it probably doesn't serve the agenda that most journalists have.

So yeah, last thing to note: ignore the media. They suck. Whenever they summarize some report for you or some statement made by some dignatary, ignore them and go read the report or statement yourself. You'd be surprised how different the tone sometimes is!

Oh, that makes me feel a bit better.

It is in the AP's interest to make people laugh at the idea of turning off the T.V.

Given what happened with cases where lawmakers have tried to restrict videos games deemed violent, I don't think there will actually be any laws that are upheld, and will end up costing the people.

Although I would REALLY like the limiting of commercials.

I assume they do this in all of Europe, but I like the idea of commercials between shows instead of during them.

They do that in England. It's SO nice. I can't imagine if the anime I watched got broken up by 5 minutes of ads. Ugh.

Its horrible. Unless the one on is boring, then its a nice reprive.

That reminds me of the whole reclassification of the definition of a planet debate.

4.7% of the IAU's members, and even a smaller amount (around 2% I remember reading in another article) of the earth's total astronomers voted to change the definition. Weather or not I agree with the outcome is irrelevant, the extremely low percentage being the majority ruling however is.

Like PBS in America? Any Americans back me up? They are so obnoxious, but still....

PBS is better, they only have comercials relevant to thier channel.

When I was on vacation they had the same 5 minutes of commericals per show only it was between shows instead of during them.

BBC is even better than the other British channels; there aren't any commercial advertisements AT ALL. Only ads for other BBC programmes. (And again, they're between programmes themselves, not in the middle of an episode.)

No idea what PBS is though. I can only assume it's similar to how the BBC does it from what Dags said though.

They're doing.. WHAT! How absolutely outrageous.. I'm off to write a letter to my MP.

PBS= Public Broadcasting.

I know that some commercial channels over here got quite some protest years back for cutting shows up to every 15 minutes for commercials. Personally I rather have 1 long ad break in the middle, so I can go to the toilet or refill my drink. I think commercials should be screened during what they can be shown (like no ads for booze during children's programs) but it shouldn't be overdone either. What bothers me though is the ammount of peer pressure being put into commercials lately. If you put a group of teenages on a screen with a product then you'll make kids think if they shouldn't try it also. Nothing wrong with it if it's just a new brand of lemonade for example, but if you start using this for cigarettes/alcohol/ect. then I do start to wonder if that's such a good idea.

Edit: Wanted to add I rarely watch TV anymore, read the news and weather forecast online, and only watch it when I'm at home and there's some movie on or such I really want to watch.