Channel WE

 

In his essay Us and Them, in the book Dress your Family in Corduroy and Denim, David Sedaris describes a family that does not believe in watching TV and doesn't even own one. He writes about how everyone in the neighborhood is ruffled by this and even think that they are just plain weird. It made me laugh out loud and I'll tell you why.

My wikisearch tells me that television is a word derived from Greek (tele for far) and Latin (visio for sight) - meaning far sight. However, it does not surprise me at all that over the years, the term idiot box has gained such worldwide acceptance. Given some of the banal programs that get dished out, the mindless consumerism it begets and its negative influence on children - idiot box it certainly is. While I'm conscious that this is a highly debatable topic, with multitudes of people on either sides of the fence and that this may require in-depth discussions to get to a conclusion, if any; we decided to do away with our cable connection when Kabir was born nearly 4 yrs ago. In fact after moving to the Philippines we did not even own a TV for over a year. We just did not feel the need for it with our little friend around.

On most occasions I get a lot of reaction from anyone who gets to know this. "What?? You don't watch TV? What do you do then??". The intensity of the exasperation can be associated better with questions like -"What?? You don't eat anything at all? How do you survive then??". It's hilarious!!

Fact is, I still don't watch any TV and I don't miss it at all. Instead, Pratim and I spend a lot of quality time talking about stuff we feel like. I read more books. Look up, download and listen to music I like. Blog when I'm up to it. Run most errands on time. Even overcoming the initial lethargy to run/walk/exercise is easier since no Glee or Jhalak Dikhla Ja holds me back. I get my daily dose of news from the internet. And my head is never cluttered with how many more kids Branjelina have adopted or who Paris Hilton is sleeping with! (Is she still alive?)

However I must clarify that unlike Sedaris' neighbors, we have not imposed the TV ban on our son. We do let Kabir watch his Tom and Jerry and Blue Clues DVDs when he wants to, but no cable network in our home still. And I have to admit that there are some times when he is glued to the TV as if he is the 5th Little Einstein (and that it sometimes even works to my selfish advantage! hehe!). But what really thrills me is when he rejects this option to pass his time saying - "I don't like to watch TV, Mama. I only want to play."


"The tracing of ideas is a guessing game. We can’t tell who first had an idea—we can only tell who first had it influentially, who formulated it in some form, poem or equation or picture, that others could stumble upon with the shock of recognition”. - Wallace Stegner