The Television: a Friend or Foe?

By EMILY BAGDASARIAN
Mmilyme52001@yahoo.com

Let me ask you this: How many television sets do you own in your home?

Chances are there is one in the kitchen, one in the family room, and one in your bedroom. That’s three already, but since you probably have siblings, let’s say four. In writing this article, I had the horror of coming across many statistics concerning the number of hours one spends watching television. For example, the average child spends approximately 28 hours a week watching television.

This makes NINE years by the time that child hits 65. With the average American life expectancy at 78, we have spent over 1/10 of our lives contemplating whether Ross and Rachel end up together. Now these statistics may be an exaggeration to prove a point or push an agenda, but the following is most certainly not: 99 percent of American households posses at least one television set. For a few years, my family belonged to the one percent who do not.

When I was in elementary school, my parents decided to eliminate the TV in our home to force us to read and play outside. At the time, I could not help but resent them for it. Many of us have experienced moments of social exclusion; when you’re eight years old, knowing what spell Sabrina Spellman cast on Libby Chessler to keep her away from love-interest Harvey Kinkle (okay, maybe I found a way to watch the episode) is more important than reading when everyone is talking about it the next day. After all, books are not magical, right?

And so I grew up somewhat disoriented and out of the loop in all things pop culture. I have absolutely no idea who the Care Bears are nor do I feel I can can relate to the Power Rangers on any significant emotional level. Patti Mayonaise and Porkchop are foods as far as I am concerned and the only Looney Tunes I was hearing were the ones in my own head. At the expense of social aptitude, I amassed a repertoire of conquered children’s
literature. How can I ever forget the lovable Amelia Bedelia? Her literal interpretation of idioms constantly landed her in hot water. But she taught me that one can sometimes make mistakes and still be likable, especially when you genuinely care for others. The Berenstain Bears, who lived in an awesome tree house, were a tight knit family that, by way of interactions with various community leaders such as the bespectacled Professor Actual Factual, offered simplified insight into social and environmental issues. Rainbow Fish became more beautiful when he gave away his sparkly scales to the plain fish, Encyclopedia Brown unapologetically applied cool logic and rationale to everyday life, and Alexander justified the occasional terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

Perhaps my all-time favorite was Ramona Quimby. Ramona’s active imagination and rambunctious nature often lead to misunderstandings, and the indignation she felt upon such misunderstandings was something I could always relate to. The lessons I derived from these stories were not always ones I implemented in my own life. However,
simply knowing such characters existed, if only in the imagination of their authors,
was and remains a comforting notion.

There were, of course, countless others, as well. Paddington the Bear, Nancy Drew, Matilda, Corduroy, the Paper
Bag Princess. Each character afforded me a unique perspective in a world my own imagination could contribute to creating: a world in which my interpretation of good comedic timing is not drowned out by a studio audience’s laughter. Now that’s magical. Maybe one day I will torture my kids too...