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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

We don't have a TV in our living room anymore. AIBU?

184 replies

mrsm43s · 08/06/2018 23:26

So many people think its weird!

We have plenty of tvs in the house! Our bedroom, upstairs spare room, plus everyone has a tablet or a phone or a laptop or some other way of watching TV if they want to.

We don't have a tv downstairs.

AIBU to think that the days of everyone round the telebox to watch mindless crap are over?

TV itself is fine, but its OK to not make it the centre of your life and family!

OP posts:
junebirthdaygirl · 09/06/2018 07:44

No tv in any bedrooms here. Older dc in early 20s watch tv with us in in living room; sport quizzes and they suggest movies to us which we all watch together. They get us to record stuff when away so we can all watch it when they come home at odd weekends. I'm not a big tv person but it brings us together especially in the winter. We rarely turn it on in Summer.

BasinHaircut · 09/06/2018 07:45

When people boast they don’t have, or don’t watch TV, but then say they watch stuff on iplayer/Netflix etc through an alternative device it really makes me laugh.

You don’t gain IQ points for not having an actual telly, and Netflix is full of as much drivel as itv2!

MrsExpo · 09/06/2018 07:45

We don’t have a tv in our living room, but that’s because it’s a shrine to DHs hi-fi system .... think huge boxes of stuff on a large stand, with massive speakers on either side (drives me crazy - but that’s a whole other thread!). He has a huge tv in our smallest bedroom used almost exclusively for watching sport and I watch my own stuff either on my lap top or my tablet. I watch so little tv that this arrangement works for me. I can go literally weeks without watching anything at all, so no point in dedicating to biggest room in our house to such a minority activity. I have banned tv from our bedroom or I’d just end up enduring yet more footy (or mindless crap, as I prefer to call it) in bed. YANBU OP, tv doesn’t need to rule your life.

cariadlet · 09/06/2018 07:51

I like having a tv in the lounge.

I won't have a tv in the bedrooms, because they're for sleeping. I do have tv and films on my tablet, but watching on a tablet is pretty solitary so I only do that at the gym or when I'm on a train/plane.

I think it's nice to watch tv as a family. In an ideal world I'd probably have it turned off a bit more and do something a bit more sociable together, but at least we're in the same room as each other!

nervousnails · 09/06/2018 07:56

We got rid of ours when we moved and I have a super comfy armchair and a nice lamp instead. I have read loads more, after I got rid of the telly. We still have one in the kitchen and the bedroom and it rarely gets used during the week.

adaline · 09/06/2018 07:56

Having no TV at all I could understand, but I find it a bit odd that you have them in bedrooms but not the living room. Don't you ever have a movie night as a family, or all sit and watch a boxset or sports match/event together?

FASH84 · 09/06/2018 07:58

We have one in the living room and after many years resisting , one in the bedroom. It's the little old one we had in the living room in our flat. I actually quite like it which in know is shameful here, we don't use it every day by I like snuggling up with DH to watch a film in bed. Of it was one or the other though I'd have it in a communal space. Don't you ever watch films together?

Undercoverbanana · 09/06/2018 07:59

No TV at all. Can’t stand how it dominates a room.

Waste of money, space and the dusting!!!!!!!

Just watch catch-up of anything that interests me on my iPad.

When I go to other people’s houses and the TV is droning on and on in the background and everyone is either gawping aimlessly at it or shouting over it, I often have to make an early escape.

LagunaBubbles · 09/06/2018 07:59

No I don't think the days of TVs are over regardless of how many other ways you can watch things. I watch TV in the living room myself and I watch it with my DH etc.. I don't want to sit and watch the programmes I like on a tablet or laptop in the living room.

LightAsTheBreeze · 09/06/2018 08:02

DS and I always used to watch TV together but there is no way on earth I could watch what DH watches, endless cycling on Eurosport, it all just looks the same and is so boring, there is hours of it. He finds all my box sets boring though so we watch separately, we still see each other though

oblada · 09/06/2018 08:05

I also prefer a single TV for everyone to enjoy than separate screens. When we watch TV it's usually together (me and DH) and the kids sometimes watch a movie or something at the week-end and they have to agree together on what to watch. I prefer that to be honest. The kids never watch any screen before school and it is very rare that they watch after school either as there is no time. Usually they will watch 1 movie at some point over the week-end.

Lethaldrizzle · 09/06/2018 08:06

We all watch tv as a family so love our tv in sitting room. Absolutely no tvs in bedrooms though

bakingdemon · 09/06/2018 08:06

I would never put a TV in any of the bedrooms in our house. We have the TV hidden in a smart cabinet so it doesn't dominate the room. I much prefer watching TV on a bigger screen than cramped on a little laptop or iPad.

Ohyesiam · 09/06/2018 08:11

I don’t have a tv in the sitting room, or any other room.i just do t have a tv, haven’t for years. Yanbu

Strugglingtodomybest · 09/06/2018 08:13

I don't think it's weird that you don't have a TV in your lounge, but I do think it's weird that you don't have a TV in your lounge whilst having them in the bedrooms. That's the opposite to us as I see watching TV as a sociable thing.

fleshmarketclose · 09/06/2018 08:17

We have a TV in the living room but I don't have one in the bedroom. The dc have TVs in their rooms though. Ds watches sport up there because his TV is bigger and better than the one downstairs. Dd doesn't watch TV at all (or netflix or any other streamed TV) and the TV in there is the one that was her sister's before she moved out two years ago and hasn't been switched on since. I like the TV although it's not big and obtrusive so wouldn't say it seems a feature in what is a pretty large room.

SerenDippitty · 09/06/2018 08:20

We have one (a big one sorry, but we love it!) one in the spare room and one in the garage which I watch DVDs on while exercising.

I don’t think all TV is mindless - we watch mostly films, drama series that we are invested in, as well as history programmes, wildlife and sport and the odd game show or comedy panel show. We never have it on for the sake of it.

ivykaty44 · 09/06/2018 08:20

I don’t have any TV 📺 if we want to watch something we do on computers

I’ve watched Australia google box this week, but to be honest haven’t seen anything else I want to view

WhaleofaThyme · 09/06/2018 08:20

but its OK to not make it the centre of your life and family! There's quite a view now that screen time for children should only be with parental supervision, particularly young children.

I personally think TVs in bedrooms, particularly children's bedrooms are bad for health - same goes for all screens. No children here yet, but I don't have screens in the bedroom. So much evidence on how bad it is for sleep health.

Also, no TV here.

TheFirstMrsDV · 09/06/2018 08:23

Oh I do love a MN telly thread.

LightAsTheBreeze · 09/06/2018 08:24

DH has one in the garage also so that he can watch while doing his cycling on his roller thing. we also have a 26" one in our touring caravan.

roundaboutthetown · 09/06/2018 08:26

Sorry, OP, but it's a bit weird to imply it is somehow morally superior to spend time in your bedroom watching mindless crap on your own while the rest of yourfamily watch mindless crap on other screens elsewhere... You might want to reconsider the way you phrased your comments!!! And not everything on TV is actually mindless crap, anyway, particularly if it fosters an interesting discussion with the people you watched the programme with!

LightAsTheBreeze · 09/06/2018 08:26

I like watching telly and can often be found on the TV addicts threads Grin

TheFirstMrsDV · 09/06/2018 08:26

Seren we have tvs in every room except the bathroom. I have a tiny one up in the loft Grin

I probably watch less tv than average. I prefer the radio. I do like to be able to watch tv wherever I want to in my own home.

I don't need to use tv ownership as a marker of low intellect, lack of familial cohesion or general chaviness.

Metoodear · 09/06/2018 08:26

I think it encourages everyone to sit separately in their rooms we have 1 tv in the house in the front room