Eliminate TV Addiction and Save Money

America has a TV addiction (moreover, a media addiction) and it adversely affects our ability to be frugal. How? By increasing the level of dissatisfaction in our lives.

You might not consider frugality to be a casualty of a television addiction, but it most certainly is. Our personal finances suffer because TV has an ability to influence us to make unwise purchasing decisions.

If you want to live a happier and more fulfilling life, then you need to know the effects of television and how to eliminate a television addiction.

I’m not a sociologist or a psychologist. I’m not an expert in media either. Nevertheless, it isn’t hard to see the effects of TV and media in America. And, it isn’t difficult to see our television addiction and the general love affair we have with media.

TV and the media are like anything else; they have good points and bad points. Some folks can handle it, and others can’t.

I’ll focus my remarks on TV, but the difficulties are much the same with all forms of media – print, movies, TV and radio. They are all a focal point for advertisers, so they all have similar effects on how happy and satisfied we are with our lives.

No one is saying that TV is evil. No one is suggesting that you kill your television (although that isn’t a bad idea). And, no one is suggesting that the problems with TV are the fault of TV, because they aren’t. The fault is with us for getting sucked into watching it on a regular basis, believing what we see and hear, and allowing it to be an important part of our lives.

The key point here is that among the limited benefits of television, there are a multitude of negative influences of which we should be aware, so we can guard against them. Awareness is the first step toward doing something about the great influence that a TV addiction has in our lives.

Television and media in general are contributors to (not causes of) many human failures. It leads us astray in our expectations, and it consumes voraciously some of the most precious things we have – our time, our enthusiasm and our independent thinking.

The Symptoms

Let’s look at some of the evidence that America has a TV addiction.

• Walmart installed televisions all over their stores to inform us about products to buy while inside their stores. They are very much aware of our TV addiction, and are making good use of it.

• Commercial aircraft have television programs shown free during flights. Advertising on aircraft TV programming is now blatant.

• Restaurants, bars and sports grills have televisions galore. Sanford’s restaurant here in Cheyenne has one television per table. Large screen TVs are common in many other eating and drinking establishments.

• Professional sporting events have large displays and sound equipment that entertain during timeouts, in between innings and any time there is a moment that you might “waste” talking with your neighbor.

• Hotels and other businesses have a TV program on in the lobby, waiting rooms, and breakfast areas almost nonstop. Cheap motels still advertise “color TV” as if it were a value-added feature.

• In many homes, the TV is in a prominent place and often in the main living area of the home. Televisions in the kitchen and eating areas are not uncommon. If you can't talk with your family over a meal and would rather have the television turned on, then you might have a TV addiction.

• There are hundreds of TV, movie and music channels to choose from with cable and satellite service, and some people are paying nearly $100 a month to have this in their homes. For many, that is considerably more than the monthly cost of a telephone, and for some, it is more expensive than their monthly electric bill. The money we spend toward television programming points to a TV addiction.

• Lastly, take a stroll down a residential street in the late evening when it is dark and the street lights are (or should be) on. Look at all the houses to see ghost-like images of light and movement on the curtains that indicate a television is turned on. You’ll find only a few homes that don’t have a TV on at night, and it’s probably because no one is home.

The Consequences

Enough said about America having a TV addiction. Let’s look at the adverse effects of television in our lives.

Our TV addiction effects the quality of our lives like nothing else. It appears harmless on the surface, yet its influence can be seen in so many ways. Our TV addiction causes us to be:

• Dissatisfied
• Unproductive
• Distracted
• Unrealistic
• Misinformed

Dissatisfied – this is the single largest problem that TV watching poses. With its regular focus on commercial advertising, the more we watch television, the less satisfied we are with our lives. The less satisfied we are, the more we are apt to do something about it.

Commercial advertising is designed to motivate us to purchase items and services so we will feel better about ourselves - regain that satisfaction, at least for a while. The aim of advertising is to create a level of dissatisfaction that motivates us to buy. The more dissatisfaction, the more we buy.

Commercials tell us that if we don't buy a product, we might smell bad, or germs will take over our homes; our health is in danger, our teeth need to be whiter, and we won't be nearly as happy without a new car. With a bombardment of clever advertising, how can we help but feel less satisfied with ourselves and our lives the more we watch TV?

TV is a solid core of advertising wrapped around programming designed primarily to entertain. The better the entertainment, the longer you'll sit there and view the advertising. More money is spent on commercial advertising than on programming. This is how television makes money. Advertisers pay for TV.

Advertisers get paid by those who have products to sell, and we pay for the products, so "we" are paying for television indirectly. Not everyone of course, but the collective “we” pays for television. If TV advertising didn’t work, there wouldn’t be any advertising on TV.

The continued existence of TV is proof that we are influenced to buy based on the advertising it offers. Our TV addiction is just what advertisers are looking for.

Unproductive – an hour spent watching television is an hour that we never get back. It’s an hour in which little productive work is done and little knowledge is gained. An hour watching television is an hour that we watched others do things instead of doing things ourselves.

How do things in this world get done? By watching others, or by doing them? Unless you get paid to watch others, it isn’t anything except entertainment and a few morsels of information.

Time spent watching television only contributes to the success of those involved in the world of "info-tainment". It has very little potential to contribute to your success. Your time is better spent washing your hair.

Distracted – that’s exactly what we are when we watch television. Our mind isn’t on our lives, it is on the lives of others – others that are acting, pretending, posing, and entertaining.

How are we supposed to get focused on our own success when our TV addiction compells us to keep track of the success of Brad Pitt, Brittany Spears, Mel Gibson, and all the other celebrities that are lauded each day on TV? You can bet these celebrities don't spend time watching TV, and they certainly aren't spending time keeping tabs on you.

We even have entire programs and major parts of “news” casts that are dedicated to entertainment. I think it is entirely appropriate to turn a blind eye to those in our popular culture that are “worshipped” as celebrities. The only reason they are in the public eye is because of our TV addiction.

Instead, we need to recognize that it is our lives that need our attention and celebration.

I remember a young man at a friend’s house who was distressed about having had his credit card account closed because of his inability to pay. He was worried about how he was going to pay it down, and was concerned that the credit company had closed his account.

A short while later, he was watching a movie on television, laughing at some of the parts of the show, completely distracted from the important issue of the day, his indebtedness. His distraction didn’t help solve the problem, it only postponed the solution.

Unrealistic – both TV and movies portray some of the most unrealistic things packaged as realistic. America’s TV addiction and infatuation with movies causes us to feed on these unrealistic portrayals and subconsciously, we see these things as real, or at least possible, even though they are impossible or highly improbable.

As a result, the requirement for us to suspend disbelief is often part of our daily lives, and soon we don’t know what it real and what is “only the movies”.

A popular television show was “The A Team” and it always involved machine gun fire, explosions and vehicles crashing into things. If you have a chance to watch this program, you’ll notice that there is never any blood shown anywhere, despite the fact that people fly through the air propelled by explosions.

You’ll see arms bandaged up in a sling and bandages wrapped around their heads, but you’ll never see blood. And, no one ever dies on the program. Bullets flying everywhere, explosions and car turning end over end, but no one ever dies. How unrealistic can you get?

A friend of mine was looking at a revolver of mine. I told him it was a .357 magnum. He said: “This must tear the target to shreds.” I didn’t say anything for a moment, and then he offered: “Or am I just watching too much television”?

Yes, he was, and he had himself believing that a magnum cartridge would somehow tear a paper target apart. The reality, of course, is that it simply punches a hole in the paper.

If you were a child raised in the 50s, you probably heard of instances of children jumping off of roofs like Superman, thinking they could fly. Some were injured, and some died. All because of the unrealistic expectation that they could fly - something they had seen on TV.

Today, it is much more likely that our TV addiction will give us unrealistic expectations of: winning the lottery; becoming a talented performer; being a big game show winner; or making it big as a famous and highly paid professional athlete. None of these are realistic for 99% of the population, but they constitute at least 50% of what is shown on television.

Oh, and I almost forgot - TV also teaches us that you can "flip" a house in 30 minutes and two commercial breaks.

Misinformed – one of America’s greatest humorists was Mark Twain. He said that if you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed, and if you do, you are misinformed. How right he was, and this truth applies to TV news as well.

The local news is 30 minutes long. The national news is 30 minutes long. The longest news program I have ever seen was 60 minutes long, and that included national and international news.

Do you think that everything of importance in a major metropolitan area like Dallas, New York, Atlanta, Denver or Chicago can be told to us in 30 minutes? Of course not, especially when sports, weather and entertainment news has to be squeezed into that same 30 minutes.

When things are left out, you are being misinformed by omission.

A few years ago Denver had a large snowfall. City services couldn't keep up with clearing streets. Schools were closed. The airport was shut down and thousands of travelers were stranded for days.

The story about the snow consumed nearly every moment of one of the local news stations broadcasts for 4 days in a row. Are we to believe that nothing else of importance happened in the Denver metro area for 4 days straight?

The point is simply this; if you are counting on the TV news to keep you informed, you'll only learn what they want you to know, and at best you will be misinformed.

There are many examples of misinformation that can cited, but I want to give you just one more to show how the media misinforms us for the sake of our entertainment.

Many years ago the TV news interviewed a child who was supposedly an eye witness to a commercial airline crash. The boy described how he saw the occupants of the airliner beating on the windows and screaming just before the crash. Yeah, right!

How in the world are you going to see people in an aircraft that is moving at 200 miles per hour? How do you see such details as what people are doing? You'd have to be very close to the crash. You'd be close enough to be part of the crash yourself, and you'd never live to tell about what you saw.

The point is, the boy made the whole story up so he could be on the news. It was a complete fabrication, and any clear thinking person knows it, yet the "news" ran the story with the eye witness account from the boy.

The media has complete discretion as to what they say and show, yet they chose the entertainment value of the boy's fabricated story and misinformed their viewers.

Such sensationalism feeds our TV addiction, and that's why many of us just can't go without watching "info-tainment" provided by the "news".

Alternatives to Consider

Okay then, if TV isn't so great, then what should we do to combat our TV addiction? Here are some ideas:

• Use the Internet for entertainment. You can be much more selective, and you tend to get just the right amount of information without the powerful advertising that comes with a TV addiction.

• Watch only selected TV programs. I like programming that is educational, like The History Channel. There are also a few wildlife programs that are interesting and informative.

• Play a card game. You would be amazed at how many card games you can enjoy with the same 52 playing cards, and at next to nothing cost.

• Play a board game. There are many to choose from. The cost of a board game is minor when compared to the enjoyment you can receive.

• Play a video game on your television. This is one of the few opportunities to be interactive with your TV. Instead of feeding your TV addiction with your attention, you have to be involved in the game.

• Go for a walk, or spend time with your neighbor.

• Read a book or magazine, especially something that isn't a mainstream media production. It uses your imagination and can be quite entertaining. It also provides an alternative source of information and opinion.

• Build something or work on a home improvement project.

This is just a short list. It's not hard to find things to do other than feed the TV addiction. I haven't watched TV for more than 10 years, I'm not employed, and I never have any problem finding interesting, satisfying and productive things to occupy my time.

Test Yourself

Last but not least, take these tests to evaluate your own TV addiction:

1. Stop watching TV for 30 days, and see what a difference it makes in your life. See if your life has really changed for the worse because you missed out on something that was being shown on TV.

2. Over 30 days of watching the evening news, make note of the news that you will act on. Write down what you learned and what you did about it.

If you take these simple tests, I'll bet you'll find that you reach the same conclusions that I have reached:

• You don't miss a thing that is important to you.
• News isn't really "news you can use" - it's entertainment.
• More time is available for your life.
• Levels of fear and anxiety drop off abruptly.
• Opinions you have are of your own creation.
• You'll have meaningful conversations with others.
• The urge to buy happiness subsides.

If you are going to be frugal, you need to carefully consider the effects of TV and other media in your life. Good fortune to you as you eliminate or otherwise guard against a TV addiction.

Done with TV addiction, take me back to Frugal Living Tips.