Television: The Drug of the Nation

Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation. You remember when TV was the big drug? When you learned that watching TV was bad for you and would melt your brain or make your eyes go square? Yup those were the days. I remember growing up with less than twenty channels to choose from. See, I grew up without cable. That means I didn’t watch Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon or anything like that. The only times I got to see those shows were on vacation and at my cousin’s house.

I’ve never really been a big TV person. Yeah, there were shows we would watch every night, mostly CSI, CSI: NY, NCIS, and the like. Crime shows were big and really, there wasn’t much else to watch. Sometimes we would watch Survivor, but that really only lasted one or two seasons. It wasn’t like the 90s when there were tons of good shows running around. However, TV was still a huge part of my childhood and the childhoods of many.

Then the internet came. It started with a computer, some simple little games, mostly educational, and dial-up. You remember dial-up, don’t you? But we’re not talking about that. With the internet came less television, but not much. Living in a house with one computer sporting internet access turns had to be taken. This left me with plenty of time still with my TV, when my brother wasn’t playing whatever game system he had at the time. This also left me a plenty of time for outdoor activities and most importantly, reading.

The TV habit got worse when we traded dial-up for Comcast my ninth-grade year. It was for my sister’s cyber schooling originally but it made life so much easier. Not only did we have unlimited internet access, with wireless, I might add, we also had all those channels I missed out on as a kid. We were, naturally, still pretty far behind most modern families but that’s the way we’ve always been so I was okay with that. I could watch cartoons at any time during the day. I could watch MythBusters and Gilmore Girls and Scrubs as well. It brought out a whole new form of television addiction.

And then two things changed. I got a laptop, and we got Netflix. Television is now little more than a device on which I enjoy my video games, when they aren’t on an emulator. The addiction has moved from the physical TV to the computer screen. I can watch entire seasons on my lap top while lying in bed. And you know what? This is worse than the television age. While it is true that people began forgoing physical activity for television, as well as drifting away from personal communication with the family, the television age did not separate us from the people in our households. The computer, however, does. It is a solitary device used by one person at a time. A family does not gather around a computer to watch their favorite shows. The family goes into separate rooms and watches them on their own personal computer.

This is, however, still a television addiction. I spent all day watching Bones on Netflix. This is not healthy in anyway, but oh so entertaining. I did take a two hour break to watch a movie with my sister, but it was in the same place, in my bed. This is not healthy, people. Not healthy at all.

British Mind Control

Why is it that British television is so damn addictive? Think about it. How many crazy British television crazes are there here in the states? Okay, most of you can name two off the top of your head. Monty Python and Dr. Who, which are both great examples! My brother and I were quite into Monty Python’s Flying Circus for a while and I’ve got several friends who are addicted to Dr. Who. But it’s not limited to them.

I recently discovered, though YouTube’s talent for suggesting rather random videos based on those that you’ve watched. Seriously, I once got six or seven videos suggested to me from YouTube on planting hydrangeas. Why? I’ve got no clue. I can’t think of what I could have possibly watched that would in any way be related to hydrangeas and the proper way to plant them. Anyway, I was suggested the first part of an episode of a BBC television sitcom called My Hero. I’ve been watching it ever since.

My Hero is about a super hero, Thermoman, who is from the planet Ultran, and assigned to protect earth. He hasn’t been on earth very long and doesn’t quite understand everything about humans and their behaviors. However, when he saves a nurse named Janet from falling in the Grand Canyon he falls instantly in love with her and follows her to London just to see her… and complement her in odd ways. His alter ego is George Sunday, a health shop owner from Ireland. His shop isn’t very successful due to poor employment and perhaps the fact that he constantly has to run to the bathroom, where he changes into Thermoman. It has to be in a bathroom, too. He can’t change anywhere else.

So, what happens when a superhero from another planet starts living with a human nurse from London? Hijinx, duh! It’s actually really amusing watching the kind of trouble George and Janet get into as they try to keep George’s identity a secret, while dealing with her odd co-workers, his alien ways, and her overbearing mother along with Janet’s neighbor Tyler who was on something very special in the sixties. He thinks he’s been to pretty much all of the planets in the suns orbit, plus several others he’s probably made up. He also somehow instinctively knows that George is Thermoman. It’s very special.

My Hero has six or so seasons of seven episodes each. Not sure why that is. It’s rather cute most of the time, though some things don’t really make sense all of the time. But it can be super cute at times and really amusing so one can over look the inconsistencies. This still begs the question, however, why is it, exactly, that this has had me hooked for the past three days when I should be doing school work? Well, because it’s British. And that’s what they do. Thanks BBC. Really.