People that Say they don't watch TV

[Aquarius1234]

OMG so annoying. Esp those that lie.
You do watch TV so stop making out you spend all evening not looking at a screen!
Or those that say they never watch movies or go cinema. You then find out they go twice a year.
Watching sport or netflix counts as watching tv regardless if you watch it on your laptop or not.

Haha! Brilliant post, I totally agree. It's bollocks!

I don’t watch tv. Sports, news, nothing. I check news websites briefly for the headlines and read articles but that’s not watching tv. I read books. Especially at night in bed.

Growing up, large family, there was always a tv on which bothered me. I felt that no tv should be turned on before 6 or 7 o’clock, after dinner. I don’t know where I got that idea but I have held that view since I was a little kid. When we’d get home from school there would always be sitcoms on which I hated. The only shows I liked were Star Trek and Andy Griffith. Haven’t seen those in years. I watch movies rarely and that wouldn’t be fair to accuse me of watching tv because I hardly ever. People who watch tv regularly are tv watchers, very simple. Has someone accused you of wasting all your time watching tv? Is that why you’re angry and accusing everyone of being tv watchers?

Oh god was it the same OP?

Yes. Unless you’re screening it onto the ceiling I suppose.

What ‘people’? This seems very specific.

I can’t think when I last watched anything on TV. It’s sometimes on at friends’ houses when we go round or maybe we’ll go with the intention of watching a movie etc.

We don’t have a TV or any of the streaming services, but it’s amazing to me how many people find that hard to believe.

As pp have mentioned, I work at a laptop screen all day and therefore try to make a concerted effort to reduce reading screens in the evenings.
I’ve plenty of other preferable hobbies.

I tend to listen to radio or podcasts when I’m at work, and read the news headlines when I get to my desk each morning in an effort to keep a handle on current affairs.

After 12 years with a husband who couldnt be in the house without the TV being on and would literally put any old shit on rather than not watch something, I love not owning a TV. The kids dont watch it on their phones, although they do watch Youtube shite about minecraft and pokemon! (Yes I do monitor). We made an agreement about TV time and I said that my choice in my time was to switch it off as I get sensory overload. He got really pissed off and said that surely he coul dhave my time then and didnt understand that it was an active choice. He then just ignored me and put it on and told me if I didnt like it I could fuck off. This paled into insignificance to his other abuse so I dont think I even registered it.

I listen to audio books and plays and knit or I do zoom quizzes a LOT (recommend MB quizzes if anyone else is into that) but I have noticed that my lack of a TV means my quiz performance is suffering!

I do watch a couple of specific shows but luckily they are both BBC so I wait until all the episodes are on iPlayer and then watch them at my mothers over a couple of days, hate having to wait a whole year for a new series of Ghosts!

I don't think I've been to the cinema since before I had DC. It's not something I enjoy and I don't particularly enjoy films. Sometimes I sit with DH if there's a film he wants to watch at home and I'll read or scroll my phone.
Why would it bother you OP if I said I don't like films or go to the cinema?

We didn’t have a TV for many years (not for ideological reasons- it stopped working and I couldn’t afford a replacement. We eventually got used to not having one. My DCs were voracious readers.).

However, DCs did see tv at their dad’s (one weekend a month - not often!). We were at a friends house for dinner and their tv was on in the background. Isaac Hayes was doing the voiceover. As one, both DCs piped up - “that’s the man from Southpark!” Everybody’s head spun round and said to me in chorus “Thought you didn’t have a telly?!” Meanwhile I’m thinking “What arsehole lets under tens watch Southpark?” 😂

I watch maybe 3 hours a week if averaged out over the year. I'm sitting in my living room now and the TV isn't on.

I rarely watch tv, last time I watched tv was in November for a specific series.
I haven’t sat and watched tv/laptop or any other device since.
Is that allowed or no??

Ooo this is me - really haven’t watched much telly for years apart from the very odd series that grabs me (Ghosts & State of the Union had me hook line & sinker). But then, oh dear🙈…. Kids wanted to watch Enola Holmes so I subscribed to Netflix for a month…. Now watch an hour an evening and am loving it😂

Hilarious! Yes I have friends who don’t own a tv and “don’t watch television” but who absolutely watch their sport on a laptop in the living room.

also i find the people who say “i read” say it with such pomposity as to be like, i do highbrow downtime, despite the fact there is just as much a spectrum of high and low quality reading as there is television. I have marvelled at the adaptation of His Dark Materials on BBC and The Witcher on Netflix - it’s been a delight to me as a book reader AND tv watcher

Did you post this by telepathy then?

Just thinking about the cinema.......last time I went was with ex who moaned and moaned about going so went to see Hot Fuzz and there was a fire alarm and we spent an hour in the car park and then they started the film back up before we all went back in. I said that I had willed it and he never asked me again! Before that was to see Chicago with my sister because it was her birthday and she really wanted to see it.

HATE the cinema. Dont mind the odd film although I cant remember the last one I watched, but the idea of spending £££ to sit with other people in a room where I cant talk, fart, pause the film for a drink, wee, whatever.......when I could wait a couple of months and buy the DVD/download and do all of the above whilst watching it as often as I want with no further cost!

Since when has a phone been a television?

Well.. you watch TV then.

And as for a DVD (do you actually watch dvds or Netflix? Even the word DVD seems ancient) you're still watching the film, on the TV. So you're watching TV.

How're you not watching the telly? When you say you know what you want to watch and when, do you close your eyes while it's on, so you're not actually watching it?

Not sure what to make of this really OP.

I'm mid 30's and don't have a TV or TV licence (through choice), I think it's been about 5 years now since we've had one in the house at all. Equally I don't really tell anyone that, and can't see why anyone would feel the need. The impression I get is that that's a bit weird, and I'd likely not get a very positive response if I disclosed it.

I've never been overly interested in TV and don't watch films so it makes for some awkward social encounters as I've not seen practically anything that anyone seems to regard as 'essential' viewing or a 'cult classic' etc. I just don't care for it and am generally not overly intrigued or impressed when I have seen things when I was younger or inflicted on me at others houses etc.

In terms of screen time I spend a lot of time on my computer WFH and general research or reading online and do happily watch short form content (vlogs, travel vlogs, short videos relating to interests I have) on youtube when I'm getting ready in the morning or I'll watch one at night before bed so certainly wouldn't consider myself above technology, and if other people enjoy TV then I also can't see an issue with that either. It shouldn't be the case that other people need to validate our life choices or not.

I don't even have a tv licence.
But I watch loads via streaming services🙈 (not live)

Should I therefore be able to claim I also don't watch tv? Aince I don't even need tv licence

In the last 12 months I've watched one documentary and a three part drama series. I don't think it makes me superior in anyway, my hobbies just don't involve the TV.

The last time I went to the cinema was in 2016.

Why on earth would that bother you but be annoyed if you want to, I'm not going to watch more TV to please you.

What if you’re asleep during some of that time is that still counted? Is it averaged over a period of time, like over a month or a year? Is there someone that we need to report a status change to?

What about those times when you’re in a room and the tv is on but you’re not paying attention?

So many questions!

It used to really annoy me that DP turned the tv on every single evening, I found it really weird as I’ve always gone weeks at a time without watching tv because I had lots of other things to be getting on with.

It’s worked out well for me though because I got chronically ill a few years ago and it meant that I had a decades worth of tv shows to experience😂

My TV has not been switched on in 3 years at least. I know this because it hasn't been switched on since before lockdown. I dust it and so it has become my most expensive ornament.

I watch DVDs on my laptop. That is a computer, not a television.

We have Sky, Netflix and Amazon. My DH watches programmes on each streaming service although I definitely wouldn't watch 90 mins of tv a week, will watch a film the odd time with DH. Feel quite left out when everyone in work is talking about what the latest Netflix craze is 🤣 I could happily live without a tv - so long as I have Spotify.