What is TV doing for you?

I just read an interesting article about the effect of television on our lives. I took the liberty of pulling out a few quotes:

"We are proposing that television as a simple, constant, repetitive and ambiguous visual stimulus, gradually closes down the central nervous system of Man."

Becker holds a similar view of the effect of television on American's ability to think:

"Americans don't really think, they have opinions and feelings. Television creates the opinion and then validates it."

Take politics for example; Television tells Americans what to think about politicians. The media tells people what has been said and what is "important." Everything else is filtered out. You are told who can win and who can't. And few people have the urge to look behind the images in the screen, to find the truth for themselves

"Are they brainwashed by the tube?," asked Becker of the interviewer. "It is really more than that. I think that people have lost the ability to relate the images of their own lives without television intervening to tell them what it means."

Here's the link for the full article ... it's very long but worth the time to read.

Oh yeah, "reading" ... now don't get me started on that long lost pastime!

http://www.fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/media/television/news.php?q=1213739143