Everybody knows that TV has many bad influences upon people and yet it´s so hard to make people turn it off. For kids, nothing could be worse. Kids get exposed to inappropriate content, publicity makes us buy unnecessary things and fear is spread through news and shows all day long.
Personally I quit watching TV in 2004, but way before that I was getting quite aware in a way to choose better the channels and the shows. So when I had my daughter, in 2007, it was no problem for me to keep her away from TV. We simply don´t have a TV at home (the best and maybe only way to avoid it).
If you let your kid watch TV at any hour of the day he can see fights, rapes (even if just obvious insinuations), war scenes (oh, so normal these days to watch bombing over towns and real bodies on the streets), robbery, murders and the list of horror goes on and on.
Even if you only let your kid watch TV in the morning. Tell me sincerely, doesn´t you kid take a pick on what you are watching around 7 or 8 pm (or even later)? Doesn´t your kid take a pick on the news? (I´d love to see one day when the news gets called horror show)
I won´t talk of how these shows can damage your kids view of the world. We all know this. There are infinite sources to read from this available (check some I chose on the bottom of this post). What kills me is that people don´t take action to shut this all off.
Ah, the wanders of having your kid sitting down quietly for one or two hours! I love that feeling. What I do is put videos or films that I approve for my daughter to watch for very limited time. I´m the censor in this house, no broadcasting channel can know better than me. And the sources of good shows, films, cartoons on DVD and available on the internet are endless.
Just think of how strong those TV images can be on your kid´s subconscious mind after he goes to bed. No wander kids come up with the craziest nightmares. I have a history of nightmares following hard core scenes, my mother learned to not let me watch some movies but I´d still do at friend´s house now and then. Just think how watching violence over and over can affect your children.
How about families complaining that the kid won´t go to bed early, while the parents are watching TV? I´ve heard of kids that sleep no matter how busy the house is. Even doctors say that you should get your kid used to the night noise in the house, not to get the “bad habit” of wanting to sleep in silence (there are good doctors around too).
But how about turning the evil box off around 7 pm for a start? How about making a proper family environment for dinner, reading and quieting down? How about turning it off for good? You can watch all the shows you like on the in internet anyway (check here on sources to find all the TV shows on the internet).
Although I don´t have a TV, it definitely doesn´t mean that Luísa never watches it. For this, I would have to isolate myself from all the people I know, never go to their houses and never let Luísa go to a playmate house. She does get a portion of TV. I don´t forbid her to watch elsewhere, and of course, when she has the opportunity, she is glued to the monitor. But at least is the minimum available for us.
Since I don´t have the habit of watching TV anymore, whenever I do, I can get pretty hooked too. I love watching documentaries and sitcoms when I´m sitting in front of cable TV. But I also get tired of it so quickly. The news are a horrible way of mass domination, it´s so easy to see it once you don´t watch it often. People still buy the idea that it´s informative, when it is actually delivering all sorts of political ideologies, fake necessities and fear.
All the information you need is available from much more reliable sources. And the amount of publicity you get exposed to is just overwhelming. Not to mention you are not trained to get rid of the marketers influence. It´s like you offer your home for sellers to come in and sit in your couch with you for hours, with a smile from your face.
There are very good cartoons on TV too. On Discovery Kids, I love Pocoyo, Charlie and Lola and Pinky Dinky Doo to name a few. But the publicity that gets in the middle is a killer. First, they get your kid´s attention. When the kid is hooked, they stop it to present useless toys and stuff. The young kids get confused because they think the cartoon is over and is not, but early enough they learn to wait for all the crap to finish in order to keep watching the goodies. I´ve seen it happening to Luísa, she would complain that the cartoon was over, but now she waits for the commercials to finish.
But even worse is that all those commercials are made to make your kid ask for those products and feel bad about themselves if they don´t get them. Slowly TV builds a low self esteem in the children like it does to all of us adults too.
As I mentioned earlier I do let Luísa watch videos. I do use them as a babysitter like most parents. What I do is buy some DVDs of some nice cartoons, like Pocoyo which is made for improving vocabulary and if you can let your kid watch it with no commercials, than it can be really good. If you can use them in a second language like I do, even better.
The turn off button is there for a reason: use it.
I´d love us to talk about this more. Do you watch TV? How do you filter the bad information that´s coming in? If you don´t watch it, how did you quit it? How can we inspire other people to shut it off?
Here are some interesting sources on this subject:
A Creative Alternative to Baby TV Time
The Eletronic Pacifier: No TV Under Two!
Television´s Impact on Children
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
I applaud your efforts to keep Luisa away from commercial Tv and , just as bad, advertising geared towards childen, easier to carry out consistently with a child as small as Luisa, but what will happen when she is older and goes to school with other childen that follow popular TV shows, lousy reality shows like BIg Brother, very popular with kid in their early teens. How can you isolate her from such thing that will be all around her at school? Bear in mind also that childen in certain ages, early teens again particularly, want at all costs to be like all the others. Being different, doing different things, not liking the same games ot TV shows, not knowing about them, may brand them as weird freak outsiders and trender them easy targets for ostracising or ecen mobbing, and that may be more harmful psychologically than watching TV. Not an easy way around it certainly.
Keep up the good work!!!
where it says trender I mean “render”, otherwise ir does not make sense
Just a quick note on Pocoyó, that you seem to like. It has been crated in Spain by Guillermo, friend of a friend of mine. There is s popular prayer for children that says “Jesusito de mi vida, tu eres niño como yo” and Guillermo has a small kid that could not say it properly and would always say “poco yo” instead of “como yo”. He thought that was a funny word and that was how the Pocoyó name came about. He has had a huge success and there are two Spanish version, one for Spain and one for Latin America plus an English version. Well deserved success!
Thank you for jumping in Eric. If Luísa keeps away from comercial TV and if she only has friends who watch and talk about the stupid shows, I guess that yes, she might be a bit off of the main conversation, which is a good thing. Quoting Walter Lippman: “Where all think alike, no one thinks very much”. She might even have a bit of a hard time or be so smart to find her way around it.
If she is after social proof (seeing an action more appropriate when others are doing it), like we all do in fact, I´m sure she will fit in other areas with her peers, like doing sports or playing an instrument (I hope).
We might be in an enviroment with likeminded people and kids that watch less TV as well. Who knows, maybe she won´t even go to school and we will unschool. There are so many variants in what´s going to happen.
Very interesting information on Pocoyó. I always thought it was a sweet name, with a very international pronunciation. What a coincidence that I like it and you know the creator!
Thanks for such a great article! I have heard many times and from many sources that it is not good to watch too much TV, especially for children.
Luckily, we have an older TV set that is not equipped for HDTV, so we let our kids watch DVDs. What we model will have an impact on our kids as they become older.
I have a great-grandmother who watches a lot of news. She believes that the world is a very scary and evil place and is afraid to see new places and travel to large cities. She used to ask my sister and me if we had ever had a stalker who followed us (nope). My “Grammy” is also scared of being in crowded settings because she worried that someone would open fire on the people. It’s good to stay away from the news.
Thanks for sharing your story Beth. Your great-grandmother is a perfect example of how watching news is disturbing.
I come from São Paulo, one of the biggest metropolis in the world and yet, my mother wouldn´t allow me to visit Rio de Janeiro, from all the news we knew it was too dangerous…
Cutting out the TV is a tough move in today’s culture but good for you! We do have a TV but we only have very basic cable (about 20 channels) and my daughter watches VERY little. I let her watch two shows in the morning and then I put a DVD in for her when I am making dinner. When she gets old enough to help me in the kitchen then we’ll cut the afternoon TV out. I do realize how hard it will be to limit her screen time as she gets older but it’s well worth the effort! I don’t mind a little TV but I’d like to limit it to under an hour a day.
Great article! And thanks for visiting me today!!!
That´s great that you limit your daughter TV like that Mandi. I don´t have a TV set, but I treat the DVDs I let Luísa watch as TV time, making it less than 1,5 hours and not every day.
We can´t deny it´s a great baby sitter to help us cook and do whatever we need to do in peace, it´s also educational, we only need to be sure of what´s on.
Thank you for coming by and commenting right away.
We have a TV but it only works to watch movies and we have netflix and the shows we do want to watch are on there. The few times in the past few years that we’ve seen regular TV my husband has gotten so upset with all the commercials we had to turn it off. It seems like there’s more commercials than shows now.
I would love to get rid of the TV all together but I am not the only one in the house so I only count for one vote.
Too much comercials and also shows made for dumb people. Even channels that I like, like National Geographic and Discovery Channel, have a way to summarize everything that´s happened after the comercials, which is so annoying if you are paying atention.
So far, my twins have only seen the TV 3 times in their 16 months. Each time they were sick and it was a way for them to zone out and stay calm. Otherwise, we have a very strict rule of no TV before age 2. Even after that….nothing with commercials and very limited viewing like Sesame Street or similar educational.
Of course it will be harder as they get older, but it’s up to us as parents to make the best choices for them. Oftentimes, this means there is no easy street.
Having twins must make it much appealing to use the TV, kudos for you for doing all it takes to make your boys active without the TV!
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