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I guess that I am ashamed to admit that I am a T.V. watcher!
(by Judy Reiss - May 13, 2007)
I guess that I am ashamed to admit that I am a T.V. watcher!
(by Judy Reiss - May 03, 2007)
I guess that I am ashamed to admit that I am a T.V. watcher! These days, when you ask someone about a T.V. program, they always want to tell you how they don't watch T.V. and so don't know the answer. Well, I'm not one of those people. I like to think that I am a little discriminating about what I watch and because I am not sure that this is true, I'm not going to tell you what I do watch!
Malcolm really does not watch much T.V. When I watch, he usually goes into the other room and either reads, fixes his and Sebastian's skis, or reads everything that there is to read about old silver on the internet. But he has found one program that he adores and when that program is on, he is right in front of the tube, watching. And, thank heavens, it is one of my favorite programs too. So, we watch it together. And I think that it was during this particular program that we noticed that things have changed in T.V. land
Oh, I guess that I should tell you that our "together" program is Boston Legal. And it was there that we first noticed that commercials aren't what they used to be. I'm sure that we all know and have always known that T.V. commercials made it impossible to watch an hour-long program for 60 minutes. I think that I always thought that you were subjected to one at the beginning of the show, 2 at 15 minutes, maybe 2 at 30 minutes and then 1 or 2 towards the end. How much that actually came out to, minute-wise, I have no idea. But it was the cost of watching whatever program you wanted to watch. Well, it was first apparent during our Boston Legal show that things have certainly changed, commercial-wise. I haven't actually timed the show but no longer do we have the opportunity to watch maybe, 50 minutes of actual show. Now we have so many commercials that we are lucky if we have 35 minutes. And what were opportunities to learn about some product, now is an inundation about products that not only don't I know what half of them are for, most of those that I do, I am embarrassed to know about! I don't know what happened to Betty Furness and her spiel about refrigerators, but they are gone and gone for good. Now we are given more information than we want to know about every dysfunction that you could possibly have and about the product that will cure it.
Well, I thought, Boston Legal comes on my T.V. at 10:00 p.m., so that must be the reason that these outrageous commercials are on. Most kids are in bed by then, I hope, and someone, somewhere has decided that once is not anywhere near enough time to sell their product to you. Now you have to see it over and over and over again. In fact, there are so many commercials during Boston Legal that you have to concentrate to be able to remember what the story line is for that episode when it eventually comes back on again.
One of my other favorites is The Amazing Race. Now this show is on at 8:00 and during several past summers, it was the one show that I allowed my grandsons to stay up and watch. We were all great fans and to be sure that we didn't miss a minute, we put post-it notes on the T.V. I think that their mother still allows them to watch The Race because they and their Nana are such fans. But, give me a break! The commercials during this program are outrageous too. It isn't just the quantity, which is ridiculous, it is what is being advertised. Again, 8:00 p.m. isn't that late and children do have the opportunity to watch. I find it obscene that during what is touted as a family program, the commercials and advertisements are for things that are still inappropriate for children. And if your kids are like my grandchildren, they want to know what in the world Viagra, Cialis etc. are for. And call me old-fashioned, but I don't think that they need to know, and believe me, they do understand that all the Victoria Secret ads for certain bras and underwear are something that they probably shouldn't know all that much about.
O.K. if you are one of those who think that these outlandish commercials are appropriate for your children to watch, let me just ask you this one question: What happens on the program that you have tuned in to watch? For me and my boys, The Amazing Race is a terrific program but it is just too short. No longer is there time to follow each team and due to the shortened time available for programming, it just isn't that easy to follow. But you sure do get enough time to learn everything in the world that you don't really want to know about diarrhea, bad skin and now, even condoms and other birth control devices. Just let us watch those teams climb a mountain, drive a Yak or figure out how to get from here to there. That is my idea of an amazing race.
My daughter Sarah, who lives on Cape Cod, called me the other night during Grey's Anatomy (which is also one of my favorites) and complained bitterly about the number of commercials and lack of time for the story. I told her that I not only agreed but was going to write a column about it. She urged me on and also told me that next week she was going to keep track of the number of commercials and how long each one was. She was also going to time the actual show part of the hour. To date, she hasn't done it or at least hasn't given me the figures. When and if she does, I will let you know what she found out. We also agreed that the more popular shows have the most commercials.
And because commercials etc. are my topic of the day, I decided to watch Masterpiece Theater the other night on Vermont Educational Television (I think it is still called that!) But instead of the program that I wanted to watch, they were having their phone-a-thon/ bi-yearly fund-raiser. O.K. that is like it always was. But instead of talking about commercial-free programming, they only talked about the type of programs that they do offer. And the reason for this is now, they too, have commercials. I don't know what they call them, but a commercial is a commercial is a commercial. And if they can do both, beg for funds and sell advertising space, will regular old commercial T.V. be far behind?
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