SMASH IN YOUR TV AND SET YOUR MIND FREE

by Brooke Allen

I was eight when we got our first television. Although it cost a month’s take-home pay, my parents consumed it sparingly, as if it were candy.

In the eighth grade I became interested in Amateur Radio, and lost interest in TVs configured as receivers, so I took one apart and rebuilt it as a shortwave transmitter. When my friends watched the Flintstones, I talked to people all over the world.

Yet television is insidious and relentless, and by my senior year in high school, my father, mother, sister, and I would spend hours each day sitting together as we drifted apart.

My freshman year at college was 100% TV-free and it felt great. As I flew home for the summer I formulated a speech about how I had no time for television.

Before I could speak, my dad told me the TV was in the barn if I wanted it for parts. My family had figured out what was happening to them. One night after dinner, my mom and my sister watched as my dad took out a .22 and put a bullet through the picture tube.

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Clay Shirky discusses television and brains with time to spare in his book Cognitive Surplus – Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age. He says TV claims about 200,000,000,000 brain-hours in the United States each year. He estimates this to be about 2,000 times the effort that it took to build the Wikipedia in all its various languages.

Broadcast television and the Wikipedia are both things your brain can consume, but the Wikipedia is also something you can help produce. And if you do, two things will happen: 1) The world will be a better place, and 2) You will increase your connectedness with others.

In 1973, my girlfriend and I hitchhiked to Appalachia to spend a week with her aunt and uncle, who had surprisingly little news to convey about her childhood friends. “Don’t worry,” my friend said, “we’ll get the low down at the hoedown on the weekend.” It turned out there were no more hoedowns; they had been canceled once Hee Haw went on the air.

Shirky says that when lonely people watch TV, they report feeling less lonely, even though their passivity and the one-way nature of the experience makes them even more alone.

Q. What do people do when they lose a job?

A. They watch more TV. (Click on the graph above to see an interactive version of how people spend their time throughout the day. The big dark red band is TV viewing by the jobless. The tiny orange sliver is time spent working.)

When you lose a job, it is easy to feel useless and disconnected. And yet, watching TV is a useless activity that does not make you more connected – it just makes you feel as if you are.

Instead, do something with your excess brainpower (cognitive surplus). Even if you can’t find someone to pay you right away, I’m sure you can find something you enjoy doing for its own sake.

View the rest of this article for more pictures from people who have better things to do than watching TV all day (such as taking photographs). Copyrights are reserved by all original photographers.

The photo above was conceived of by model Miss LoLo who says, “The inspiration behind it was to display an independence from TV and to motivate people to think outside the idiot box.” The photo was taken by  Dave Wolanski who says, “My50th birthday was a month ago. I can hear the clock ticking and I don’t want my legacy to be that I knew all the quirks of the characters of NCIS, one of my favorite shows by the way.”

Would you go out of your way to take a photograph for a complete stranger for no money?

Eleven people did that for me.

TWICE!

The First Time: I wanted to illustrate an article about my favorite park in Japan so I wrote to people who lived near the park on my favorite social networking site, Couch Surfing, and asked if anyone had a photo lying around. None did, but 11 people went to the park to take pictures just for me. This is free time and generosity at work.

This Article is the Second Time: Zillions of people have posted gadzillions of photos on Flickr, including hundred of smashed TVs.

We asked 12 people for permission to use there photographs for this article and 11 said yes. (Still have not heard from one of them.)

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Ede swares he does not have a gun. However my father did, and Ede has the perfect photo to go with the story of how my dad shot the TV.

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Hopefully Andrina did not waste too much of her day watching this TV.

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Chase says, "The economic downturn may make it hard to find a regular job, but it can also be a great time to go into business for yourself. Invest that time in yourself in one way or another."

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Reed says his brother, his girlfriend, and he found this old TV in the desert and decided to put it out of its misery.

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Jim says, "I find that ordinary television just sucks the intelligence right out of my head. The best use for a TV is as a DVD monitor so that you can at least choose exactly what to put into your mind. Have you heard the Groucho Marx quote about TV, probably from the ealry 1950s? He said, "I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book."

Julia says, "I like watching TV as much as any other teenager, but I don't think that a life should depend on that."

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Whitney and some German friends found this shirt in a store and althought they did not have enough money to buy it, they tried it on in the changing room. "I, however, snuck a photo, SHHH"

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Dustin says, "I'm proud to say I watch zero TV and haven't had cable for multiple years. Life's too short to spend yours watching someone else's."

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