Reshma Balkaran

English 11000-B

March 4th, 2015.

                                                  "Our Choices Impact Our Lives"

          Marie Winn was a well known author, journalist, translator and producer; some of her most famous works included "Red Tails in love, Shiver Gobble and snore, as well as "Television the Plug-In Drug."  Her book "Television the plug-in Drug" was the first in a series addressing family in modern society.  Television viewing has dramatically changed over the years; she states "the early articles about television were almost invariably accompanied by a photograph or illustration showing a family cozily sitting together before the TV set."  Throughout her article Winn argues that the very idea of television that was originally believed to be the item that brought families together in the same room is the thing that is destroying family bonding, children are no longer as active and communication: conversation amongst family members and friends are diminishing. 

         Winn continues by arguing that today many households contain numerous TV sets and families are dispersed in their own directions, watching their own programs.  She goes on to say that the interaction between friends is at a minimum because instead of them participating in activities, playing games, interacting, they prefer to spend their time sitting in front of a TV set.

"The peer group has become television oriented and much of the time children spend together is occupied by television viewing.....participation in church and community activities have diminished with TV a primary cause for this change."

Winn uses her article to showcase the negative effects TV watching has on a child, she consulted a teacher as well as parents.

"Through the changes it has made in family life, television emerges as the important influence in children's lives today."

Winn conveys that we might not consider what a child watches on television or how much television they watch as a big deal but in reality a child's television watching habits influences them in many ways.  A first grade teacher was quoted as saying that in her first grade class there is a child who was quite isolated.  The teacher wanted to inquire why this was the case so she spoke to the parents about the child's home life and discovered that after school the little girl goes to the babysitter and once her mom picked her up and they went home she watched tv while her mom fixed dinner.  The teacher suggested that maybe the little girl could help her mom fix dinner and chat with her mom instead of watching tv.  The teacher as well as Winn makes the argument that parents would rather have their children watch television versus doing activities which in tie negatively impacts the child's communication skills both in the household (in regards to everyone being in different rooms, watching different shows) and outside of the house. 

         Winn goes on by stating that even though families today might still engage in family activities during the summer and on weekends, the fact that they are spending all this time during the week isolated from one another and watching a significant amount of TV diminishes the positive effects when they do pens together.  To Winn family time versus television watching is all about quantity over quality.  A perfect example of this would be the young woman from Chicago who spoke about the ways in which television has negatively impacted family gatherings and parties because everyone is so focused on watching tv instead of enjoying each other's company and interacting whereas in previous years the children would play games and everyone would have conversations and just enjoy each other's company.  

          I agree with the author that television viewing has negative effects however I do believe that these negative effects only arise when viewing is done in large quantities for an excessive amount of time.  We  all at one point or another was responsible for babysitting and in an effort to keep peace, calm or just for entertainment allowed a child to watch television.  In my opinion the author wanted to address a very selected few instances where she witnessed or heard of extreme cases of ways in which  television watching had a significant negative impact and wanted to address those concerns however she failed to relate it to society as a whole.  When discussing "the quality of life" the author presents an interview that she had with a teacher in an effort to support her argument, this teacher explained that there was a child in her class that was isolated, the teacher continues to explain that upon enquiring she found out that the child watches television after school while her mother makes dinner.  Winn and the teacher were quick to make the assumption that this child's isolation was due to her  watching television while her mother prepared dinner, they both failed to explore other factors as to why this child was isolated, instead they chose to blame television.  Throughout the article Winn constantly bashed on television watching for the destruction of what once was family life, children being children, partaking in activities, family time being ruined.  Not once did she mention that in every situation their was an adult that could have changed this, not once did she mention that watching television during dinner or on a Saturday instead of going to the park was a choice, instead she formulated her argument to make it seem that it was a written law that these families were forced into watching television.  She failed to mention that someone could have easily gotten up, turned off the television and kept their family time and communication amongst each other.  While I do agree that television could possibly ruin communication amongst family and we do spend a lot of time discussing our favorite shows I cannot agree with Winn's argument that television is solely responsible for the breakdown in communication within families as well as for the diminishing amount of time children spend being active because I believe that the amount of time families spend together along with how they interact is a matter of choice and is determined by self control.