The other reason is that I will watch anything. I seem to have no ability to discriminate between good shows and bad. I learned this many years ago, when I was an undergraduate. I was visiting some relatives who had young children. They put a tape of the "Smurfs" in the VCR for the girls to watch. I could not help watching it myslf. In fact I can still recall the evil man with his cat who had a plan to destroy the Smurfs.
I have heard that some people watch television after working, and find it very relaxing. I don't need to do that since I am lazy. Perhaps it is like alcohol, in moderation not a problem, and for certain people a problem since they lack the ability to be moderate.
New article! Is tv addictive?
Another book that has given me some hope is by Noel Perrin, Giving up the Gun. It concerns the Japanese adoption of firearms, and then their turning away from them. That the Japanese warrior culture was able to renounce the use of the most effective weapon of its day because it destroyed the character of battle gives me hope that the American leisure culture can renounce tv because it destroys the quality of leisure.
Here is an article that documents that the more tv people saw of the Gulf war, the less they knew about it! Rather an extraordinary finding, given that we heard again and again how CNN was putting us right there.
Channel One is a controversial project to bring tv into the classroom. Does it bring valuable information to the students, or take away much needed time for basics?
Casting and Fate: tv underrepresents and misrepresents women and minorities.
And if all that were not bad enough, in the future tv and the 'net will combine to not only tell you what to buy and how to act, but will become a panopticon reporting every detail of our lives to the corporate masters.