Who Watches TV?

[Free Christian]

Where I live we used to have only 5 channels for years and just in the last few years we have got more. I don't know but off the top of my head we now have 15. But for all the extra ones the programming has got worse. There used to be better programs on the 5 than there now is on 15 of them. Reality (anything but reality, notice how no-one looks at the cameras in a room full of non expecting to see cameras people, what a joke)
I used to like to watch a good program but they are getting fewer and fewer these days. And the doco's these days im sick of, "this creature has been around for 20 million years, this valley was carved out over 15 million years, this lizard is the culmination of millions of years of evolution, blah blah blah...
I call TV, even though I selectively do watch things and turn over or off when they mock God or show graphic violence and other sick things, I call it "Satans Classroom".

 

[jambo]

Similarly to Jon I work for Virgin Media which recently amalgamated with Liberty Global. We have free TV and I would watch the likes of football, love westerns and old black and white movies. We don't watch a lot and now with on-demand and
recordable set top boxes you can record and watch when it is convenient. Thus you can get on with other things and watch when it suits.

 

[Jack K]

I watch sports on TV but little else. For years I worked for TV stations, doing news, but these days I'm not even interested in TV news anymore. I do like a good movie now and then.

What is TV news? Is that where they sit at a desk and talk about all the bad things that happen in the world and laugh at each other's jokes?

TV can be an excellent medium for communicating important news immediately and with visual impact. It also makes a great storytelling medium for thoughtful news stories. Sadly, it turns out that TV news is most profitable when when a small staff fills hours of programming by chattering on about little that has any depth, and the majority of TV news in this country has turned in that direction. I miss what I used to do.

 

[Logan]

I think I'd consider the news stations more reliable if they would say every once in a while "nothing really to report, good night folks." Instead it's incredibly dramatized news ("Super Storm Sandy!", "Newtown Shooting!") around the clock.

 

[Frosty]

We have a TV, but no cable. The very few TV shows I care to watch I watch on Netflix for $8/month.

The only thing that hurts me is missing out on sports, but I can listen to my teams on the radio if need-be so it's not that big of a deal.

Honestly if cable wasn't so expensive I'd have it. Just can't justifying paying for it when the only things I'd watch would be 2 or 3 TV shows and an occasional game.

 

[THE W]

Grew up with TV. Couldn't live without it. If someone was gonna take away my TV and my videogames they may as well have taken away the oxygen i breathed.

Videogames destroyed me. It was normal for me to play videogames all day non-stop. My childhood was videogames all the time. I didnt play with the other kids. I didnt want to go over a kids house that didn't have videogames and when i went over a kids house i would find his videogames and play them as if i were at home. I wouldn't interact with the kid at all unless the game i was playing was 2 player.

My parents didn't do the best job of monitoring my viewing. was exposed to p0rn when i was 3 and had numerous accidental run-ins with such material from that point in time. By the time i was 12 up until i was 30 my life consisted of TV, videogames, Wu-tang, and p0rn.

After being saved for a year and a half all 4 of these things are out of my life. Don't watch TV..at all. I have no use for it and see it now as an absurd waste of time.

I have videogames that are brand new and are unopened that i have not played and probably will never play. i had spent some $500 on video games a couple years ago and bought two systems and a bunch of games. I went through a handful of them and then i just stopped playing. I was just no longer interested and my consoles just sat there collecting dust until i eventually unhooked them from my TV and put them in a suitcase.

I was for a while really into watching fighting game community tournaments on youtube but i have recently stopped this as well. I've also recently eliminated sports viewing but not totally. I'm down to only watching if one of my teams is in a championship game(besides the superbowl for obvious reasons). I currently have a 19" flatscreen that doubles as a computer monitor. At this point, it may as well just be a computer monitor.

wouldn't bind anyone on the issue, i just see it, again, as a gross waste of time. there's way better, more productive things to be doing other than watching TV.

 

[Quatchu]

We have a TV but no cable or satellite, just because of price. We have Netflix as well, nowadays allot of TV channels post there shows online the day after they have aired for free. There are a couple of shows we watch regularly this way.

 

[Tripel]

I watch some TV. I'm thankful for DVR and Netflix so I can watch the things that really interest me during the times when I choose to sit down and relax that way. And I don't have to deal with commercials.

Sometimes a beer and a quality TV show make for a good ending to the day.

 

[sevenzedek]

I am happy to see a growing trend in these threads. I have been to other online Christian forums and I believe the people at the Puritan Board have their heads screwed on straight. That is not to say that we are all perfect and nobody else is. It is just a good thing to be among those whom I view to think and behave in a godly manner.

 

[Somerset]

We do not have a TV. We prefer the radio, music and reading in our free time, which is limited.

In the UK you have to have a licence to watch live TV. There are three groups of people over here - those who have a licence, those who watch TV without a licence and those who do not need a licence because they do not have a TV. However, the TV licence authority are very reluctant to accept that this third group actually exist. About once a year we get a nasty letter telling me I have to telephone them to explian why I do not have a licence. This year I could not be bothered to tell them yet again, so I have now had a letter telling me they will be taking me to court. I doubt if it will actually come to anything - apart from having a detector van outside the house.

Does anyone know if detector vans actually work, or is it just a scare tactic. If we do have a van outside, we will offer them tea and bore them with updates about the Archers, a long running radio drama.

 

[py3ak]

I don't like my mind filled with images that are false representations of life (though I do like LOTR, and an occasional significant movie, such as I Am Legend), as I am an artist (poet and writer) creating my own non-fiction spiritual adventure genre work.

Mr. Rafalsky, if you haven't seen any of them yet, I think you might find the films of Zhang Yimou to be well-deserving of the significant epithet. Not all Chinese epics are equally successful, but his are at the top of that heap. I also have to acknowledge the magnificent Musa the Warrior for demonstrating that the themes and approach of Waldere are still moving.

 

[Scottish Lass]

We have a small flatscreen upstairs and a old one downstairs. Both get used mostly for live sporting events. Tim and I both use Netflix, and I use Hulu. To aid with Grace's feeding, we use Netflix and Amazon Prime.

For me, it's less about the cost (though that's a factor), but the fact that I want to watch on my own schedule. Even live PBS doesn't work for G's feeding; we need to be able to pause it frequently.

 

[jwithnell]

We watch some Netflix and Amazon Prime on our computers. We haven't had a TV or cable for quite a while. I have been thinking lately about the "escape" I obviously seek when I tune it for an old TV show or movie. It's really hard to know if it is a harmless way to bust stress after being with a special needs child all day, or an escape from what God has, in his sovereignty, brought into my life.

 

[ZackF]

I'll offer a personal case study that doesn't address the issue in a binary way on whether to watch or not to watch but rather in being mindful of what you do watch. I suppose this example can be applied to novels and plays too. More and more I find myself avoiding tv shows and movies that use cynicism as the overall driving force in character behavior. Several years ago I listened to Jerram Barrs lecture on the perils of allowing cyncism to run amuck in your intake of humor, music and various other media. I just kind of said "hmm" and forgot about it. The past couple of years I've remembered the talk. House MD was an example of a cynically drenched show. In varying degrees all of the characters were cynics. The show was without hope most all of the time. If even a guest character, usually a patient or relative of the patient, demonstrated hope for anything in this world or the next the character was booed off the set. I find a similar bleak hopelessness in much of Cormac McCarthy's stuff. A steady diet of this is worse than the obviously nihilistic garbage out there in the music and cinema, specifically represented in violent 1970s/80s exploitation films. Give me a splatter zombie flick any day over "realistic" dreary cynicism because at least after the hoards of zombies are all gunned down a remnant of struggling survivors willing to live remain. Just because it isn't p0rn nor violent doesn't mean a show, novel or play isn't taking you down.

 

[VictorBravo]

Just because it isn't p0rn nor violent doesn't mean a show, novel or play isn't taking you down.

Thanks, Zack. A very good point.

 

[Sherwin L.]

Sure do. Watch TBN everyday!

 

[jambo]

We do not have a TV. We prefer the radio, music and reading in our free time, which is limited.

In the UK you have to have a licence to watch live TV. There are three groups of people over here - those who have a licence, those who watch TV without a licence and those who do not need a licence because they do not have a TV. However, the TV licence authority are very reluctant to accept that this third group actually exist. About once a year we get a nasty letter telling me I have to telephone them to explian why I do not have a licence. This year I could not be bothered to tell them yet again, so I have now had a letter telling me they will be taking me to court. I doubt if it will actually come to anything - apart from having a detector van outside the house.

Does anyone know if detector vans actually work, or is it just a scare tactic. If we do have a van outside, we will offer them tea and bore them with updates about the Archers, a long running radio drama.

I had a friend who was in this position. He instructed his solicitor to write to the licensing authorities and that was the end of the matter.

 

[Free Christian]

News shows and the reporters crack me up. These guys, some of them, have been reporting for years but still get it so wrong its laughable.
Saw one where a guy was holed up in a house with a handgun. The reports says "the police are very concerned and want to create a large perimeter as the gunman has a handgun which is lethal up to 3 kilometres!" Another where the reporter said that a shotgun was very dangerous as it had a killing range of over 1 kilometre. Another where guys were shooting pigs with shotguns and he said "these men are culling these pigs with high powered assault style rifles".
Another where a bulldozer was pushing over a house "the man used a tractor to demolish the home". Or, "the man was circled by the shark just meters away and our helicopter was there to capture the drama" yet the chopper showed the guy in the water and the shark no-where in sight. Or you hear of some terrible thing like Christian's being killed over seas or some other horrid thing like African refuges being slaughtered whilst trying to get food but it does not get air time, instead it will be what Beyoncé said or what Miley Cyrus has done.

 

[JoannaV]

We do not have a TV. We prefer the radio, music and reading in our free time, which is limited.

In the UK you have to have a licence to watch live TV. There are three groups of people over here - those who have a licence, those who watch TV without a licence and those who do not need a licence because they do not have a TV. However, the TV licence authority are very reluctant to accept that this third group actually exist. About once a year we get a nasty letter telling me I have to telephone them to explian why I do not have a licence. This year I could not be bothered to tell them yet again, so I have now had a letter telling me they will be taking me to court. I doubt if it will actually come to anything - apart from having a detector van outside the house.

Does anyone know if detector vans actually work, or is it just a scare tactic. If we do have a van outside, we will offer them tea and bore them with updates about the Archers, a long running radio drama.

I think they can detect something, but that's not scary if you're not receiving tv signals.
My thinking was that we did not have a tv, so we did not have to buy the licence. Nor did we have to spend any of our time or money on telephone calls or posting a letter (written with my ink!). If they came to the door we would tell them we had no tv. Sometimes that meant they left us alone for several years, other times they returned the next year.

I grew up with The Archers Plenty of scandal just in that one show! I've just realised my family hasn't mentioned it recently, and I'm sure I must have phoned around 7pm a few times...huh guess they finally got bored of it too! I did see someone on facebook mention something about a dramatic storyline recently?

 

[Logan]

Does anyone know if detector vans actually work, or is it just a scare tactic.

If your television stations are broadcast over the air, there is no way to detect who is receiving them via the EM signal, they just radiate and are absorbed by various objects including antennae. It's like talking in a large room and trying to detect which people are actually listening to the conversation vs which ones your voice just "bounces off" without them actually paying attention.

On the other hand, I suppose it is possible that the detection vans could have some sort of sound detection equipment (laser detecting vibrations off of glass windows interpreted as sound) and if they could correlate the sounds coming from your house to a particular TV show that was being broadcast at that moment... but that would be pretty creepy!

 

[ZackF]

Does anyone know if detector vans actually work, or is it just a scare tactic.

If your television stations are broadcast over the air, there is no way to detect who is receiving them via the EM signal, they just radiate and are absorbed by various objects including antennae. It's like talking in a large room and trying to detect which people are actually listening to the conversation vs which ones your voice just "bounces off" without them actually paying attention.

On the other hand, I suppose it is possible that the detection vans could have some sort of sound detection equipment (laser detecting vibrations off of glass windows interpreted as sound) and if they could correlate the sounds coming from your house to a particular TV show that was being broadcast at that moment... but that would be pretty creepy!

Do TVs give off a particular EM signature?

 

[Logan]

Do TVs give off a particular EM signature?

In the form of light

I suppose there's always a possibility there's something I'm unaware of but I work in radar. I can't think of any way they'd be able to detect what station you're watching based on EM.

 

[ZackF]

Do TVs give off a particular EM signature?

In the form of light

I suppose there's always a possibility there's something I'm unaware of but I work in radar. I can't think of any way they'd be able to detect what station you're watching based on EM.

I thought in the UK that if a resident had a TV period... he had to pay for license. In that case they are just looking for a TVs being owned. So if inspectors see a TV through the window whether or not it was being fed by VCR or DVD player only you had better have your license or pay a nasty fine. At least I thought that is what my brother told me. He's lived there off and on for the past decade. Maybe I understood him wrong.

 

[sevenzedek]

Sure do. Watch TBN everyday!

You're fired.

 

[sevenzedek]

TV police? Wow! Who would think that was a good idea? That would be like requiring one to have a book license.

 

[VictorBravo]

That would be like requiring one to have a book license.

Well, if the government were providing the books, the analogy would hold up better.

The license is essentially a user tax or fee to pay for public broadcasting.

 

[sevenzedek]

That would be like requiring one to have a book license.

Well, if the government were providing the books, the analogy would hold up better.

The license is essentially a user tax or fee to pay for public broadcasting.

That makes much more sense.

 

[JoannaV]

If you have a TV receiver (whether in a TV or a computer or something else) you need a licence. Unless you can prove the receiver is disabled or never used. Some people do just use them to watch videos. Or theoretically if you can somehow do something to it such that it won't receive the BBC channels, just other channels, maybe. I can't remember now if you actually need to make sure it is disabled or if you can sometimes get away with just not using it, if you look like a trustworthy nice person.
Read this as to whether/how the detector vans work: How do TV detector vans work? Do they know what channel you''re watching, or just that you have the TV on? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk
Licence for black and white TVs are cheaper. If you are registered blind you get a free licence. Also, students can save a little bit of money given that they are rarely in their student house for a full year.

 

[EKSB SDG]

We pulled the plug on television around the time that our first child was born. That was 23 years ago. Growing up, our children didn't even know what a 'commercial' was until one day when we walked past a bunch on tv sets in Sears and my oldest daughter asked was that was on the screen. Over the years, we've probably averaged about one rental a month. We also occasionally check out a movie from the library. The internet also provides some worthwhile finds.

While I can't imagine ever getting tethered to it again, I am looking forward to getting a large LED flat screen in the not too distant future.