If You Don’t Own a TV You Are Probably An A-Hole or Poor
After years of trying to figure out who catches my ire the most I think I have come to a conclusion. I would like to extend a big middle finger and a loud “fuck you” to people that don’t own televisions, well except the Amish. The Amish never really did anything to piss me off so I am giving you a free pass, but other Mennonites you are still on my radar of hate but that is another debate for another day.
Anyways, being in grad school I run into a lot of people that drop the reference that they don’t own a TV. When people announce that they don’t have a television in their home they act so morally and culturally superior that is drives me insane. Like I am a lesser person because you decide to sit at home and read War and Peace while listening to Ella Fitzgerald records. While I sit on the couch and watch Supernanny thinking to myself how I would totally do dirty things so Jo Jo would give me a stern talking to.
Screw you… you judgmental pricks. Sure you could say that maybe I am being a little judgmental in this case but I am not wrong, they are. Reading all the books in the world and not letting pop culture corrupt you doesn’t turn you into an alpha human being. In fact it is leading you down a path you never will be able to recover from. One of being an outsider in society, because when John references what the hell happened on Lost at the water cooler on Friday you will look like a total douche bag for saying you never heard of it. Even worse is if you breed you are automatically creating a family of total misfits. Sure your kid might score a 1600 on the SAT but they will be getting the shit kicked out of them everyday because they have no idea who Hannah Montana is. I hope you feel all morally and culturally superior when your daughter comes home in tears with TWAT (probably spelt incorrectly) written on her backpack because she said she didn’t know who the Jonas Brothers were and only listened to Bach.
Even worse than the tone these non-tv watchers speak in is their rant against television, that it is causing the moral and intellectual decline of this country. Like I have to sit there and feel bad about myself because I like to watch 75,000 hours of television a week. You know what, I’ve read Shakespeare and I would frankly rather watch an hour of the Wire than read that shit ever again. Don’t tell me that his work holds anymore water because it is a classic or that I can learn something about human nature. When you have a show with a gun totting, homosexual, scar faced, Robin Hood, sticking up drug dealers well that tops anything with people speaking in iambic pentameter.
So screw you non-tv watchers….
Am I the only one that feels this way?
This is going up at humor-blogs.com
no, you’re not the only one. it’s just like the people whose profiles say in the t.v. section, “burn it.” wow, they’re so deep. i read more than anyone i know, AND I LOVE BAD TELEVISION. i can’t fall asleep unless i’m watching t.v. i have a dvr and record things so i can watch other things. i talk loud and proud about it often so as to alienate those who may think that just because i’m a booknerd i share their anti-television thoughts. whew, that felt good.
I never got the whole “if you read it must mean you don’t watch tv” thing…
Also just because people read doesn’t mean their choice of reading materials is quality.
OMG. Iambic pentameter??? Now I’m going to have that damn song stuck in my head forever!!!! And yes, it’s a song from a theatre song… Iambic pentamenter-gotta move to the right paramater… Sigh.
I will just nod in agreement even though I have no idea what you are saying.
I would hope you wouldn’t. It’s an obscure Shakespearian musical. So smiling and nodding is a good response.
I feel so much better now.
Sounds familiar…wasn’t that done by the guys of Reduced Shakespeare?
There are only a couple reasons why I own a tv- To play video games on, watch dvs, the news, and the show “Heroes”, but since the writers’ strike, there haven’t been any new episodes.
So even if I may barely watch it, doesn’t mean I wanna burn it. That’s just fucking stupid.
Oh yeah, and football, but that’s just about done with till next season.
Not having anything to watch is fine, I mean I pretty much watch sports and the wire because there isn’t anything on new right now.
Especially hockey. Where else can you find a healthy dose of new violence on TV today? Well, besides the news.
I know some of those people who don’t let their kids watch tv. Or they only let them watch for like 30 minutes a day. I think those are the same moms who stay at home and clean the house all day.
Why would they want to not use the single greatest babysitter in the world?
Hey, I don’t clean the house ALL day… I watch t.v. too.
I have a t.v. My kids watch it. They know Hannah Montana, High School Musical and the new Transformers.
I spend too much time reading blogs like this instead, so I stopped watching t.v.–that, and you can only watch so much kids’ television before you go insane. I won’t judge you for watching Lost if you don’t judge me for not watching it. I used to watch hours of t.v. all day from a very early age. I realized over time that I didn’t want to look back at my life and realize that I came home every night to watch t.v. instead of play music in a band, write songs, write books, or go out with friends. I’m not saying you don’t do those things as well, but I think too many people don’t have a life outside of work and family because they waste time watching t.v. Just my 2 cents though.
There is a difference between not watching it because you are busy and not watching it and then throwing it in people’s faces because you think that you are better than them.
I can agree with that.
I have a TV, but I watch DVDs. Quite honestly, I don’t have time to watch it or the attention span to follow a show through and it frustrates me to skip episodes due to life.
My kid watches TV, but it’s limited to no more than one hour a day during the week AFTER homework and no more than three hours a day on the weekend before I drag her ass outside for fresh air. She knows who Hannah Montana is.
Sorry, I am a none TV watcher. Bite me Kevin.
You have it in your home so you don’t count.
I do so damnit!
Ha hah…Great point!
I hate it when people say that as if it makes them appear more scholarly. “No I’m too busy reading Tolstoy to pay attention to the latest Hero’s.”
I couldn’t hang with these folks and extend both middle fingers in their general direction.
I talk to some people and they’re like “I don’t really watch TV”, but they go opening night to see “Meet the spartans”. Whereas I’m a total TV nerd, I’d rather watch TV then go see a shitty movie at the cineplex (Though I did dig Juno, and Cloverfield).
My Name Is Earl, Lost, ER, House, 30 Rock- yes please.
No, I can’t stand any people in general who think that some random thing they do in their life makes them morally or intellectually superior to other people. But the world is full of those people so what can you do, I guess just kick them all down the pit of death, which they probably wouldn’t understand the reference because they’re too busy reading “intelligent” books anyway, (psht, yeah, enjoy your Grisham…twatsicle).
I used to think like you, but due to circumstances beyond my control I have converted to the morally and intellectually superior that you refer to. When I owned a TV, I indeed enjoyed dumb reality shows, American Idol, The Nanny and of course Lost. Tevo was my best friend. That is, until one fateful day my TV spontaneously combusted and I was left with a week and a half before payday and no mula.
So…. I was forced to see how my morally superior fellow humans lived. With a big task at hand, I pulled out the books I’ve been buying over the years that I never made time to read and I discovered My Space. Let me tell you, the days turned into weeks, then months and now it has been over a year. I had a chance to read over twenty books, mostly true crime which did nothing for my intellect or making me a more spiritually advanced human, but what it did do was make me realize how much of my valuable time I was wasting on a big corporate commercial. I reconnected with old friends and got my art off the ground via networking on myspace.
Loosing the tv really did change my life. As for my offspring? Well I only have one and she is 8. She spends half the time at her dad’s who DOES have a TV, yet she rarely watches it. When with me… she plays with toys, goes outside, does art work, takes classes and we both naturally slimmed down. I know if I had a TV, I would be tempted to be lazy and I like the less lazy me.
To the writer, I would challenge you to take one week off tv and then write a follow up to this piece. I would be interested to see if your tone would change. You can check out my My Space page and see how incredibly normal I actually am. You may even LIKE a non TV owner. Imagine that…..
My URL: myspace.com/bodypaintingasylum
Isn’t MySpace a bigger cultural waste than television?
You took the words out of my mouth kevin…
This blog made me have to poop.
wait is that a good thing?
I think it’s neutral.
I have a sister who is a stay-at-home mom and she hates the tv, if she watches it all day she catches hell from her husband for not get anything done around the house. So for people like her who have no self-control I guess maybe they shouldn’t even have tvs. I can’t put myself in her shoes though. To each his own, at least she doesn’t think she’s all high and mighty.
Hey…if you regularly watch Supernanny, you might just get to see our family get a stern talking to. It’s proably not as good as getting your own spanking, but they will show me getting reprimanded…pretty close to soft porn.
Sorry…that was raunchy.
Oh…and I second that finger!
I agree that the people that act like you are an asshole because you watch TV have an inferiority complex,yes there is alot of shit tv but there is also alot of amazing television that is intellegent and educational etc. I get especially mad at people who act like you are a horrible parent if you let your kids watch tv,The studies do not say all tv is bad what they say is it shouldnt be a babysitter,I watch educational tv with my kids, we talk about what is happening,play games during the show (like point at the triangle etc.)…my 6 yr old is facinated by space now because of a show in the Discover channel where she actually got to see pics and footage of the planets etc….people against tv are just assholes trying to feel better about themselves,they are the ultimate in boring because they cant even find something to identify with on tv.
Well mr. pister
I’ll have you know I own 3 T.V.’s and with my son now renting a room that makes 4 in the house None have cable or dish. Yes that means I AM POOR.
uhmmm does the internet count as far as viewing like a TV?
loving it
Deb
What is Twitter? (not a Twit)
no, you are NOT the only one, kev.
This has been a topic of discussion between my friend Mary and i for YEARS.
we JUDGE people whether or not they can fly with random “Seinfeld” quotes or not.
and we just won’t have anything to do with people that casually drop “oh, i don’t watch tv.”
WHAT??
wtf do you DO in all your spare time besides making the world a better place?
the first time i experienced this was when i was around 9, visiting my cousin in the “country”. When she mentioned her father’s friends “Bert” and “Ernie”, I said “hahahah! like the show!” and she stared @ me blankly. “you know, from sesame streeet?” and she just shrugged and said “never heard of them.”
WTF?
How can someone NOT know about Bert and Ernie!?
I have TVs, just no cable. My son had serious ADHD as a small child and all the loud overblown kids shows made him unmanageable and he was seriously addicted. No show? Cue screaming for hours. Not even interruption techniques from the child docs worked. So, we got rid of cable and kept a handful of calmer tapes for the kid. He was really confused for a while, then got bored with the lack of selection and we were better able to get him to focus on school when the time came. Now that he’s doing well and in high school we talked about getting cable or Dish and decided against. For the cost of a month we can get an entire season of shows on DVD and not have to put up with commercials, politicans, crappy slanted news or other bullshit like the writers strike.
Oh my, this is a touchy subject for me cause I am a recovering TV addict. I have spent every free second of my life sitting in from of the TV. If nothing good was on, I would watch the shopping channels. About a year ago, I just snapped and have not watched one second of Tv since. Now I read books, surf the net, watch DVD’s, play Wii, play with my iPod. And I swear, I do not miss it. But I would never get all high and mighty and make the rest of my family stop watching it. My kids are still TV junkies and that is fine with me. I do not limit their amount of time in front of the TV, just the channels that they can watch. I mean, they are all under 8 yrs old, so I only allow Nick and Disney.
75,000 hours of television a week,,,we could so hang wanna be my friend? haha
I own a TV but I hardly ever watch all the shows that are being discussed at the water cooler. I’m pretty sure it’s because I go to night classes. Also? I have no idea what time or channel anything is on because I don’t have the fancy built in TV Guide or TiVo. So judge not, lest ye be judged, Mr. High and Mighty.
I am totally guilty. Well, I own a television, but only ever watch CNN and Nip/Tuck. I have my fav shows but that’s about it…don’t shoot me!
I completely agree! I’m in grad school too and people act all hoity toity (Spelling) because they don’t watch television (even if they do own one) and look at me like I’m some sort of insect alien from outer space when I drop references to Drawn Together, Family guy or Futurama. Am I wrong or are they to the total loosers for not knowing those shows? And then they wonder why people see scientists as square boring bastards. Because of people like them, that’s why!
We HAVE a TV, but we got rid of the sattelite because what was on wasn’t worth $75 a month. So we effectively don’t watch TV because you can get exactly f-all up in the mountains without a dish. BUT…thanks to Netflix we can cherrypick the good stuff and watch it commercial free whenever we want. So I hope I escape your ire. You have to admit TV is about 84% poodle spunk. Whether you LIKE poodle spunk is something upon which I shall not pass judgement.
Going with DVD is great… Hardly using a tv is fine you aren’t destroying people that do.
I agree 100%. Even worse I dated this jerk who watched tv, but “no network” tv. He watched international news, Discovery and the Cartoon Network. He was proud that he did not get any pop culture references. I said something about Courtney Love one day and all I got was a blank stare. Kinda summed up our entire relationship. Except that the sex was mind-blowing.
Hi Little Kevin!
I’m thinking that totally avoiding TV is probably a really bad idea. I’ve been on both sides in a way. I worked in an office in which people watched a certain reality show, and because I didn’t watch it, I was not part of the daily meet-up they had about the show. It’s good to know pop culture. You really have to know what’s out there, especially if you have children too!
The new scale for the SAT is 2400(just keepin u updated on the hip-hoppeningz deez days).The Wire is a badass show, but I’m a freshman at UT-Austin(I got lucky last semester), and I’m always busy in Austin, but I try to rent DVD seasons of The Wire, Curb Your Enthusiasm, etc. etc.
I knew they changed the test but I wasn’t sure what the total number was… damn I hate being off.
yeah I don’t cable and I feel intellectually superior.. so take that! (sticks tongue out)
The real reason I don’t have cable is because I am being el cheapo and because I get seriously addicted to it if I have it..
I kinda like the cable free life.. although there are shows that I do miss… I just go to the library and check out from selection of about 5000 movies
Public Library rocks!!!!
Um…
What the hell’s a Jonas Brother?
im the biggest reader i know, once i read 27 books in about as many days, i always think to myself that people are missing out when they tell me they dont really like to read. but i also watch things like celebrity rehab and rock of love, i enjoy giving my brain a break, i guess. but if i didnt watch tv, i would miss out on a lot of good stuff, like intervention. dont know what it is as im totally against 12 step programs, but that show is riveting!!!
[...] the Losers Get Lucky Sometimes Tasty Celeb - Jennifer Ellison Loaded (site NSFW) Pointless Banter - If You Don’t Own a TV You Are An A-Hole or Poor Bright Black Internet - Sexy Pics: Leticia Is Looking Hot Hot Hot!! on 205th - Guys are shaving [...]
You tell ‘em!!! Who could have grown up properly without Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, the Tasmanian Devil, Yosemite Sam, Wiley Coyote, Disney? A life without Tweetie Bird? Please?
Did I mention Tele Tubbies?
[...] Banter - If You Don’t Own a TV You Are An A-Hole or Poor Bright Black Internet - Sexy Pics: Leticia Is Looking Hot Hot Hot!! on 205th - Guys are shaving [...]
Three Things:
1. You TRY to take my TV away and you will pull back a bloody stump of a hand. I am a whore for reality TV.
2. I’m also SuperNanny and I think parents are far to uptight about television. Obviously I don’t think they needs gobs of it as their only source of culture, but a little PBS is harmless from time to time. Big Bird never killed anybody - except that hooker in ‘82, but she was working his corner, and that shit don’t play on any Street….AND
3. Whole Grain, organic, cage free, breast milk till their 3, co-sleeping children need some outlets! You don’t want them to be the weird kid in the back of the class drinking beet juice and coloring with their beeswax crayons.
thats the most idiotic thing I’ve heard you say.. usually your idiocy is FUNNY but this.. well let me just say that ALL drug addicts, from alcoholics to crak heads will try and entice you to enbibe their drug of choice… TV is the most widely abused substance on the planet.. maybe behind that vile toxic swill coffee…
No one abuses Shakespere cause he sucks!! Boring but WTF do you call American Idol if not BORING pablum … TV Is less than worthless…… and by the way Apples rule PC’s suck since we are on the whole holier than thou thing dont forget Sbaru’s either!
I guess just like alcohol tv is good in moderation. I might watch 6 hours a week but I enjoy those six hours.
Less than worthless?….Wait…’Less Than Zero’? Sweet, I’m going to pop the DVD in right now and use it as mindless background noise.
well we all need a little more television in our life. I also stand with you on the dissing on those people who say the tv is non-existant in their abode. Like their cat peed on it, or it’s broken. Whatever. Boring. What do you do when you are dying to watch tv?
we all need to watch tele.
Especially the Colbert Report. Long Live Stephen Colbert!
And what exactly do you have against Ella Fitzgerald?
You mean there are people really don’t own a TV. What is this world coming too?
If there were no televisions, there would be no Sesame Street. Without Sesame Street I would not be able to report to you here today, that T-W-A-T is the correct spelling. If you don’t own a t.v., this report has been brought to you by the letters F and U.
I am SOOOO with you on this one. It is not the fact that they do not own a TV…I sometimes wish I could break my own addiction to the Boob-Tube. It is that they so smugly ANNOUNCE it to the world every chance they get. Before they even finish their pronouncement, I have already started to “turn them off” permanently. If I ever do get rid of all of my TVs (which is highly unlikely), I will be the only one that will know about it.
I’d love to respond, but sorry, I don’t even OWN an internet. And I’ve never even HEARD of a television. Did I spell that correctly?