To be annoyed by the smugness of some parents who have TV-free homes?

[marfisa]

A friend/colleague of mine boasted posted on her facebook (in connection with World Book Day) that her DC's imaginations "run free" because they have never been allowed to watch telly or play on games consoles. As a result (she says) they love to read! and they run round the house pretending to be ancient Egyptians!

It isn't the first time she has made comments like this and it always irks me. I have to refrain from posting a snarky response along the lines of, "My DS watches telly AND owns a Nintendo DS. Yet amazingly, his imagination still manages to run free!" In fact, we are a bookish household and he loves to read. Yet he has also been infatuated at various points with Ben10/Power Rangers/Dr Who/Club Penguin/Moshi Monsters/Pokemon and I see NOTHING wrong with this. How narrow-minded does a parent have to be in order to think that telly and computer games can't nourish a child's imagination as well? Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating UNLIMITED telly and gaming. I don't even have a problem with families not owning a TV (I know a number of families who don't, and I'm sure their DC are surviving just fine). I just think that fostering love of books is much more about having lots of books around than about banning TV and Nintendo altogether. And I'm sick of the implication that the more telly your DC watch, the less imagination they will have. Pop culture can be pretty damn amazing. If you want to restrict your kids' access to it, fine, but don't be all pretentious about it. Impersonating a Time Lord does not necessarily involve less imagination than impersonating an ancient Egyptian. end rant

"If you think that there aren't TV shows that are just as interesting and stimulating as books then I feel sorry for you"

Absolutely. People why say there is nothing worth watching on TV at all mustn't like: films, comedy, theatre, history, documentaries, news, dance, music, wildlife, sport, cooking etc. I have omitted soaps and reality TV shows because they aren't to my taste and know that a smug TV snob wouldn't deign to watch those anyway.

Like Feckless we didn't have a TV when we grew up and it was isolating when all the other children were talking about the latest episode of Doctor Who and I couldn't join in. My classmates thought my parents were weird for not having a TV. They finally relented when the teacher told them that she thought we were deprived because we didn't have a TV, so we got one when I was in my last year at primary school.

I can understand why people might not bother with a TV when you can watch most programmes on the computer, but I don't like the smug superiority some people display about watching TV.

I haven't read through all the thread, but YANBU. There's something particularly grating about the non-TV watchers. Most of the ones I know seem to spend more time watching DVDs/iPlayer on laptops than I spend watching the box and using my computer combined. And they Skype people in the same house, and seem to own every single games console going. Grrr!

YANUB, it annoys me too. TV is great, why shouldn't children enjoy it too.

I won't let ds have a tv in his room when he gets older though. I like it on in the front room.
My dad, and my Nana, always had the TV on, all day, and it was just background really. No-one was really watching it, except to say something like "Ooh what's Carol Vorderman wearing?" every now and again.
I think telly is more social than laptop-watching.

I don't have a TV, haven't for years, and really don't understand why people get so exercised about this. It's a big like the malice which vegetarians get....

It's a personal choice, some people will be twattish about it, get over it. Really.

I don't have one because I get in from work/ gym at about 8 on a night and am knackered, and I know if I did I'd crash in front of it and not doing the washing up/ the work I'd brought home/ whatever. Plus I just don't enjoy watching tv that much. Sometimes watch things on iPlayer, but I'd say about once a month. More often boxset DVDs, but again, not since before Christmas, so not that often.

Why does this rile people??

I have no problem with people who live TV-free - none at all.

But I do get very irritated by people who boast about their lifestyle / lifestyle choices all over the internet.

So YANBU.

i have no problem with people choosing not to have a telly.
but the smuggery of it all makes me want to take my own telly, and shove it up their twatty arses.
especially as a good portion of those who think this makes them morally superior still watch DVDs/iplayer.
I bloody love telly.

YANBU. If people don't want a TV then absolutely fine, their choice and their business. But it is ridiculously smug and misguided to suggest that the absence of the TV will make their children more imaginitive or bookish. I think the key thing to instilling a love of books is having loads of them around, reading to your child and your child seeing that you enjoy reading too.

The only sticking point for me was no TV in the bedrooms. DD could watch TV at certain other times of the day but when she was in her room, either bedtime or early morning, she either read or played with her toys. She is a massive bookworm and, as a small child, created all kinds of stories and imaginitive adventures with her toys which I then had to clear up

I remember BIL bought his 4yo DD a portable TV with built in DVD for her bedroom and explained how great it was because they could put her to bed and she would just lie there and watch her films until she went to sleep. But they never read her a bedtime story nor did she read much to herself when she was older. That wouldn't do for me.

Ahhhhhhhhh Deadly 60 - educational for my DS. I get to perv watch Steve Backshall. Everyone's happy.

Go tell her to grind her own wheat, ferment a yoghurt and change her hair shirt for Spring.

We had friends like this.They bragged about being a no TV house but their kids were watching DVDs on a laptop the whole time we were there inches from the screen.

I think screen time is screen time,none of it is superior and all of it can have good points if used for a small period of time.I think you need to limit screen time but it all comes under a big umbrella.

The op's friends kids sound exactly like my dc however mine watch CBBC after school and are allowed DSs at the weekend for an hour or so.

I think kids not exposed to any screens(if such kids truly exist) are missing out massively.There are some amazing TV programs out there for kids and DSs have some fantastic games.My 3 have amazing imaginations and I think TV and the console time they've had have added to it

I don't think watching a bit of TV and having some monitored DS time is any worse than surfing the net on crappy sites or playing with a phone or ipad.

Ps you can tell your friend my 3(8 and & &) were all free readers by the end of rec and devour piles of paperbacks weekly!

Yanbu to be annoyed by the smugness. This thread's bloody great. Really funny.

There's no reason for posting that comment on her FB other than to make us mere mortals feel inadequate lol. I already do, I don't need the tv guilt trip too, hehe.

My friend was raised without a tv. Instead she learned how to knit, sew, dye fabrics, she learned several foreign languages, cooked,designed jewellery (as she got older). She and her parents were bordering on self sufficient before her mum got ill and she has the most amazing array of practical skills as a result of that. Imaginitively she designs and makes knives, she designs and tailors clothes, she made her own wedding dress, corset, cake and gubbins. She is utterly amazing and my chin hits the floor whenever I speak to her (which hasn't been for a while now as I've been antisocial busy.

Having seen all this, I still chose to let my child watch tv. Well...you can have too much of a good thing, can't you???

I really don't understand why people fret about what others do in their parenting? Why bother? You do it a different way - great. It truly baffles me that where there is no real issue, somebody sees fit to find one.

YANBU, because she does seem pretty smug. I'm sure that has nothing to do with not having a TV though. I'm not surprised at the negative attitudes on this thread in general though. TV is a social norm so by definition those that don't own one would be seen as abnormal. Recently, as suggested by others, the rise of streaming has meant that not owning a TV does not define viewing habits. I currently watch about an hour of TV a month, plus a couple of films. When DD is older, I'm certain that will increase. But in our house we predominantly read, listen to music and (in my wifes case) do arty stuff, so I expect the bias towards those things will remain. Different strokes for different folks is all.

YANBU
My DCs watch tv, play Xbox and play station, have iPods

They have imaginations, I think??
I watch eastenders!
We watch the odd film, DS loves national geographic channel, dd loves TOWIE

My neighbors kids watch no tv, however they watch about 4 hours of kids programs on pc :)

I congratulate people who don't have a tv, but I couldn't be one of them, I like the peace and quiet

Why so defensive?
If people don't want their DC to watch TV then good on them. I don't mind but I'm sure I do allow, don't allow all sorts of things some inside and some that are outside the norm. As long as I have thought them through as opposed to just doing somehting because everyone else is (never was there a worse reason to do anything) then there's no reason to worry.

As has been pointed out above. though, just don't be smug about it. Now excuse me while I watch News at Ten.

Hate all Facebook smugness post full stop. You would only post such a comment if you were feeling smug and pleased with yourself and wanted to share this with all your 'friends' so they could 'like' and then you would feel even more smug and pleased.

My mum was one of these people we had no tv and no computer games. I am no more cultured or intelligent than the next person although I did fight with my brother more and my mother seemed to shout a lot

Haha no TV but many hours playing Farmville on FB, probably in between watching stuff on iPlayer!

As a result (she says) they love to read! and they run round the house pretending to be ancient Egyptians!

Well there we go. We have a telly and mine run round the house pretending to be Vandals.

But then they also know who Belisarius was, 'cos it was on Telly.....

Well, the upshot of all this is that my TV-less friend and I have made Different But Equally Valid parenting choices. However, I can feel justifiably smug, because she has committed the unforgivable sin of being smug about her parenting choices in public on the internet, whereas I have not.

Oh wait.

We had friends who were unbearably smug about not having a tv in their house etc, and yet, whenever they came to visit us they sat them selves down in front of ours and glued themselves to it. Also, no computer games etc and yet, when invited for dinner, the husband ensconced himself in front of our then seven year old DS's PS2, and made no contribution to the conversation at all after eating us out of house and home.
They're not our friends any more.

YANBU to be annoyed at how smug she is although we all have her own way of doing the child rearing thing , I wonder how long she spends on facebook and her children run round the house cos she is too busy being smug on the internet ,

Bennifer Wed 29-Feb-12 11:10:55
"I'm suspicious of people who don't watch TV in the same way I'm suspicious of people who don't read books"

In my family we'd be suspicious of anyone who didn't sail a boat. Have known other families where they are suspicious of anyone who doesn't own a pet.

At the end of the day, they are just things you do. Positive things, but not the one and only positive option. Like cream cake. Noone can deny it's nice, but so are chocolate truffles.