[at-l] No TV/VCR

[kahley7@ptd.net (kahley)]

At 06:34 PM 1/11/02 -0500, cballs@mindspring.com wrote:

>attacking my opinions in public, rather nastily I thought,

But ....at 12:49 PM 1/11/02 -0500, cballs@mindspring.com wrote:

 >  And how like an obedient American consumer to avoid all things
 >  controversial and "thought provoking." You've learned well.

What goes around, comes around.....

To ignore TV is as useful as ignoring the color blue.  It is totally
intertwined and to a great degree, responsible for many of the changes
or at least the speed of the changes in our society.    I agree with you
that TV changes the watcher but would add that all things change you,...
time changes you.....watching a turtle take a duckling changes you.
The thing to discuss is the nature of the change...for good or ill.


 >  without a single coherent, rational reason for why television is a good 
thing


1) Preferring to cacoon myself from the content of the force
that is shaping generation after generation of my fellows, does
not seem like a good idea.   I do not choose to plunge in to
the degree that some people do.  I do choose to understand
how deep the sh*t is and what monsters lurk in the depths.
To me, doing otherwise is sticking your head in the sand.
Ignorance is bliss....until the sh*t hits the fan.  I prefer to
know which way the breeze is gonna blow.

2) The idea that, on TV,  "everything has the same value from
God to Chia pets ' is even moreso an issue with the Internet.

Visit  http://www.whitehouse.gov/  and http://www.whitehouse.com/

WARNING..the second addie is a XXX Porn site.

Both are professionally done websites delivered at a click....both presented
equally.  The internet _is_a million voices.  A million unfiltered voices much
of which is lacking even the shadow of authority or even authenticity.
Yet we choose 'this' and not 'that'.  We can apply the same discretion
to TV.  Or we can choose to shoot our computers.

3)  Just as the internet _can_be a good thing or an life wrecker,
TV_can_ be an amazing tool.

On 9/11 as I sat reading at-l. the news was on in the background.
I heard the alert about a plane crash and focused on the tube.  I saw
history.  I saw the beginning of a war.  I've read much about it since then....
many author's impressions from many angles through many filters.  But
I saw history with my own eyes.  Granted, I saw what the cameraman
was shooting and the directors chose to show me.  It was edited.  But
what I saw and felt could never be reproduced by anything that I have
since read or was told.  In that vein:
I watched man walk on the moon.
I watched the birth of a child.
I watched the valve replacement surgery that my Mother was about to undergo.
I watched a lioness hide in the bushes until she launched at a gazelle.
If I didn't watch TV, I would have missed all these things and a thousand more.
Not the real thing.  Not as good as being there, but for sure, _better_ 
...more
accurate and useful than my imaginings.

Finally,  I watched the "edited due to time constraints and 
content"  version of the
director's, producer's and sponsor's vision of what Rosie chose to share about
her Thru.  For good or for ill, I learned that people hiked from end to end.
Even middle aged round women.  And so it began....for good or ill.

I find it hard to believe that most people aren't, at one time or another,
launched into a dream by something they saw on TV.  Some image or
idea that came to them through the tube that fired their imagination,
touched their soul.  Subtracting TV from the inventory of sources of
inspiration and information seems foolish to me.  Just as foolish as
relying on it as your sole source for same.

OK..that's it for me.....this is busting my hard hiked high and I can't go
out and recapture it 'cause I'm stuck inside at work.

BTW......a riddle.  Why, when serching for an accurate quoting of Curtis's
words, did I find 357 hits on the word Chia in my inbox? <VVVBG>