TV turnoff
17 Jun
When I was pregnant with my first, I was enamored with this woman I casually knew who already had two kids. She seemed to have it all together and her parenting choices came easily. She was the first person I knew to take on an elimination diet (she did it while nursing a baby with severe eczema) and the first mom I heard suggest that watching TV was bad for kids. Her reasons made sense and her implementation seemed manageable. I went home to my husband and said, “No TV on in our house while our baby is awake, okay?” He said, “Yeah, I’ll do it.” (Secretly, he rolled his eyes because he knew there was no way I was giving up Buffy and The Bachelorette.)
He was right. TV turnoff during baby awake time lasted about 15 minutes. Since our baby was not a sleeper, and we were TV addicts, this baby was exposed to some prime time from the get-go.
That being said, I was very careful about what he watched (no cartoons, not even Dora, for the first three years) and how much, until I was pregnant with number two and would do anything to make sure I got at least one nap a day. Then it all went to hell. Seven years later, he’s watching TV and I walk into the room and say, “Is this appropriate for you?” If he says yes, I’ll usually pause, glare at him like I mean business, and walk away.
I’m actually less annoyed about the TV shows these days then I am about the commercials. As if it’s not bad enough to feature young kids hocking anything from artificially-colored crap masquerading as breakfast to processed shit masquerading as lunch, now they have kids warning their friends on the other side of the screen that their dad might die from cancer.
“Dad? Are you going to get cancer?” my 7-year-old asked us this morning out of the blue. What?!? Where did that come from?
“The TV just said 28,000 men die of cancer every year and then they showed pictures of kids who don’t have dads to play with.”
As you can imagine, I am very much in favor of WAKE UP CALLS. And maybe it’s my own fault for letting my kid watch the Cartoon Network before school. But that is a low blow. Clever campaign? Perhaps. But still very much straddling the line of inappropriate.
WAKE UP CALL. While we can all thank the Heavens for Noggin and remark on how our child learned the days of the week from watching Zee, TV goes from bad to worse after preschool. And, the violence and inappropriate language are only half of it. That crap my kid’s already learning at school from friends whose parents have no boundaries at home.
What’s scarier to me? What they’re subtly learning about love, life, death, and relationships. What they’re learning about other people and about themselves.
It’s time we tune in.
Oh, I hate the commercials much more than the TV shows themselves! Something about a 4YO asking for an In-Styler to make her hair straight just makes me want to hurl. And knowing that the In-Styler is advertised on Nick Jr. during Spongebob makes me pissed off!
I’ve vascialted over the years with how much TV and what kinds of TV I let them watch … But now I’ve taken the approach of knowing what they’re watching (and watching enough of it either with them or from the kitchen while they sit in the living room) that I really know the types of themes that are being discussed and the kinds of commercials that are aired while watching so we can discuss them.
They’re going to pick up the shit that makes us uncomfortable (and that’s different for everyone and maybe even kid-to-kid in the same family) one way or another, and I figure the more I understand the context with which they’ve been exposed and can be prepared to talk about it with them the better.
Yeah… tv…
I had the same aspirations + addictions to tv when my daughter was born 5 years ago. She’s watched plenty of tv + movies since then, but the rule in the house is no watching tv channels with ads! They make me livid.
And even better, in my new apt, there is no tv! Just my laptop, so she can watch the occasional dvd or a show on Hulu. I’m loving it! She can watch the no-ad tv at her dad’s if she wants, so she doesn’t feel deprived. It’s amazing what happens when there’s no tv to watch.
I’m a lot more lax with TV than I ever thought I’d be. I still have my limits and boundaries, they just aren’t where I expected they’d fall.
While I’m all for stricter regulations about what commercials can be shown during kid shows, I’ve also found the commercials to be a great opportunity to teach my kids all sorts of things. Like, commercials try to make toys/food look really great so you’ll want to buy them. My older son (6) totally gets this. While I don’t want my kids exposed to nonstop marketing — and they know how and do skip commercials when something is recorded — I also think there’s something good about desensitizing them to advertising and teaching them what it’s all about.
Yeah I’ve definitely turned off the TV noise and don’t even have cable. There is an incredible amount of programming occurring, not just with health issues, but with how we judge and relate with people. I don’t want that.
Competition/Elimination shows are very popular these days, much of which is staged drama. I’d rather want my kids having real world experiences and learn how to relate to the world around them and not just a screen.
Also for the early comment about elimination diets, I just had a patient who’s baby was getting a rash and couldn’t figure out why, I had informed her about the risks of food allergies if certain foods are introduced too early (or even at all), the importance of breastfeeding, etc but the rash was still there.
Finally the mother who was lactating at the time eliminated dairy herself- voila – rash gone. She got confident, had cheese again 1-2 weeks later, rash came back. Decided to do away with dairy for good and lost herself 15 lbs.
We are just on the tip of the iceberg with our understanding of the amazing effects of food & our environment. Great article, can’t wait to read more!